As an A's fan I am going to try extremely hard to take my personal emotions out of this trade (believe me that little voice inside is screaming WTF!). Instead I am going to try to look at this trade not by itself but in relation to all the other flurry of trades, transactions, and signings that have taken place in the past year in order to try to make sense of what Beane is cookin up for the future athletics.

I think the best way to start this is to try to understand what type of team Beane is attempting to build. Beane's winning formula has always, first and foremost, been predicated on cheap dynamic pitching. The key to this deal, Sean Gallagher, does absolutely nothing to show a deviation from that philosophy. Sean Gallagher joins the list of recently acquired SP prospects which include Gio Gonzalez, Fautino De Los Santos (injured), Brett Anderson, Greg Smith, Dana Eveland. These acquired SP prospects- coupled with the A's quality in-house SP prospects which include Trevor Cahill, James Simmons, Vince Mazzaro, Craig Italiano, Henry Rodriguez plus the recent additions of Tyson Ross via the draft and Michel Inoa- help to make up possibly the most pitching rich organization in baseball. Now your no doubt saying all of these pitchers project to be at least solid major league SP's and there is only 5 spots in a rotation. The list is very impressive but let's not forget that we are dealing with prospects and not finished, in some cases not even close to, products.

The plethora of pitching PROSPECTS that the A's now have serves useful for two reasons. The first, which is SP prospects value as trade pieces, is something I will discuss in a second to hopefully come full circle with my tangent. The second, is the fact that Beane understands the relative unpredicatability of forcasting future player success for a prospect and is simply playing the odds. Look, we have seen this all the time. We are looking for one prospect to storm through the rankings and become our saviour only to be suprised by a less suspecting prospect to come along and suddenly fill that role. In defense of Gallagher, no one expected or knew enough about Dan Haren to project him as more than a solid #3 until he blew up as an Ace in Oakland. I'm not saying Gallagher is the next Haren, though Rob Neyer suggested he could be, but I'm just saying you never quite know what you have til that player is settled in and playing regularly. By stockpiling this much pitching talent, Beane is accepting this cold hard truth about the uncertainty of prospect projections. He understands some will be better and some will be worse- but in the end, one way or another, a couple of Aces will emerge from this group. The A's have always won with top-notch pitching and Beane is making sure that isn't about to change. I said I was gonna address the first reason why stockpiling pitching is important in terms of future trade pieces- and I will- after I get onto the other prospects in the deal and how they incorporate into Beane's grand scheme.

The second thing I feel Beane is trying to incorporate into his future team is speed and possibly a more small ball approach. This has already become somewhat apparent through the fact that the A's have been attempting a lot more steals this year. The early results seem to be good. However, the A's cleary lack an everyday player capable of stealing 30+ stolen bases an sparking an offense at the top of the order. This is where the aquisition of Eric Patterson become essential. He hopefully gives Beane the everyday player, in the near near future, who can set the wheels in motion in changing the Dynamics of the A's offense. This move has to be looked at along with the A's drafting of speedster Jemile Weeks with the 12th overall pick. Once again, banking on one of these players to become the player you envision at the top of the order is somewhat of a risky proposition. However, having two of them in your system significantly increases your chances that one of them will reach their potential. Now if Beane does have his future top of the rotation pitchers somewhere in the mix and his future tablesetter in either Patterson or Weeks. What is the next step and do the other prospects acquired have a part in it.

My thought process is that Murton is someone who will find his way into a starting outfield spot this year. However, beyond that I don't see much of a future with the A's. Donaldson is different. Suzuki seems to be firmly entrenching himself as the A's starting catcher for years to come, and there are certainly no complaints from this guy. However, Donaldson is an offensive-oriented catcher, suzuki is more defensive-minded, and could become an eventual replacement if his bat lives up to it's potential. Despite that, his greatest value to the A's might be as a future trade chip.

Now going back to the idea of Beane stockpiling pitching talent to use as future trade bait- I believe the trade market, i.e. veteran power bats, is the place where Beane will look to add a game changing bat to push the future offense and the team over the top. Beane, I believe, values minor league depth as much as star quality at the top of the prospect list. Pitching prospects are the best trade chips to deal for a quality bat because every team is always looking to acquire more. Beane also understands that a power bat is the easiest and most readily available thing on the trade market- which is why I believe he is not pushing to acquire a prospect such as Matt Laporta. Just look at this years trade market, if Beane decided he was gonna go for it this year, he could easily have any one of Bay, Holliday, Beltre, Nady or even Texiera. With the current prospect depth in the organization, he could acquire these guys without signifantly diminishing the system. I would love to trade for prospects Andy LaRoche, Mat Gamel, or Ian Stewart. However, if we don't land a prospect with bona-fide 30+ hr potential it's not a big deal- we"ll just get it on the trade market.

I am of the popular opinion that Beane didn't get enough, but I think i understand what he's attempting to do- and that is to build uncomparable quality organization prospect depth.