Former A's reliever Santiago Casilla is a key member of a World Series team. I can't believe I typed that without the world ending in a ball of flame around me. Casilla always had a live arm while he was in Oakland, but he was never able to display any consistency in finding the strike zone. Every time he takes the mound for the Giants I expect him to melt down, but so far he's managed to keep it together. We'll see if that can last through the World Series.
Is it painful to see former A's prospect Nelson Cruz crushing the ball for Texas? I covered all this in a previous blog but it still doesn't change the fact that it's hard to watch Cruz help carry the Rangers to the World Series.
One more painful thing to see as an A's fan: Colby Lewis developing into a valuable starter for the Rangers. Lewis made a mediocre pass through the A's organization before heading to Japan for a couple of years where he got his career together before returning to the states as a free agent.
Oakland showed a little interest in Lewis before he signed with Texas last offseason. But instead of getting Lewis, the A's ended up signing Justin Duchscherer and Ben Sheets, who predictably got hurt. Oakland finished the season with a .500 record while Lewis proved to be a solid bargain for the AL West champs.
It's times like these that bandwagon fans drive me up the wall. Early in the season when the Giants were just puttering along in the National League, I could go out and see a little bit of orange and black on people. Now when I run errands it seems like every other person is wearing Giants gear. You know in your gut that a ton of them just signed on as fans over the past couple of months and probably know more about the menu at Panda Express than they do about Pablo "Panda" Sandoval's stats. I know it's innocent, well intentioned, perfectly natural and you see it every time a team gets hot in the playoffs but it never gets any less annoying.
Another thought that goes through my head is how the heck did Giants general manager Brian Sabean get to the World Series?
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