In Oakland, the offseason has been predictably slow. With a team seemingly out of contention, a free agent class that lacks depth and firepower, and a league asking increasingly high rates for star players, the A’s just aren’t in the market for big moves. It’s a large departure from seasons past, a welcome respite for some but a boring stretch of baseball-less time for others.
If you fall into the latter category, take a few minutes to pretend to be a Mariners fan. Since arriving in Seattle at the end of the 2015 season, Jerry Dipoto has done his best Billy Beane, trading 31 out of the 40 men on the Mariner’s roster, reshaping a team that has had some of the worst luck in the sport.