The Oakland A's announced some roster moves Friday morning, though none of them were unexpected. The goal of the moves was to get left-handed pitcher Eric Surkamp on the team so that he can start Friday evening against the Seattle Mariners.
In order to bring up Surkamp, two things had to happen. First, he needed to be added to the 40-man roster, which meant that someone else had to be removed to clear space. That someone turned out to be R.J. Alvarez, who was shifted to the 60-day DL while he recovers from surgery to remove bone chips from his elbow.