Could Seth Smith Return to the Oakland Athletics?

The Padres made a flurry of moves in the last few days, and in doing so have filled up their outfield with Wil Myers, Matt Kemp and Justin Upton. With Carlos Quentin, Will Venable and Seth Smith currently slotted to be bench players, the team looks primed to make at least one more trade this winter.

In assessing their biggest needs, they could really use a middle infielder and some pitching help. The A’s won’t help them too much with their infield problems, but the A’s have plenty of pitching after their latest trade.

If a team is going to have a surplus of any position, that position should be pitchers. Pitchers tend to have more injury problems than hitters, and their performance can shift dramatically from year to year. The A’s realized this last year, when their depth was tested after Jarrod Parker and A.J. Griffin both underwent Tommy John surgery.

But now, the A’s have 8 pitchers who could be in a major-league rotation on opening day: Sonny Gray, Scott Kazmir, Drew Pomeranz, Sean Nolin, Jesse Chavez, Kendall Graveman, Jesse Hahn and Chris Bassitt (our new friend of the podcast). When parker and Griffin come back in the middle of next year, that will be 10 MLB-level starters.

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While depth is nice and I certainly wouldn’t trade five of them, packaging a couple of them to fill one of the team’s other holes would make sense. They may be relying too much on the injury-prone combo of Josh Johnson and Brandon Morrow at the back end of their rotation, and getting some quality young arms would be in their best interests, especially if they are capable of contributing this year.

Currently, the A’s have Sam Fuld and Craig Gentry slotted to play left field, and both of them are really just fourth outfielders. They’re fast and good defensively, but neither will give you much at the plate.

So a potential deal between these two teams would make sense for both sides. And of all of the outfielders that San Diego might have on the block, Seth Smith is the most intriguing option.

Smith was traded from the A’s to the Padres last offseason for Luke Gregerson, and put up solid numbers last year with an .807 OPS and 12 home runs. He is mostly a platoon player, hitting .277 against righties and just .205 against lefties for his career.

Smith also is more than a one-year rental, as he is under contract for the next two years and has a team option for 2017. His contract is also fairly team-friendly–he is making just 6 million next year and 6.75 million the year after that. If Alex Rios is making $11 million per year in free agency, Smith’s contract should be considered well below market value and a bargain for any team.

Smith has a history of struggling defensively, with a career dWAR of -4.8, but if he moved back to the AL, he would have the luxury of DHing. While he may not be the full-time DH, only making him play the outfield three days a week would help save his legs over a full season. Also, with excellent defensive outfielders on the roster, and a potential platoon partner in Craig Gentry, the A’s can get away with his shaky defense. They can play him in the outfield for the first six innings of a game before pulling him for Fuld or Gentry in the late innings.

Most importantly, it would be awesome if the #FaceOfPadres from MLB network’s Face of MLB contest got traded. Even better, most of the people who voted for him were A’s fans on Twitter. The trolling of this silly contest idea would be complete.

Billy Beane and the A’s are definitely not done yet with their busy offseason, and it will be exciting to see what the next move is. Let us know in the comments section what you think they will do next!