Oakland A’s will host 2020 alternate roster in San Jose, with help from Giants
The Oakland A’s will use San Jose’s Excite Ballpark, home of the San Francisco Giants’ High-a team, as their alternative training site for the 2020 season, the team announced after securing permission from the Giants.
Excite Ballpark, formerly known as San Jose Municipal Stadium, will host 18 A’s players from the 60-man player pool. Testing will be conducted this weekend, and workouts should start at the beginning of the week.
The 18 A’s prospects and players on the 60-man player pool, but not invited to the Coliseum, will start training in San Jose this weekend. As the A’s trim their active roster down to 30 players, the alternate training site will act as a quasi-minor league team, without a season to play.
Players at the training site can be called up congruent with rules in a typical season; players optioned on the active roster will head to San Jose.
“We are grateful to the San Jose Giants for their partnership in this unique endeavor for baseball. We look forward to working with (San Jose Giants president and CEO) Dan Orum and his staff in San Jose for the duration of the 2020 season,” general manager David Forst said in a statement. “Additionally, Larry Baer, Farhan Zaidi, and the San Francisco Giants organization were instrumental in making this happen and I appreciate their willingness to collaborate across the Bay. We’re excited for our players to continue their development and preparation to potentially join our Major League Club at some point this season.”
As of Friday, the players invited to the alternate site include a couple of high prospects (Robert Puason, Nick Allen) and first-round picks (Logan Davidson, Tyler Soderstrom) as well as a host of players on the 40man roster that could be at the ready and not far from Oakland:
PITCHERS >> Tyler Buam, Wandisson Charles, Parker Dunshee, Daulton Jefferies (40-man), James Kaprielian (40-man), Grant Holmes (40-man), Brian Howard, Miguel Romero
INFIELDERS >> Nick Allen, Logan Davidson, Robert Puason
OUTFIELDERS >> Luis Barrera (40-man), Brayan Buelvas, Greg Deichmann, Dustin Fowler (40-man), Buddy Reed
CATCHERS >> Kyle Mccann, Tyler Soderstrom