The A's Aren't Done Yet

For most teams, trading away their best pitcher an their best hitter for ten prospects would be enough moves for one offseason. Most teams are not the Oakland A's. On Friday, they signed former Pirate and Royal Emil Brown to help fill the void in the outfield created by the Nick Swisher trade. That immediately sparked rumors that the A's were looking to send Mark Kotsay to the Braves. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, team president David Forst won't deny those rumors and Kotsay sounds pretty excited about it:

"There's nothing official," Kotsay emphasized. "But there is a possibility. And I've always liked to play against Bobby Cox, I have a lot of respect for him as a manager. He's got a competitive club day in and day out. If I'm going to be traded, Atlanta is a good situation."

[...]

"Obviously, the direction of the A's is that they're in transition," he said. "Sometimes, that's a difficult place to be for an older player. But that's not to say the A's aren't going to win - they still have a quality group there and they've just gone out and acquired a lot of talent. If that talent pans out, they're going to be good, and you can't put a timetable on talent. It could be sooner than people think."

The A's target is rumored to be Joey Devine, a 24-year old reliever who dominated at AA and AAA last year with a 1.89 ERA, a 1.05 WHIP, and a crazy 78 strikeouts in 58 innings. He's struggled in the majors (22 walks in 19 and 2/3 big league innings from 2005-2007), but he's still got a pretty high ceiling as a big league reliever. Would this trade satiate Billy Beane's rebuilding hunger or will he keep going? Only time will tell.

Via Rotoworld