![]() ![]() Nobody in Oakland Athletics history has hit more doubles in a season than Jed Lowrie. In 2017, he hit 20% better than league average and was second in the league with 49 doubles, breaking Jason Giambi’s Oakland A’s record. Over the next two seasons, he reached a higher level offensively and put up back-to-back All-Star caliber seasons. Now stationing himself at second base with a bit more age on his legs and Marcus Semien growing into the shortstop position, it seemed like the 32-year-old’s best days were way behind him.īut somehow, every time he gets counted out, Lowrie comes back with another gear - typically gear that’s colored green and gold. His first season back in 2016 was a bit of a write-off. The team pulled the plug on the Lowrie experiment once again just one year into his contract and sent him back to Oakland, this time for a relief prospect you’ve probably never heard of, Brendan McCurry.Īs the A’s were still figuring out the identity of their next team, they brought Lowrie back to hopefully recapture his 2013 form and mentor the young players coming up through their system. In the first season of that contract, the Astros were hoping to get the new Oakland version of Lowrie but instead got the middling, injury-prone version that they traded away the first time. He ended up being rewarded for a couple of solid years and returned to Houston on a 3 year, $23 million contract. It was time for Lowrie to find another team in free agency and for the A’s to start building its next core. Suffice it to say, the team fell short once again in its quest for a World Series title. The A’s lost their division lead late in the 2014 season but secured a wild-card spot and. Never being known for having exceptional range or arm strength, Lowrie always relied on a rockbed of sound fundamentals to stick around in the middle infield. However, he did improve defensively to being passable at shortstop after putting up -1.1 dWAR in 2013. The following season, Lowrie stayed mostly healthy again but experienced a dip in his offensive performance. And of course, he hit a signature 45 doubles, helping the still underrated A’s secure a second consecutive division title. Not only did Lowrie stay healthy the whole 2013 season, playing a whopping 154 games, he broke out by putting up a. ![]() Injuries and inconsistent play led the Sox to cut bait and trade him in a two-player package for burgeoning Houston Astros closer Mark Melancon.Īfter a solid season with an awful Houston team, the A’s took a chance on the former top prospect, hoping he’d find more fortune in the Oakland Coliseum. He made his major league debut with the team on April 15 that year, two days before his 24th birthday, and had a few bumpy seasons. ![]() It seemed like a good pick after Lowrie hit his way into a couple national top 100 prospect lists in 2008. Going back to the 2005 MLB Draft, the Boston Red Sox selected him with the 45th overall pick. I don’t know how many front offices would’ve drawn up this trade, but most front offices aren’t Billy Beane and David Forst, who clearly saw something in Lowrie the two teams that had given up on him didn’t. Trading a potential All-Star, a top pitching prospect, and a young catcher for a shortstop who’d never played a full season before wasn’t the most straightforward win-now move. Following years of questions about his ability to hit major league pitching, Carter hit 16 homeruns in just 67 games with a 139 OPS+, perhaps a precursor to an All-Star career. This included Brad Peacock and Max Stassi - #3 and #19 in the system at the time - as well as a substantial contributor to their 2012 playoff run, first baseman Chris Carter. The move was not only a gamble because of Lowrie’s unproven and inconsistent track record, there was also ample risk in trading away three talented young players. Looking to get back to the playoffs and bolster their chances of advancing, the A’s took a decent-sized gamble on Lowrie, a 28-year-old switch-hitting shortstop who never fully put it together at the major league level. The A’s had just fallen to the Detroit Tigers in the ALDS after clinching the AL West division for the first time since 2006. Speaking of 2012, it was just five months after the end of that season that the team traded for Lowrie. JED LOWRIE - 12.9 - Sad A’s Fan March 23, 2023 Top 5 in Oakland A's WAR since 2013 (via Fangraphs):ĥ. ![]()
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