Happy Thanksgiving

Buster Olney reports that he believes David DeJesus has an arbitration gentlemen’s agreement in place, he writes,

“Arbitration gentlemen’s agreements likely in place with Aaron Harang, Jose Molina and David DeJesus — meaning they won’t accept.”

It hasn’t been entirely clear how the CBA effects this year’s free-agent crop, but Type-B free-agent DeJesus appears to still be considered a Type-B, unlike what I wrote yesterday where I thought the new system might be in place eliminating a chance of him being offered arbitration. He was offered arbitration (so was Josh Willingham) but it doesn’t seem like that means the A’s must be willing to offer him a $12.5M contract which one might think he very well may accept. This leaves me unsure of what to think of Willingham’s arbitration process (though I assume he declines regardless), I suppose it is on the back end that things have changed for this year (how and when the picks are distributed and where the compensation comes from – for example Willingham’s signing by another club will not result in that team forfeiting a pick).

That all said, the point of today’s post was to be a Thanksgiving one. While I was in college in the week leading up to Thanksgiving, when all we could care about was a nice long weekend and the upcoming Detroit Lions game (I went to college in Michigan) and accompanying parade, I would always make a list of things I was thankful for. The list wasn’t ever serious, it’d fill up countless notebook pages and include items like nuclear fallout; the Northwest WorldPerks Visa with a low introductory rate; the Iowa Corngrowers Association; and the like. In that same vein – though with much more brevity as that list would usually end in the 3,000′s range – I present the “What I am Thankful For from the 2011 Oakland A’s”:

1. Andy LaRoche‘s beard
2. Being able to borrow Trystan Magnuson from the Blue Jays
3. David Purcey‘s shoes
4. Josh Willingham‘s lack of right field souvenir offerings
5. A 1-2-3 inning from Brian Fuentes
6. Bud Selig
7. Another Opening Night with Seattle
8. Brett Anderson‘s starts against Texas
9. Trevor Cahill‘s starts against New York
10. Renewing the rivalry with the Diamondbacks
11. Renewing the rivalry with the Marlins
12. Gold jerseys
13. The call-up of Graham Godfrey
14. Bob Geren‘s firing
15. Josh Willingham being offered arbitration
16. David DeJesus smiling when he has just struck out – again
17. Mark Ellis netting us Bruce Billings
18. Kurt Suzuki‘s offline throws to second
19. Michael Wuertz‘ flat slider
20. Grant Balfour swearing loud enough for the CSNCalifornia audio to catch it
21. Gio Gonzalez melting down
22. Dibs
23. Jemile Weeks losing his helmet then sliding too late
24. Adam Rosales lapping other baserunners on HRs
25. Hideki Matsui‘s earlobes
26. Coco Crisp‘s fro
27. Daric Barton taking a close pitch
28. The question’s Jane Lee opts to answer in the mailbag
29. The question that someone sent Glen & Ray and the lack of forearm hair
30. Finding exciting ways to lose 1-0
31. Ryan Sweeney getting a clutch single
32. Moneyball
33. Lawyerball
34. Watching C.J. Wilson meltdown in the playoffs
35. Watching the A’s give up twenty-two runs and three-grand slams at Yankee Stadium
36. Chris Carter muffing a routine pop up
37. Jai Miller swinging and missing
38. Another PCL-South Championship for Sacramento
39. A new ballpark in San Jose?
40. There is always next year…