Possibly losing your team's entire outfield and DH to FA is hard (Josh Willingham and David DeJesus were offered arbitration, but looks like DeJesus is chosing not to accept). Taking a look at the run production in the 2011 season, I've tried to replace that production with either free agents or internal promotions.
Instead of just using runs scored straight up, I've used wRC (weighted runs created) and wRAA (weighted runs above average) to get a more accurate reading. 2012 projections are from Bill James data on Fangraphs.
Click after the jump to see how the A's can stay competitive.
This group of 4 came in at 247 wRC and 28.3 wRAA. It looks like in order to stay competitive in the AL West, the A's will have to at least sign at least one veteran free agent. The best case scenario for the signing would be if the A's can get Jason Kubel (75 wRC, 14.7 wRAA) or Kosuke Fukudome (63 wRC, 4.4 wRAA) for left field. Kubel is projected to nearly match Willingham's 2011 production (78 wRC, 15.2 wRAA).
The rest of the OF would look like Ryan Sweeney in CF and Michael Taylor in RF. At DH, we'll replace Hideki Matsui with a second run at trying to get Vladimir Guerrero.. With this new group they're projected to produce 242.8 wRC and 24.4 wRAA. Should yield about 1 win if we look at the wRAA comparison to 2011. There's some other FA options shown, but that's just to humor myself, namely Cody Ross and Ryan Ludwick as some good possibly buy low veteran pickups
I know, our free agent spending isn't going to get us very much, especially if we're bootstrapped until the stadium situation. And talking to a few A's fans on Twitter, I know it might look absurd that Cody Ross is on here, but that goes to show, free agent outfielders this year are gonna be hard to come by.
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