​“It’s the injuries” has become the favorite excuse for why the A’s, who were 38-38 and jockeying through a fragmented, underperforming AL West, have cratered, fallen behind, and now seem unable to climb out. The refrain of “wait until we’re back at full strength” has become the standard game plan for letting a season that flirted with two games above .500 slip away in a slow, steady collapse.
Undoubtedly, the A’s have missed key contributors when they’ve been missing: Jacob Wilson, Zack Gelof, Tyler Soderström, and Luis Severino, not to mention Brent Rooker, who never quite found his footing after a rocky start. Yet across the division, no one is shedding tears for Oakland’s misfortunes simply because they’ve been short-handed. The Mariners endured long stretches without Cal Raleigh and Braden Donovan’s latest absence since May 13. The Rangers endured Wyatt Langford’s absence, Corey Seager’s IL stint, and Cody Bradford has yet to throw a single pitch this season. The Astros have fought through Jeremy Peña’s five-week absence, watched Carlos Correa miss most of the year, and welcomed Hunter Brown back into the rotation only recently. The difference is that those clubs endured their share of setbacks and still managed to win roughly half their games.
Here are some realities that better illuminate why the A’s sit at 41-55 at the All-Star break, when a more respectable 48-48 would have left them in more favorable sport.
The Myth Of “Good Offense/Bad Pitching.” This claim is only partly true. The pitching has been profoundly subpar, yes, but the A’s offense has also been a major factor in producing the second-worst record in the American League. After a miserable Chicago trip where they plated just two runs in three games, it’s now official: on the road the A’s own the worst OPS in MLB. Their road slash line sits at .223/.297/.347, a .644 OPS that places them 30th out of 30 teams. Injuries certainly haven’t helped; losing Wilson, Gelof, or Soderström at any point would have hurt, but the larger reality is that, when healthy, the roster simply hasn’t performed up to expectations outside of West Sacramento.
Consider a healthy Nick Allen, who, aside from one last stretch, batted .236/.364/.394 with a 114 wRC+ on the road in the first half—an ordinary line by most standards. That contrasts with a mirror image of strong home numbers, a reminder that the roster’s home-heavy production cannot simply be transported to the road. Shea Langeliers, the other core contributor, has posted .236/.303/.434 with a 103 wRC+ on the road and a 135 wRC+ at home. Tyler Soderström, despite a 162 wRC+ at home, has slashed .216/.290/.383 for a 84 wRC+ on the road. Zack Gelof, who shows a 148 wRC+ at home, has managed only .222/.287/.374 for an 84 wRC+ on the road. Put bluntly, if the narrative is that the A’s miss these players, the tangible reality is that they don’t deliver much more on the road than they do at home, and as a team they’ve crafted the worst OPS on the road in the league.
In short, the injury narrative glosses over a deeper truth: the A’s have underperformed offensively, especially away from their West Sacramento comfort zone, and that underperformance has been a more systemic problem than a simple absence of a handful of players. The team has not managed to compensate for those losses with productive road production, and as a result, their 41-55 mark at the break reflects a broader struggle—one that cannot be cured by simply waiting for everyone to return to full health.