Gelof My Cloud

 

I said going into this season that if Zack Gelof went about 2026 the same way he went about the last few seasons [hitting .210 and getting hurt], it'd be a one way ticket to Colorado. So he must have heard me, cause he used an injury to Max Muncy to become an everyday third baseman and is hitting incredibly well, with an .833 OPS, a .282 average, 11 homers and 29 RBIs. After so many years of being the 'and the rest' portion of the young A's core, Gelof finally has something to say. Now...preferably it'd be happening for a non-4th place A's team, but they can get there.

I knew they wouldn't be a 1st place team forever, and they were really just one rough stretch away from where they usually are, and sure enough that's the case. They had a tricky end of the month schedule, they didn't find an upper hand barring more Kurtz homers, and now they're 41-49, trying to get back above the Astros. 

The good news is that, as this was already the fullest vision of this A's team going into the season, it's gotten even fuller as we've gone on. Here's what the A's train has gained as we've embarked on another campaign: Henry Bolte, a working centerfield bat with great defense, Gelof becoming an everyday infielder, J.T. Ginn reaching ace status, Gage Jump finding his footing in the bigs [despite a rough go of things last night against the Marlins], Jonah Heim as a kickass backup catcher, and the rise of Joshua Kuroda-Grauer, from New Brunswick, who's looking to take over for Jeff McNeil going forward, and is hitting enough to potentially unseat McNeil soon. We already established the baseline pieces of this team [Kurtz, Wilson, Butler, Rooker, Soderstrom, Langeliers], but now we're filling things out and adding some pitching mainstays, which is very helpful.

Now...of course this is the exact moment that some of the baseline pieces start going down. Brent Rooker's out for the season, which has to smart. Tyler Soderstrom's out for a few more weeks, despite a really nice June. Wilson's once again hurt, meaning Muncy's gotta cover short. Denzel Clarke is still out, hence Bolte. It's not all insurmountable, there's enough guys like Carlos Cortes, Colby Thomas and Alika Williams who can cover those positions while not just being replacement-level. But seeing the rest of this season without Rooker is pretty tough. It's also not helping that Lawrence Butler still hasn't found his groove, he's hitting .202 with only 5 homers. Granted, his whole thing is catching fire after the all-star break, but is that sustainable??

The back half of the rotation still worries me, as does the 3.75 ERA the bullpen's been sporting. But this is a better A's team than we've seen, and there's still room to be potentially good this year, even if they're not able, with the pitching, to truly go deep yet. Getting Zack Gelof in place is a very big thing though, and won't go unnoticed.

Coming Tonight: Extremely weird that this guy's stayed in one place for 10 years, and is still pretty elite.