Although the A’s and Giants are quiet on the trading front at this point, their divisional rivals have been busy. The Arizona Diamondbacks dealt ace Dan Haren to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in exchange for LHP Joe Saunders, LHP Patrick Corbin, RHP Rafael Rodriguez, and reportedly LHP Tyler Skaggs.
This combination is also known as the poo-poo platter (or salary dump if you’d prefer). This certainly will help the Angels in their attempts to overtake the Texas Rangers. The Rangers added Cliff Lee earlier this month and have been holding off the Angels thus far.
The A’s sit just back of the Angels and since it seems likely that only one team is coming out of the West, the A’s might not be able to hang around without any additions. As I mentioned earlier, the next six games (3 @ Texas, 3 @ Chicago) will be fairly huge in determining whether the A’s will be buyers or sellers.