Lowell Cohn: Dismantling of A’s a vicious cycle

The Oakland A’s dismantled the dismantle. That’s how screwed up they are.

In 2014, they traded Josh Donaldson, a future MVP, to Toronto for third baseman Brett Lawrie and other players including pitcher Kendall Graveman. But Lawrie was the centerpiece of the trade, such as it was. It’s just that in the most recent offseason, in something of a stealth move, they traded Lawrie to the White Sox for two guys. The guys have names. Zack Erwin and Jeffrey Wendleken. Be still my heart.

So after the A’s dismantled the team by trading away Donaldson - not to mention Yoenis Cespedes - they dismantled the dismantle by unloading Lawrie after just one season in Oakland. They also got rid of Ike Davis, if you’re keeping score. The A’s specialize in dismantling and then in dismantling the dismantle. I credit Billy Beane for this novel innovation because he is a genius.

In 2014, the A’s were very good, were for a while the hottest team in baseball until they took themselves off the map via the dismantle route. They had a fabulous run differential after which they weren’t so good and didn’t have a fabulous run differential.

For a while, they were a team to reckon with and they stole the play from the San Francisco Giants until they weren’t a team to reckon with and didn’t steal the play from the San Francisco Giants. The A’s fell victim to the Great Dismantle of 2014 - you can read about it in the history books along with the Decline of Western Civilization as We Knew It.

After a miserable 2015 season - don’t bother to read about it, way too depressing - well, after a miserable 2015, the A’s have to show they are respectable. Of course, this means winning lots of games. Can they? But it also means acting professional. Being serious. Fielding a serious team. Keeping serious players. Being a serious organization. They need to show they’re a serious big-league team.

Instead of a baseball trading association. So many mornings, I wake up and see a notification in my inbox the A’s acquired some player on waivers or in a trade, some player no one ever heard of except his mom and dad. And fans and media are supposed to take this seriously.

Certain teams are top-of-the roster traders - like the Giants. The A’s generally are bottom-of-the roster traders. They pick up bits and pieces - so to speak - to fill out the 24th and 25th spots. Do this constantly. Guys come into town and guys go out of town. Again and again. I have visions of Beane flipping baseball cards against some wall in East Oakland, picking up guys here and there. As easy as that. And as irrelevant.

And, yes, I know the A’s got outfielder Khris Davis, a promising pickup, and they have some good hitters - Josh Reddick, Stephen Vogt. And Danny Valencia, maybe. And, yes, Billy Burns may be a comer. And they have a good bullpen and at least one great starting pitcher - Sonny Gray. Except that a rotation consists of more than one starter.

There are some interesting twists on the roster. They reacquired Jed Lowrie, who used to be a shortstop but now is a second baseman. So, get this, Lowrie was part of a dismantle and now he’s part of a remantle. I’m out of breath just keeping up with all the mantling.

And, to their detriment, the A’s still have Billy Butler, one of the worst free-agent signings in the history of bad free-agent signings. They owe him a cool $20 million over the next two years. If a player ever needed to get dismantled in the trading sense - bad player, bad attitude - Butler is the guy.

And then there’s Beane himself. Is he even interested anymore?

As far as I can tell, he’s stepped back a few inches from his day-to-day brilliant stewardship of the A’s. I mean, who in his right mind would take credit for THAT?

He seems to be approaching figurehead status as general manager or whatever he is - genius in residence? At various intervals, he imparts knowledge to the media and gives speeches to whomever and waters his lawn a lot. And he’s handed off much of the GM burden to what’s-his-name, David Forst, who may be a very nice man, who may become a name in his own right. Nice idea to make it a good name.

The A’s have so much to prove, so much respect and credibility and goodwill to regain. To fight for. They owe a good team to fans and, frankly, to manager Bob Melvin, one of the best in the business. Melvin managing the A’s with all the comings and goings of personnel, with all the intrusion from the front office with their mathematical formulas of baseball, is like telling Michael Tilson Thomas to conduct a high-school band.

For the time being, the A’s are done dismantling, remantling and just plain mantling. Now they need to play and play well. If they don’t, what’s the point?

For more on the world of sports in general and the Bay Area in particular, go to the Cohn Zohn at cohn.blogs.pressdemocrat.com. You can reach Staff Columnist Lowell Cohn at lowell.cohn@pressdemocrat.com.