The Oakland Athletics have one of the best problems in all of baseball, they have five spots in their rotation and seven solid starting pitchers.  Most teams would kill for this problem, like the Minnesota Twins who just had to drop a lot of money on starting pitchers who are considered mediocre by most people, because they did not have enough starting pitching in 2013.  So, with this problem, how does the 2014 Oakland Athletics rotation shake out?

1. Jarrod Parker

The top spot is pretty simple.  Parker set himself apart from the rest of the pack in the 2013 season when he went 19 straight starts without recording a loss.  Parker is entering his third season with the A’s after coming over in a trade with the Arizona Diamondbacks, and is proving the genius of Billy Beane by outperforming former all-star Trevor Cahill whom he was traded for.

2. Sonny Gray

Gray wasn’t expected to make the big leagues when the season started, but by midseason it seemed a guarantee that he would be in the rotation before the season was over.  He had proven that he was ready to step up in AAA and the A’s wanted to give him his first shot at the majors out of the bullpen, so they called him up right around the all-star break, and he did not disappoint.  22 days after his second and final appearance out of the bullpen Gray got the call to start, and again, he didn’t disappoint.  He took that spot and didn’t look back and is now a lock for the 2014 rotation after going 5-3 with a 2.67 ERA in 10 starts and two relief appearances.

3. Scott Kazmir

Kazmir returned to the majors after missing all of the 2012 season, and only pitching in 1.2 innings in 2011 due to injury, and he returned with a splash.  He has big shoes to fill, though, as he was signed via free agency to take the spot of the veteran in the rotation vacated by the loss of Bartolo Colon.  Filling Colon’s shoes is unlikely as Colon had an amazing season in 2013, but Kazmir is coming off of a season where he pitched in the most games, and pitched the most innings in any of his seasons since 2007.  Oh yeah, and Kazmir is only going to be 30-years-old in 2014, 11 years younger than Colon.

4. A.J. Griffin

Griffin was an innings eater in the 2013 season and was very consistent.  He pitched 200 innings, had an ERA of 3.83, and had only one major issue of giving up the long ball.  If he can figure out what he was doing that caused him to give up so many long balls, much like Cahill did between the 2009 and 2010 seasons, he could surprise everyone and represent the A’s in the all-star game in 2014, and this is the guy who is starting in the fourth spot for this team.

5. Daniel Straily

Straily did everything the A’s wanted him to in 2013, and then some.  He was the swingman for the A’s and made the trip from Oakland to Sacramento more times than any big leaguer would ever hope to, and in the process earned himself fourth play in the rookie of the year voting for the American League.  After only starting in one game for the suspended Colon, Straily eventually came back up to replace the injured Brett Anderson and ended up pitching in 27 games and held an ERA of just under four.  He will have some competition for this final spot, but he has done everything he has been asked of and earned a shot in the rotation and it will be someone else’s turn to learn that ride from Sacramento to Oakland.

With those five spots set,what happens to the other two guys who missed out?  Well the guy who is going to learn that drive that Straily did in 2013 has to be Tommy Milone.  

It is a far fall for a guy who was the third starter at the beginning of the 2013 season, but Milone needs get the location back that he had in his rookie season of 2012 if he wants to get a steady spot in the rotation back.

 For Drew Pomeranz, who the A’s received in a trade for Anderson, he is likely going to earn a spot in the bullpen out of spring training and be the swing man in the rotation.  He will likely get spot starts when one of the pitchers needs a day off, or if the team wants to throw another lefty out there, but unless he blows away the competition in those rare opportunities he would probably stay in the bullpen with Milone getting the shot if an extended spot in the rotation arose.