AL West

After trading shortstop Cliff Pennington to Arizona for outfielder Chris Young and losing Pennington's eventual successor Stephen Drew in free agency to the Boston Red Sox, the Oakland A's once again took to the international market to fill a void.

Veteran relief pitcher José Veras signed a one year deal with the Houston Astros, according to the Twitter feed of ESPNDeportes writer Enrique Rojas.

The right hander will be 32 next season as he enters his eighth season in the majors. The product of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays farm system made his debut with the 2006 New York Yankees and played in the 2007 Division Series.

Josh Hamilton is off the market and I'm OK with that, but not everyone feels the same way.

In fact, based on the response from most of the people I've spoken to and read, the Mariners' whiffing on Hamilton is a bit of a problem.

Upon hearing the news, a good friend and long-time M's fan sighed, "It's going to be a long winter and summer at the rate things are going."

Let me begin by saying this is never an article I envisioned I would ever have to write.

There are times in the world where we, the fans, lose sight of what is important in the world. We become so obsessed with free-agency signings, poor performances, wins, losses and lockouts that we forget that the games we become so obsessed with our merely that: games.

After missing out on essentially every big-name free-agent signing and failing to execute a trade for Justin Upton before the Arizona Diamondbacks addressed their shortstop situation, Texas Rangers’ general manager Jon Daniels’ failure to sign Josh Hamilton may have caused irreparable damage.

The Michael Young trade that had been hinted at for so long has finally happened, with prospect Josh Lindblom being the key piece in the deal.

It's all about Felix Hernandez in Seattle. The Mariners revolve around him.

For now, anyway, and for good or ill. Of all the situations that must be handled with care in Major League Baseball, Hernandez's future with the Mariners is right at the top of the list.

The Detroit Tigers took Game 1 of the 2012 ALDS, beating the Oakland Athletics 3-1. Though the team is down one game in a five-game series, there's no reason for worry—yet.

The game opened up with excitement as leadoff batter Coco Crisp hit a home run against Tigers ace Justin Verlander.

However, Verlander regained composure as the game progressed, striking out 11 A's batters along the way. Jose Valverde came into for the save.

The Oakland A's were quite good in the second half of the 2012 season. So good, in fact, that they had us all asking the same question every time they actually lost a game:

"Wait a second, how the heck did that just happen?"

Here we are on this Saturday night asking this question after Oakland's 3-1 loss to the Detroit Tigers in Game 1 of the American League Division Series. What the heck kind of person/thing/ominous force sucked the life out of this A's team?

Pat Neshek came into Saturday night's American League Divisional Series game in the same tight situation that he's seen many times before in his six-year career.

With men on first and second for the Detroit Tigers, the Oakland Athletics reliever's main job was to escape the jam with a two-run deficit intact.