Breaking news from the San Francisco Chronicle:  Going 3-21 is "no fun".

Don’t ignore the Never-Heard-Of Guy: I didn’t like the Rich Harden trade at first glance, because in return for Harden and Chad Gaudin, the A’s got three players I’m not too excited about, and another guy I had never heard of.

That "guy" is single A catcher Josh Donaldson. Donaldson had a triple and a home run for Stockton on Sunday, and is now hitting .394/.466/.712 in 114 plate appearances since the trade.

Matt Spencer, the Never-Heard-Of Guy in the Joe Blanton trade, is hitting .353/.411/.576, even after an 0-for-4 yesterday.

Interesting interview with Brad Ziegler by BP’s David Laurila.

This experiment of short blog entries reminds me (via Rodcorp) of the Brian Eno interview discussing the little tune he wrote ("The Microsoft Sound") that played when Windows 95 booted up :

The thing from the agency said, "We want a piece of music that is inspiring, universal, blah-blah, da-da-da, optimistic, futuristic, sentimental, emotional,” this whole list of adjectives, and then at the bottom it said "and it must be 3 1/4 seconds long.”

Perhaps, like Eno, after switching from long to short forms, I will find "at the end of this that it really broke a logjam in my own work".

Is the correct term for a blogging logjam a "blogjam"?

The Heavyweight Championship standings have been updated on the sidebar.  The Milwaukee Brewers are the current champions.  The Mets have a large lead in the standings, thanks to a six-week streak from mid-June to the end of July when they won the final game of every series they played.  The streak included a 3-1 victory on June 29 over the Yankees that eliminated the American League from any further championship bouts for the rest of the regular season.

Ex-Athletic news, part 2:  Tim Hudson had Tommy John surgery yesterday.

Some things never change, ex-Athletic department:  Joe Blanton pitched a seven-inning one-hitter last night, but his team still lost.

The A’s break their 10-game losing streak.  Dallas Braden pitches seven effective innings.  Brad Ziegler throws two more scoreless innings, giving him 37 consecutive shutout innings to start his career, and picks up his first career save.  

Braden’s ERA is 4.62.  Since he’s essentially replacing Joe Blanton (4.96 ERA) in the rotation, that’s pretty good.  Blanton is easily replaced, and the A’s both save money, and get three prospects.  That deal has worked out well so far.

Ziegler’s ERA is 0.00, obviously.  If Ziegler went out in his next appearance and gave up 19 runs without recording an out, his ERA would be…(drumroll please)…4.62.

Forbes declares the Sacramento River Cats to be the most valuable minor league franchise, worth $29.8 million. 

Forbes also declare A’s fans to be the third least loyal in the majors.  Doggone Angels finish first again.

Vincent Mazzaro is one of Peter Bendix’s "eight prospects to watch" over on Beyond the Boxscore.

A’s prospects Trevor Cahill and Brett Anderson are both possibilities to start the Olympic opener against South Korea.  But apparently, the starting pitcher is kept a secret in international competition, so US manager Davey Johnson is keeping mum.  We won’t know for sure until game time.

The opener for the US is scheduled 6pm Beijing time on Wednesday.  That’s 3am ET, midnight PT.  The game is scheduled to be shown on MSNBC on tape delay between 10am and 2pm PT.

The A’s have lost 10 in a row, and are now eight games under .500, but they have still outscored their opponents, 4.04 runs/game to 3.93 runs/game.

Which player has the highest 2008 Win Probability Added among A’s batters?

First, a little hint: the player that leads the team in Win Shares (14) is dead last on the team in WPA (-10.45).

Made your guess?   OK, now you can peek.

Bet you were wrong.

* * *

Also, be sure to check out our little experiment on the Catfish Stew home page.  Explanation here.

Graham Goldbeck takes a look at the debut of Gio Gonzalez using Pitch/FX.

Huston Street, unsurprisingly, did not pass through waivers.

Brad Ziegler admits to contemplating his bobblehead.

Lenny DiNardo likes sad songs.  Is a losing streak like a sad song?  Is Lenny DiNardo enjoying himself?

Sure, Rob, it’s easy to boycott watching the Olympics for two weeks in protest over the Chinese government.   But can you go two weeks without using any product made in China?  That would be a much more impressive feat.

The closer on the 1988 US Olympic baseball team was Joe Slusarski.

15-year-old Bryce Harper has a beautiful swing.