The Athletics may have made their deadline intentions plain, but that doesn’t mean the rest of 2026 has to be a dead watch. The club is stumbling toward the finish line, and on the surface there aren’t many reasons to circle this team on the calendar. But the young talent is real enough to keep the conversation alive.
Jacob Wilson, Tommy White, Alika Williams, Nick Kurtz, and Joshua Kuroda-Grauer are the names that change the mood, especially when they’re healthy. They give this roster a different kind of appeal: not what the Athletics are right now, but what they might become.
That’s the hook. Even in a season that has gone nowhere, there’s still something worth tracking every night.
Baseball’s fun in those moments when a rookie gets thrown into the fire. Bottom of the ninth.
Two outs. Runners at the corners.
That’s when the question gets interesting: how does a young player handle it? Does he come through, or does the moment swallow him?
The Athletics may not get many satisfying answers this year, but those situations are part of why the team remains watchable.
There’s also the reality that these players probably won’t all meet the moment right away. That doesn’t mean they won’t get there. The idea here is less about immediate payoff and more about getting in early, before the wins start to show up and before the wider baseball audience catches on.
The infield is where the future gets especially crowded. Tommy White, Joshua Kuroda-Grauer, and Alika Williams all bring flexibility, and that kind of overlap can become a real issue when it comes time to draw up lineup cards. For now, the infield feels static, though not in a way that suggests permanence.
With JKG and Gelof out, the next step is simply getting healthy and seeing what this group looks like when the pieces are back in place. That’s when the front office and Mark Kotsay, if he is still around, will have some tough choices to make.
Those choices could carry real consequences. In a year, these players should be more developed, and their trade-block value should be higher too. That gives the Athletics a chance to turn excess talent into franchise-altering trades, this time for the better.
So yes, this season is bleak. But it isn’t empty.
There are still storylines to follow, still young players to watch, and still the chance to say you were there when things were rough. That matters now, and it may matter even more with the move to Vegas in 2028, when a new wave of fans won’t be able to say they were there in 2026.
In Other News...
Athletics Pitching Prospect May Be Building Something Oakland Needs
Nathan Dettmer took another step forward for Midland on a night when the Athletics farm system had plenty of activity to sort through. The right-hander worked deep into the game and kept Frisco quiet, while Luke Mann supplied the offense with a home run and two RBIs in support of a sharp RockHounds effort.
For Oakland, outings like this matter because the organization has been looking for more reliable pitching depth to emerge from the lower levels. Dettmers mix of strikeout stuff and efficiency stood out in a system report that also included action across the Pacific Coast League, Midwest League and California League, but the bigger question is whether this kind of start is a sign of something more durable coming together. [Read more 🡒]
Athletics Just Made A Front Office Change At A Brutal Time
The Athletics are making a front office shift at an awkward moment, with general manager David Forst and the organization mutually agreeing to part ways. Forst had been with the club since 2000 and had served as GM since 2015, so this is a significant change for a franchise already juggling a difficult season and a looming move to Las Vegas for 2028.
Dan Feinstein will step in as interim GM for the rest of the 2026 season, giving the Athletics a new voice at a time when the current roster is sitting at 45-70. The timing only adds to the sense of transition around the club, which now has to keep moving forward on the field while its baseball operations leadership takes on a different look. [Read more 🡒]
Athletics Just Changed The One Job That Shapes Their Next Era
The Athletics are entering another reset in a front office that has already defined much of their recent identity, parting ways with David Forst after an extended run that stretched across a quarter-century with the organization. Forst had been the clubs general manager since 2015, and his departure lands at a moment when every decision around the roster and the business of rebuilding carries extra weight for a team still trying to chart a steadier path forward.
Assistant GM Dan Feinstein has moved into the interim role while the search for a permanent replacement gets underway, putting a familiar internal voice in charge during a transition that could shape the next era of the franchise. For the Athletics, the bigger question now is not just who fills the job, but what kind of direction the next hire will bring to a club that has spent years searching for something closer to stability. [Read more 🡒]