Eric Chavez (Remember Him?) Having Surgery Again

Every time Eric Chavez sees his name in a headline, it is usually on top of a story that throws a little more dirt on what was his career.

The A's former third baseman is going to have another microdisectomy on his back on June 23 in Los Angeles. This news comes a few weeks after Chavez said that he would not be able to continue playing if he had another back surgery.

Apparently, the A's are not so pessimistic. Their story now is that this surgery, which will be Chavez's fifth since September 2007, by the way, will have Chavez ready to go next spring.

And we're supposed to believe that because ... ?

In case you hadn't given up on Chavez's career already, I think it's pretty safe to give up on him now. Back surgeries are nasty things to begin with. Anyone who has had back trouble can tell you that you are never 100 percent healed.

For Chavez, this is going to be his third back procedure. Oh, he's also got a pretty torn up right shoulder, which made it no certain thing that he'd be able to return to play third, even if his back miraculously healed.

Whenever this sort of news surfaces about Chavez, there is plenty of talk about how badly GM Billy Beane screwed up when he chose to let Miguel Tejada go and give Chavez the $66 million contract. Although it looks that way in retrospect, I've never bought it. At the time, it absolutely looked the right decision to keep Chavez instead of Tejada.

• Chavez was younger (by his listed age, even more so when Tejada's true age came out later).

• Chavez was more consistent. At the time the deal was signed, he had come off four consecutive seasons with at least 26 homers, and three in a row with more than 100 RBI. He'd also won three consecutive Gold Gloves.

• Chavez was harder to replace. The A's had Bobby Crosby ready to step in at shortstop, but no one to play third. (Yeah, Crosby doesn't look too great either, but he was a first-round pick, a top prospect, and he'd go on to win Rookie of the Year in 2004.)

• Finally, Chavez ended up signing for less than Tejada in the first place. Tejada got $72 million from the Orioles.

Now that Tejada is still playing and Chavez is likely to have played his final game in the big leagues, it certainly doesn't look like the right choice, but there was no way to predict what happened.