Quote:lol lineup protection, that's a myth.


So youre telling me the only thing that separates Oakland from being the worst team in baseball is Cespedes? Did you even read the article I posted.


Everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. Gray and Kazmir pitched like crap. Donaldson, Moss, Norris, and Crisp hit like crap. Doolittle missed some time and the rest of the bullpen struggled. Lowrie got hurt. Jaso got hurt. Beane never fixed that blackhole at 2B.


Cespedes was a good hitter, but they had more than enough bats to make up for it.

 

Maybe the loss of Cespedes had everyone else pressing too much to try and make up for it. Maybe that factored into it. But no.....you don't see that aspect. 

 

Cespedes loss from that lineup was the main reason for their collapse. You can choose to ignore this if you wish. 

 

Not saying they'd have won it all with Cespedes, but I don't see them falling completely out of the playoffs like they did without Cespedes. 

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