Or, Jack Hananhan-lite, if you will. I really don't know what else to say about the guy. He's never gotten on base at a decent rate, but he always had a little bit of pop and played gold glove defense. Now he's swinging at sliders in the dirt that START OUT outside of the strikezone, grounding into double plays and is doing a spot-on Jose Offerman impersonation at third. He's far from the only A struggling, but he's certainly the one that they have no replacement for. Eric Chavez has apparently found the Fountain of Youth (steroids) and a good way of masking the Fountain of Youth in his urine stream and is playing really well for the Yankees. Failed prospect Andy Laroche is currently the alleged utility man while actual utility man Adam Rosales is on the 60 day DL, and has been even worse than Kouz in the field. AAA Sacramento has no legit hot corner prospects. So the A's are faced with the prospect of going into battle night in and night out with the rare MLB starter who has negative value to his team. There is nothing worse than watching a pitching staff go out and do their job only to watch the inept offense fail to score a single run, and that's what we A's fans have been going through so far. I have a bad feeling we're a week or 2 away from Billy Beane remembering he's a GM long enough for him to turn off the soccer game and declare the A's not fit to compete and use it as an excuse to start trading his usable pieces for minor league journeymen with high OBP. An early May Oakland Fire Sale might be enough to kill my interest in the rest of the season.
