A’s roster: Outfielder Brown makes team; Gossett out.
Oakland’s 30man roster for Friday night’s opener against the Angels will feature 15 pitchers, but lefty A.J. Puk will open the season on the 10day injured list, as expected, and righthander Daniel Gossett — two years removed from Tommy John surgery — was designated for assignment.
After Tuesday night’s exhibition game against the Giants, manager Bob Melvin said Austin Allen will open the season as the A’s backup catcher, with Jonah Heim joining the threeman taxi squad. The taxi squad will consist, at least initially, of Heim, reliever Lucas Luetge and utilityman Nate Orf, but any players from the poolplayer site at San Jose are eligible, even if they are not on the 40man roster.
Outfielder Seth Brown, who performed well as a lateseason callup last year and hit .324 with a homer and eight RBIs in spring/exhibition games, will open the season on the roster, with another 40manroster outfielder, Skye Bolt, joining the poolplayer group.
As The Chronicle reported last weekend, reliever Jordan Weems, a nonroster minorleague signee, made the roster. Rule 5 infielder Vimael Machin also is on it, as expected; Machin must stay on the bigleague roster all season or be offered back to the Cubs.
“This keeps what we feel like are the 30 most important guys here right now,” Melvin said. “The catching position was tough. I would’ve liked to have kept all three. But with some of the guys that we needed to keep, whether it was in the bullpen with
Weems and (Burch) Smith and guys like that, or the position players — like (Franklin) Barreto’s an important guy, and Machin a Rule 5 — it just added up to where we couldn’t keep a third catcher. But the toughest ones were probably the last couple in the bullpen and the catching position.”
The group that did not make the final roster will report to San Jose, including taxisquad players; the team would like Heim to be able to continue to get atbats, Melvin said. Heim is likely to be an option for the bigleague team at some point, so the A’s would like him to stay as ready as possible.
Gossett, 27, went 414 with a 5.91 ERA in 23 starts for Oakland in 2017 and 2018. The A’s needed to open a roster spot for Daniel Mengden to come off the 60day IL after minor elbow surgery. Mengden is slotting into the rotation, at least initially, with Puk out and Jesús Luzardo in the bullpen as he builds up his innings after missing twoplus weeks while selfisolating because of a positive coronavirus test. If Gossett clears waivers, he would remain in the organization and could be sent to the poolplayer site.
Melvin said that Luzardo was to throw a bullpen session Thursday, and the manager wouldn’t rule out the lefty as a possibility for Friday’s opener. He’d like to get Luzardo a clean inning for his first outing, but after that would not hesitate to use him in a highleverage situation.
The A’s will have to trim the roster to 28 players in 15 days, so competition will continue. Melvin said that with the 60game season, even established players will have to perform.
“We’re going to keep the most productive guys at a particular time,” Melvin said, “and it might not just be because of somebody’s name. You have to play this thing out like it’s August and September and the guys typically in August and September that are in the lineup are the ones that are performing at a high level — and that’s probably going to be the case.”