Major League Baseball has no idea what it's doing with the A's

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It’s been sixteen months since Bud Selig announced the formation of a committee to study the Athletics’ stadium situation. Despite the fact that a focused task force could probably thoroughly analyze the situation and publish a glossy report on the matter in the space of a week with time left over for a happy hour on Friday, there is still no report from Bud’s experts. And no hint of when one will come out.

This has irked San Jose mayor Chuck Reed, who has wanted to put a stadium proposal on the fall ballot. Major League Baseball has told him not to, however, probably for fear that it will destroy the delicate alchemy in which Bud’s committee is engaged. Break their vacuum tubes and slide rules and whatnot.

Last week Reed said “screw it,” and announced that this fall’s ballot will have the stadium measure. Yesterday Major League Baseball’s Bob DuPuy told Reed that baseball would pay for the campaign.  To sum up:

  • Bud Selig’s college roommate/A’s owner Lew Wolf has repeatedly slammed Oakland and has said he wants to go to San Jose; and
  • San Jose’s mayor wants the A’s; and
  • Major League Baseball is going to fund the campaign for the ballot measure that will make moving the A’s to San Jose possible; but
  • Major League Baseball won’t simply say that the A’s are going to San Jose.

I imagine the reason for that last part is that baseball is afraid of the Giants’ territorial claim, but everything else they’re doing is consistent with baseball’s interest in disregarding it. Which they should do, because carving up the nation in arbitrary territories is stupid, anti-competitive and, in the long run, bad for business.  We know it would be outrageously difficult for a third team to relocate to New York now, but if it had happened 20 years ago as the stadium and RSN boom was getting underway, they’d be swimming in it now.

Grow a pair, Bud. Call the Giants on their bluff. If it gets ugly, it gets ugly, but the most you have to lose is an archaic system that is going to prevent your successor from helping baseball propel itself into the 21st century.

Yanks pitcher Severino has lat strain, likely to start on IL

severino injury
Dave Nelson/USA TODAY Sports
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The New York Yankees could be opening the season without three-fifths of their projected starting rotation.

Right-hander Luis Severino has a low-grade lat strain, Yankees manager Aaron Boone told reporters Saturday, putting the two-time All-Star at risk of starting the season on the injured list.

“Obviously it’s going to put him in jeopardy to start the year,” Boone said.

Boone expressed optimism this wouldn’t be a long-term issue but acknowledged that Severino “most likely” would get placed on the injured list.

Severino, 29, went 7-3 with a 3.18 ERA in 19 starts last season. He struck out 112 in 102 innings.

Boone said the issue arose after Severino made his last start on Tuesday.

“Afterwards when he was kind of doing his workout, arm-care stuff, he just felt some tightness in there,” Boone said. “He came in the next day and it was a little tight, and then yesterday he was going to go out and throw and that tightness was still there enough to where he wanted to go get it looked at.”

The Yankees already won’t have right-hander Frankie Montas or left-hander Carlos Rodón for the start of the season.

Rodón, who joined the Yankees by signing a $162 million, six-year contract in the offseason, has a left forearm strain that will cause him to open the season on the injured list. Rodón has been an All-Star the last two seasons, in 2021 with the Chicago White Sox and in 2022 with the San Francisco Giants.

Montas is recovering from shoulder surgery and won’t begin throwing until at least late May.

The only projected starters from the Yankees’ rotation likely to be ready for the beginning of the season are five-time All-Star right-hander Gerrit Cole and 2022 All-Star left-hander Nestor Cortes.

DEGROM SHARP

Jacob deGrom struck out six over 3 2/3 shutout innings against the San Diego Padres in his final start before making his Texas Rangers regular-season debut.

The Rangers had announced Friday that deGrom would get the start Thursday when the Rangers open their season against Aaron Nola and the Philadelphia Phillies. The two-time Cy Young Award winner signed a five-year, $185 million contract with the Rangers in the offseason after spending nine seasons with the New York Mets.

GREINKE WORKS 5 1/3 INNINGS

Zack Greinke pitched 5 1/3 innings in his final test before he gets the ball against the Minnesota Twins in Kansas City on Thursday.

It will be Greinke’s seventh opening day start. At 39 years old, he will be the oldest opening-day starter in the history of the Royals franchise, breaking his own record set last year. He will be the the oldest opening day starter in the American League since a 40-year-old Curt Schilling started against the Royals in 2007.

Greinke allowed two runs on five hits against the Dodgers with no walks and two strikeouts.

“He was great today,” first-year manager Matt Quatraro said.“It certainly looked like the way they (Dodger batters) were taking those pitches, he was just dotting the plate on both sides. His two-seamer and changeup looked really good. It was encouraging.”

VOIT OPTS OUT

First baseman Luke Voit has opted out of his minor league deal with the Milwaukee Brewers, giving the veteran slugger the opportunity to negotiate with other teams. He also could still return to the Brewers on a major league contract.

In other Brewers news, right-hander Adrian Houser left his start Saturday after 1 2/3 innings due to groin tightness.