Reunion with Olson comes just as talented 1st baseman finds hot bat
All-Star struggled in first two months playing in Atlanta
It’s just the kind of luck that’s followed the Athletics around since the calendar turned from an encouraging April to a disastrous May.
The A’s open a two-game series in Atlanta on Tuesday just as former teammate Matt Olson is heating up.
The split hasn’t been easy for either side, although Olson came up a big winner when he signed an eightyear contract extension worth $168 million after being dealt from the A’s to the Braves during spring training in exchange for centerfielder Cristian Pache, catcher Shea Langeliers and pitchers Ryan Cusick and Joey Estes.
It’s the kind of money that’s foreign to the Athletics under owner John Fisher. The company line holds that the money will flow once there’s a new stadium at Howard Terminal. Thus the trades of Chris Bassitt (Mets), Olson, Matt Chapman (Blue Jays) and Sean Manaea (Padres).
Yet with the kind of money Olson received to return home — he grew up in the Atlanta area — came bigger expectations than he ever had in Oakland. The Braves are coming off a surprise World Series win, and parted with an icon in Freddie Freeman in order to sign Olson, who last season was a first-time All-Star and finished eighth in the AL MVP balloting. There also was pressure on Olson to help offset the absence of Ronald Acuna Jr., the superstar outfielder who missed the Braves’ first 19 games recovering from knee surgery.
While the A’s stagger into town after a 1-9 homestand and a 20-36 record, Atlanta finished a fourgame sweep of Colorado to improve to 27-26 — the first time they’ve been over .500 since they were 2-1. In an 8-7 win over the Rockies Sunday, Olson hit a threerun home run. It was their fifth consecutive win.
In his last six games, Olson has eight hits including two homers and has driven in 11 runs.
“Any sweep you get is a good one,” Olson told reporters. “To come here and have the guys throw the way they did this entire series and have it be a fourgame sweep is nice.”
Whatever grumbling there was about Olson’s early production could dissipate quickly with a hot streak. He currently has a .255/.363.466 slash line with seven home runs and 28 RBIs and a league-leading 23 doubles. But included were some long dry spells as well as five errors in 52 games. Olson had only six errors in 152 games at first base for the A’s last season in winning a Gold Glove.
“You want to go out and you want to play well,” Olson said in mid-May. “It’s no secret that I’ve been scuffling a little bit. You do what you can to bring the emotions down a little bit and get back to business.”
Before the Braves’ fivegame winning streak, teammate William Contreras felt the need to come to Olson’s defense.
“Tremendous ballplayer, tremendous teammate, tremendous person. I think everyone knows that he’s going to do what he does, so as a team, we have all the confidence in the world in him,” Contreras told The Athletic.
The rash of errors is unexplainable and Braves manager Brian Snitker acknowledged Olson has been under pressure.
“The guy’s a very gifted defender,” Snitker said. “I mean, he’s got that gold on his glove to show it. That’s why this game, you never figure it out. You’re never immune from anything in this business. And a lot of experiences and things that guys go through — there’s a lot going on in their lives and things, in playing this game. It’s not easy. That’s part of why it makes it so hard to be successful in this game.”
While there may be a light at the end of the tunnel for Olson, the Athletics have floundered offensively and miss the bat of a player who had 39 home runs, 111 RBIs and a .913 OPS last season.
The A’s have been shut out seven times and 20 times have scored one run or fewer — going 1-19 in those games. As opposed to putting Olson’s name in indelible ink on the lineup card (he played 152 games at first base last season), manager Mark Kotsay has used six players at the position — Seth Brown (32 games), Christian Bethancourt (19), Sheldon Neuse (11), Billy McKinney (7), Stephen Vogt (3) and Jed Lowrie (1) .
Brown, who usually sits against left-handed pitchers, is hitting .203 with five home runs and 23 RBIs. Brown’s five home runs at the one-third mark of the season ties him with Sean Murphy and Chad Pinder for the team lead. That projects to 15 over the course of a season, and the lowest for the A’s since coming to Oakland was 16 by Kevin Kouzmanoff in 2010.
In terms of a return on the A’s trade of Olson, Pache, 23, arrived in Oakland with the reputation of being a very good defensive player who was challenged offensively. Pache has played excellent centerfield, but is hitting just .167 (27-for-162) with two home runs and 12 RBIs.
Pache’s defense and the A’s interest in developing his offensive potential are reasons the team remains patient, and Kotsay said his attitude has been good.
“Whether it’s an 0-for-4 night or a 2-for-4 night, he comes in with the same approach, the same demeanor, which we want to monitor,” Kotsay said. “We go back to pulling out the positives.”