The retooling Mets jettisoned another core player Monday, trading second baseman Jeff McNeil to the Athletics for minor league right-hander Yordan Rodriguez in a deal that left pitcher David Peterson as New York’s longest-tenured player.

New York will send up to $7.75 million to the A’s to offset some of the $17.75 million remaining on McNeil’s $50 million, four-year contract.

McNeil follows Pete Alonso, Brandon Nimmo and Edwin Díaz in leaving the underperforming Mets, who failed to reach the playoffs this year despite the second-highest payroll in the majors behind the World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers.

McNeil, who turns 34 in April, was selected by New York in the 12th round of the 2013 amateur draft from Long Beach State and had spent his entire professional career with the organization. He made his Mets debut in 2018 and won the big league batting title with a .326 average in 2022, when he was picked for his second NL All-Star team.

He hit .243 with 12 homers and 54 RBIs in 122 games this year, when he made his season debut on April 25 after recovering from a strained right oblique.

McNeil has a $15.75 million salary next year as part of a deal that includes a $15.75 million team option for 2027 with a $2 million buyout. The Mets will send the A’s $5.75 million with another $2 million payment conditionally included if McNeil’s option is declined.

Rodriguez, who turns 18 on Jan. 29, signed with the A’s for a $400,000 bonus in January and went 2-0 with a 2.93 ERA in one start and seven relief appearances for the Dominican Summer League A’s. He struck out 20 and walked eight in 15 1/3 innings.

Peterson made his Mets debut in 2020. If he is traded, New York’s longest-tenured player would be shortstop Francisco Lindor, acquired before the 2021 season.

New York has added closer Devin Williams,infielder Jorge Polanco, Gold Glove second baseman Marcus Semien and reliever Luke Weaver this offseason.

To open a roster spot for McNeil, the A’s designated left-hander Ken Waldichuk for assignment.

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AP Baseball Writer Ronald Blum contributed to this report.

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The A’s, who are scheduled to move to Las Vegas before the 2028 season, met their year-end goals of beginning the concrete phase, having cranes in place and putting in the first buttress and concrete column.

A’s President Marc Badain also was instrumental in getting Allegiant Stadium built in time for the 2020 NFL season, when he had the same title with the Raiders. Mortenson-McCarthy built Allegiant and is the contractor for the A’s new venue.

“I feel great about (the progress),” Badain said. “Obviously, we know the workforce. We know the construction firm, and the (supervisor) is the same super that delivered on Allegiant. When he tells me things are good, I don’t worry.”

Ceremonial groundbreaking on the 33,000-person capacity domed stadium located on the Las Vegas Strip occurred June 23. The A’s Ballpark Experience Center opened Tuesday in Las Vegas to give fans a chance to view the stadium in detail and take part in other immersive experiences.

The price tag has gone up considerably twice, rising from $1.5 billion to $1.75 billion to the current estimate. A’s vice chairman Sandy Dean indicated he didn’t expect the cost to increase much more.

“I think we’re through a lot of the processes and design that were contributing to escalation,” Dean said. “Our strong goal is to keep it to that.”

Nevada and Clark County have approved up to $380 million in public funds for the ballpark, and the A’s have said they will cover the remaining expenses. Owner John Fisher has been seeking investors, but Dean said he didn’t have an update on that effort.

“I think the most important thing is that starting in December of 2024, we were able to describe the financing for the stadium as being complete,” Dean said. “We have the ability to bring in some investors. We thought, in particular, if we have Las Vegas investors, that will be a positive.”

Steve Hill, CEO and president of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, said A’s officials have not yet asked for their share of public assistance.

“It will probably be sometime next year,” Hill said.

This Las Vegas Stadium Authority meeting occurred one day short of the one-year anniversary of when it approved lease, non-relocation and development documents, the last major hurdles before construction. The lease and non-relocation agreements each cover 30 years.

The A’s this year played the first of at least three seasons at a minor league ballpark in West Sacramento. They played their previous 57 seasons in Oakland.

Management has been constructing a roster to be competitive when the club arrives in Las Vegas. Several young players are under contract through at least 2028, including Nick Kurtz and Jacob Wilson, who finished 1-2 in the AL Rookie of the Year voting. Kurtz was the unanimous choice.

NEW YORK (AP) — A month ago, Marcus Semien was a father of four with three years left on a lucrative contract in Texas.

Needless to say, there’s been a couple of big changes around the house lately for the former Oakland A’s star.

Three weeks after he and his wife, Tarah, welcomed their fifth child, Semien was traded by the Rangers to the New York Mets on Monday for veteran outfielder Brandon Nimmo.

And just like that, the Gold Glove second baseman was headed to a new city and his fifth major league team — first in the National League.

“It was surprising. Just understanding that, hey, I signed here on a long-term deal four years ago,” Semien said Tuesday via Zoom. “But once again, I’m very conscious of what’s going on in the business side of baseball, just kind of paying attention to everything. So in the back of my mind, I knew something could always happen.”

Eager to improve their defense, the Mets agreed to send the 32-year-old Nimmo — their longest-tenured player — and $5 million to Texas for Semien, who at 35 has three seasons and $72 million remaining on the $175 million, seven-year contract he signed with the Rangers in December 2021.

“I want to play until they tell me to go home,” Semien said. “At this point in my career it feels extremely good to have a team that believes in me, sees what I do well, wants to help me.”

Semien said he was training last Friday when he received a call from agent Scott Boras informing him a deal could be forthcoming. But the sides were waiting to hear if Nimmo would waive the no-trade provision in the $162 million, eight-year contract he signed with New York after the 2022 season, so Semien was asked to keep quiet for a while.

He spoke only to family at first, until news of the agreement broke Sunday. That’s when Semien called former Texas teammate Max Scherzer to ask him about playing in New York. Scherzer pitched for the Mets from 2022-23.

“I just asked him a lot more about family stuff more than baseball stuff, because I know he has four kids of his own, and just kind of bounced some things off of him, about how we’re going to do things moving forward,” Semien said.

“In terms of baseball itself, I couldn’t be more excited to play in a large market, play in front of a fan base that brings energy every single night, because that brings the best out of me.”

Semien grew up in the Bay Area and attended Cal, but said New York was his favorite city to play in on the road.

He was sidelined with a broken foot when Texas took two of three from the Mets at Citi Field in September.

“I just sat back and watched and I liked the passion that the Mets players were playing with,” Semien said. “I liked the young pitching staff that they were putting out there and the stuff that those guys had. And I’ve just been thinking about that series and imagining myself on that side now, and it makes me really excited.”

Semien won his second Gold Glove this season despite missing the final 5 1/2 weeks after fouling a pitch off his foot Aug. 20. That was only the second time he was on the injured list in 13 big league seasons. He’s played at least 155 games eight times.

“I want to be a player who plays every single day. I want to be a player who runs every single ball out,” he said. “I take a ton of pride in keeping my body healthy, making sure my defense is on point.

“I feel like when I play every day, I get better. Experience is key in this game. Playing every day, getting better throughout the year is something that I want to do.”

Semien, a three-time All-Star, has finished third in AL MVP voting three times with three different teams: the Athletics in 2019, the Toronto Blue Jays in 2021 and Texas in 2023, when he helped the Rangers win their lone World Series title.

His OPS dipped to .699 in 2024 and .669 this year, but he thinks new Mets hitting coaches Jeff Albert and Troy Snitker can help him regain his stroke at the plate.

“Offensively, I think that I still have a lot to offer,” Semien said. “I’m disappointed in the way that I performed offensively last year.”

He knows it will be no easy task stepping into the lineup for the popular and respected Nimmo, who compiled a .760 OPS this year and set career highs with 25 homers and 92 RBIs.

“I understand how good of a clubhouse presence Brandon was. I understand how much of a fan favorite Brandon was, and I feel for the Mets fans when you lose a player who’s been present and who’s been such a fixture in that lineup and in the community and has a great personality and such a nice guy,” Semien said.

“I want to get to know the fans, get to know the community, let my game do the talking. And I think I definitely will be a presence in that locker room that guys can lean on. That’s always a goal of mine. … Hopefully Brandon, the things that he did, hopefully I can fill in and do as well.”

Modesto’s new Pioneer Baseball League team, recently named the Glow Riders, announced six-time Gold Glove award winner and former San Francisco Giant J.T. Snow as its manager last week. The Glow Riders, an expansion team, will compete in the same league as Oakland’s Ballers.

Snow played first base for most of his career and won the premier position-player award six consecutive times from 1995 to 2000 as both a California Angel and a Giant.

His career slashes (batting average, on base percentage and slugging) were .268/.357/.427.

Snow was initially drafted by the New York Yankees in 1992 but was traded to the Angels the next season. He played for the Angels from 1993 to 1996. He was traded in 1997 to the Giants, where he played until 2005. Snow’s tenure with the Giants included a World Series appearance in 2002. The Giants lost to Snow’s former team, the Angels, in game seven. Snow had a .407 batting average in that series. He retired a Giant in 2008.

Since 2024, Snow had been the bench manager for the Ballers, who made headlines for replacing the Oakland Athletics following their departure for Las Vegas via Sacramento. The Ballers won the Pioneer League championship in 2025.

Snow was announced at a press conference held at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel in downtown Modesto.

During his address, Snow covered how he was going to roster the team, his style-of-play philosophy and his approach to community engagement. Snow said he did his research into the history of baseball in the area and called it “a great baseball town.”

“We’re an independent baseball team and we don’t have any affiliation with any major league team, so we’re going to have an affiliation with the people of Modesto and the fans of Modesto,” he said. The press conference also announced Alex Leach as the team’s pitching coach. Leach is the head coach for Modesto Junior College’s Pirates baseball team.

The Glow Riders will arrive as the Single-A Modesto Nuts — an affiliate of the Seattle Mariners since 2017 — will relocate to San Bernardino in 2025.

Athletics slugger Nick Kurtz was accompanied by a good friend as he joined one exclusive club on Monday night.

Kurtz was a unanimous choice for American League Rookie of the Year, and Atlanta Braves catcher Drake Baldwin won the National League award.

“It’s a great honor that I’m going to be put up with some of baseball’s greats who won the award,” Kurtz said. “It puts some finishing touches on the year, look back on it and enjoy what I’ve done a little bit.”

The 22-year-old Kurtz is the 14th unanimous selection for the AL honor and the second from the A’s franchise, joining Mark McGwire in 1987. Finishing right behind Kurtz was A’s teammate Jacob Wilson, and Red Sox outfielder Roman Anthony was third.

It was the fifth time in the AL and ninth time overall that teammates finished in the top two spots in Rookie of the Year balloting. The last time it happened in the AL was the Mariners’ Alvin Davis and Mark Langston in 1984.

“It’s awesome. He was actually in the same room with me 30 minutes ago or so,” Kurtz said of Wilson.

“That’s something that we really wanted to do together. It shows the kind of teammates we are and how we strive to make each other better.”

The 22-year-old Kurtz batted .290 with 36 homers, 86 RBIs and a 1.002 OPS in 117 games this year. The first baseman became the eighth rookie since 1901 to finish with an OPS over 1.000 while making at least 400 plate appearances.

For winning Kurtz will be credited with a full year of major league service instead of 159 days, under the collective bargaining agreement. If he isn’t sent back to the minor leagues and there isn’t a work stoppage that costs him service days, he would become eligible for free agency after the 2030 season.

Baldwin, 24, stepped up for Atlanta after No. 1 catcher Sean Murphy was sidelined by a cracked rib in spring training. While Murphy was limited by injuries for much of the year, Baldwin hit .274 with 19 homers, 80 RBIs and an .810 OPS in 124 games.

Baldwin’s win secured an extra selection for Atlanta after the first round in next year’s amateur draft under the collective bargaining agreement’s prospect promotion incentive.

“I was just going into it with an open mind, kind of realizing how cool it is to even be a finalist for it,” Baldwin said. “But I didn’t know how it was going to turn out. I know it’s tough to rank or try to judge who had a better year between a pitcher and a hitter or a catcher.”

Baldwin received 21 of 30 first-place votes. Cubs right-hander Cade Horton got the other nine first-place votes and finished second, followed by Brewers third baseman Caleb Durbin. The balloting was conducted before the postseason.

Baldwin said Horton had a fantastic year.

“Either way, even if he would’ve won, I would have had all the respect in the world for him and I’d have understood why,” he said.

Baldwin and Kurtz each get $750,000 from a pre-arbitration bonus pool, and runners-up Horton and Wilson each receive $500,000.

The Manager of the Year for each league will be announced on Tuesday, followed by the Cy Young Award winners on Wednesday.

Kurtz, 22, starred at Wake Forest University before he was selected by the A’s with the No. 4 pick in the 2024 amateur draft. The 6-foot-5 slugger began this season in the minors, but he hit an RBI single in his first big league at-bat on April 23 against Texas.

It was a sign of things to come.

He hit a solo drive off Dodgers reliever J.P. Feyereisen for his first big league homer on May 13. He belted four more homers in a span of four days that same month, including his first career multihomer game on May 21 against the Angels.

He had his signature performance on July 25 at Houston, becoming the youngest player in major league history and the first rookie to hit four home runs in one game. He went 6 for 6 with eight RBIs while matching an MLB record with 19 total bases.

Kurtz is the ninth winner for the A’s overall, second in the AL behind the Yankees’ 10.

Baldwin was a third-round pick in the 2022 draft out of Missouri State University. He started on opening day for Atlanta and got his first major league hit on March 29 at San Diego.

Baldwin had one of his biggest days of the season on July 21, driving in six runs in a 9-5 victory over San Francisco. He went deep twice and finished with five RBIs in his first career multihomer game on Aug. 7, an 8-6 win over Miami.

Baldwin is the seventh catcher to win the NL honor and the second from the Braves, joining Earl Williams in 1971. He is the 10th winner from the Braves franchise overall, second in the NL behind the Dodgers with a record 18.

Baldwin’s new manager, Walt Weiss, was the 1988 AL Rookie of the Year with the A’s. Weiss had been the Braves’ bench coach since 2018.

“The last game of the year he told me good luck,” Baldwin said. “Even being on the same list as him is pretty cool. Everyone respects him. He’s a great guy.”

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/MLB

Here’s everything you need to know about the 52-year-old tasked with leading Colorado out of its worst three-year stretch in club history. The team has yet to make an official announcement about the hire.

DePodesta, currently the Chief Strategy Officer for the Cleveland Browns, is most famous for one of his first jobs in baseball. He was an assistant general manager to Oakland GM Billy Beane, and DePodesta was featured heavily in Michael Lewis’ bestselling book “Moneyball,” which was then turned into a movie. Jonah Hill portrayed DePodesta in the movie as the character Peter Brand.

What is Paul DePodesta’s background?

DePodesta was born in Alexandria, Virginia, and attended Harvard University, where he graduated with a degree in economics. He played baseball and football for the Crimson. As Lewis wrote in “Moneyball,” DePodesta “was just the sort of person who might have made an easy fortune in finance, but the market for baseball players, in Paul’s view, was far more interesting than anything Wall Street offered.” DePodesta’s first baseball job was with Cleveland, where he started in 1996 as an intern in player development. He spent three seasons with Cleveland, becoming an advance scout and later special assistant to the GM before moving to the Athletics in 1999.

DePodesta with the A’s

During DePodesta’s time with Oakland from 1999 to 2003, the A’s won three divisional titles and one wild card as the organization used sabermetrics to give the small-market club a major advantage on the field. Oakland applied that approach in both free agency and the draft, a realm that draft-and-build Colorado has struggled in over the past decade. Lewis wrote in “Moneyball” that “Billy (Beane) and Paul no longer think of the draft as a crapshoot. They are a pair of card counters at the blackjack tables; they think they’ve found a way to turn the odds inside the casino against the owner. They think they can take over the casino.” In some ways, they did: What Beane and DePodesta accomplished in Oakland changed the way nearly every MLB team evaluated players’ potential and worth.

DePodesta’s tenure in the NL West

DePodesta’s success with Oakland catapulted him to the general manager job with the Dodgers in 2004. At 31 years old, he was one of the youngest GMs in baseball history. In his first season with L.A., the club had its first playoff win since winning the 1988 World Series. He didn’t last long in L.A., however, as he was fired following the 2005 season after the team went 71-91 and finished fourth in the division. DePodesta then spent five seasons with the Padres from 2006-10, where he was a special assistant for baseball operations and the club’s executive vice president.

Mets, transition to football

From San Diego, DePodesta went to the New York Mets, where he was the club’s vice president of player development and amateur scouting from 2011-15. In that time, the Mets improved drastically, eventually culminating in a World Series appearance in 2015, where they lost to the Royals. DePodesta then jumped to football, becoming the Browns’ Chief Strategy Officer on Jan. 5, 2016. According to the team’s site, in that role, DePodesta “is tasked with implementing systems and processes to strengthen the Browns organization.”

Does DePodesta have any ties to the Rockies?

DePodesta worked with two guys with significant past ties to the Rockies. Dan O’Dowd, who was the Rockies’ GM from 1999 to 2014, was the assistant GM for Cleveland during DePodesta’s time there and was one of DePodesta’s baseball mentors. Plus, Jim Tracy, who managed the Rockies from 2009-12, was the Dodgers’ manager when DePodesta was GM there. DePodesta would be the second Colorado front office leader to have played baseball for Harvard, joining Jeff Bridich, who is four years younger.

The team, in case you missed it, is playing in limbo in Sacramento for at least three seasons until a planned move to Las Vegas can be executed. But fans of the Oakland-era of the Green and Gold can take a trip down memory lane this month when they tune in to a a playoff game — any playoff game.

All 12 of the teams that reached the postseason have some direct connection to the Oakland A’s. Even the Cincinnati Reds, the first team eliminated from the wild card round, had some old Stomper mojo going for it. Manager Terry Francona was Ken Macha’s bench coach in 2003, and his first base coach is former Oakland outfielder Collin Cowgill. As for players, the Reds had utilityman Miguel Andujar (acquired in mid-season from the Sacramento A’s, so he and now-Padres reliever Mason Miller go down as the first Oakland/Sacramento Athletics to appear in a playoff game) and reliever Emilio Pagan, appeared in 55 games with the A’s in 2018 after being acquired from the Mariners for Ryon Healy.

Here’s a look at the rest of the Oakland A’s connections to this season’s playoffs:

American League

Boston Red Sox

Andrew Bailey — Boston’s pitching coach was an All-Star in each of his first two seasons with the A’s and was the A.L. rookie of the year in 2009 when he saved 26 games (and won six more) on a 75-win team. After the 2011 season he was traded to the Red Sox in the deal that brought Josh Reddick to Oakland.

Nick Sogard — The Red Sox infielder is the cousin of fan favorite Eric Sogard.

Cleveland Guardians

Stephen Vogt – Oakland fans are not the only ones who believe in Stephen Vogt. The two-time All-Star and one of the most beloved Oakland A’s players of all-time led Cleveland to the AL Central title last season as a rookie manager, but that was just the start. This season he guided the Guardians from 15.5 games behind the Tigers in early July — and 10.5 out at the beginning of September — to repeat as division champs.

Bonus A’s connection: Guardians sparkplug left fielder Steven Kwan is a Fremont native and graduated from Washington High, the same school as A’s Hall of Famer Dennis Eckersley.

Detroit Tigers

A.J. Hinch – The Tigers manager was Oakland’s third-round pick in 1996 and played two seasons with the A’s, but his biggest impact to the franchise was being part of a three-way trade that brought Johnny Damon, Cory Lidle and Mark Ellis to the Bay Area.

Gary Jones — Detroit’s first base coach was Art Howe’s first base coach in 1998 after nearly a decade as a minor league manager for the franchise.

Bonus A’s connection: Tigers ace Tarik Skubal didn’t play for the A’s, but he was born in Hayward and grew up in Fremont, and went 2-1 with a 1.19 ERA in four career starts at the Coliseum.

New York Yankees

Paul Blackburn — The A’s lone All-Star in 2022 pitched in Oakland for eight seasons, setting the franchise set the team record for the most scoreless innings to start the season in (22) in 2024. Blackburn pitched in eight games as a reliever for the Yankees after he was released by the Mets.

Mike Harkey — The Yankees bullpen coach made 12 starts for the A’s in 1995. He was released in mid-July to make room for Ariel Prieto in the rotation.

Bonus A’s connection:  Yankees superstar Aaron Judge grew up in Liden and attended games at the Coliseum as a kid. He was Oakland’s 31st pick in the 2010 draft but went to Fresno State instead.

Seattle Mariners

Kevin Seitzer — The Mariners’ batting coach was signed in 1993 to replace all-time A’s great Carney Lansford at third base, but Seitzer hit .255 and was released in July. His departure opened the door for Craig Paquette. Seitzer finished second to A’s slugger Mark McGwire in the 1987 A.L. Rookie of the Year vote.

Bonus A’s connection: Mariners ace and Alameda High grad Bryan Woo goes down in history as the last Oakland-born major leaguer to play in the Coliseum.

Toronto Blue Jays

Chris Bassitt — Acquired after the 2014 season from the White Sox along with Marcus Semien and Josh Phegley for Jeff Samardzija and Michael Ynoa, and spent six seasons in Oakland. Barely a month after appearing in the 2021 All-Star game, he was struck in the face by a line drive during his start in Chicago. He returned to the Coliseum mound barely a month later and pitched three scoreless innings against the Mariners. His trade to the Mets before spring training in 2022 was considered by many the beginning of the end of the franchise in Oakland, with Matt Olson and Matt Chapman traded just days later.

Ernie Clement — Had a six-game audition with Oakland in 2022 after being claimed off waivers from Cleveland, batted .056 and was dumped before the start of spring training. Clement, 29, has been the Blue Jays’ starting third baseman the past two seasons and has hit .276 with 22 home runs and 111 RBIs with the team.

National League

Chicago Cubs

Daniel Palencia — the Cubs closer never played for Oakland — he was a 21-year-old A’s prospect pitching at Stockton in 2021 when he was traded to the Cubs for Rod Beck lookalike Andrew Chafin.

Los Angeles Dodgers

Max Muncy – The biggest Oakland property that got away: He debuted with the A’s in 2015 at the age of 24, hit .195 with five home runs in 96 games and was released late in spring training in 2017. He’s made two All-Star teams and hit 209 homers the past eight seasons with the Dodgers, which is seventh in franchise history, just two behind Steve Garvey. No relation to the Max Muncy who made his debut this season with Sacramento.

Blake Treinen – The hard-throwing reliever spent parts of three seasons in the A’s bullpen, collecting 67 of his 82 career saves and representing Oakland at the 2018 All-Star Game.

Bob Geren — The A’s manager from 2007-2011 is the Dodgers’ minor league field coordinator.

UPDATE: After not being on the Dodgers’ roster for the first three series of the postseason, right-handed reliever Will Klein made the World Series roster as an injury replacement and got the win in the epic Game 3 18-inning win, allowing one hit and two walks with five strikeouts in four scoreless innings after coming on in the 15th. Klein had a brief and forgettable run with the A’s after being acquired from the Royals during the 2024 season in the Lucas Erceg trade. Klein appeared in three games in August, allowing six of the 11 batters he faced to reach base and five of them scored. He was traded to the Mariners after the season and then traded to the Dodgers in June. Before Game 3, he’d never thrown more than two innings or 36 pitches in his professional career.

Milwaukee Brewers

Jared Koenig – The Aptos High grad’s path to the majors wasn’t easy — he went undrafted out of college, had stints in independent ball, including with the San Rafael Pacifics, but caught the A’s attention and appeared in 10 games in 2022. Koenig, 31, signed a minor-league deal with the Brewers before the 2024 season and has become one of the key members of Milwaukee’s bullpen, appearing in 127 games with a 2.67 ERA over the past two seasons.

William Contreras – Never appeared in a game with Oakland, but was part of another of the significant cost-cutting deals that marked the end of the franchise’s era in the Bay Area. The Brewers got their All-Star catcher from the Braves as part of the Sean Murphy three-team swap in December of 2022.

Rickie Weeks — The Brewers associate manager never played for the A’s, but his little brother, Jemile, played three seasons (2011-13) in Oakland.

Bonus A’s connection: The Brewers appear to have a keeper in Chad Patrick, who they acquired from the A’s after the 2023 season for 94 games of Abraham Toro. Patrick, who had appeared in just six games above Double-A at that point, started 23 games as a 26-year-old rookie this season with a 3.53 ERA and averaged more than a strikeout per inning.

Philadelphia Phillies

Jesus Luzardo — A’s fans in the early 2020s envisioned a rotation anchored by Luzardo and A.J. Puk. That never happened, with Luzardo shipped off to the Marlins during the 2021 season, but the lefty, now 27, has found a home with the Phillies. Luzardo went 15-7 with a 3.92 ERA.

Lou Trivino –– After spending his first five seasons with Oakland the reliever has bounced around — Yankees, Giants, Dodgers — and appeared in 10 games (with a 2.00 ERA) after joining the Phillies for the final month of the season.

Sam Fuld – The former A’s outfielder is transitioning to the Phillies’ president of business operations after four seasons as the Phllies’ vice president and general manager. His teams reached the playoffs three times, including the 2022 World Series.

San Diego Padres

Mason Miller — The hard-throwing former A’s closer was traded from Sacramento to the Padres at the deadline. His playoff appearance in Game 2 against the Cubs on Wednesday was something Oakland fans might recognize: six batters faced, five strikeouts and a hit batter.

Ramón Laureano – The former A’s outfielder wasn’t on the wild card roster after suffering a broken right index finger. But he might be activated if the Padres get past the Cubs.

WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — After spending this season in California’s capital city without acknowledging that on their uniforms beyond a should patch, the Athletics will have “Sacramento” written on gold alternate jerseys in 2026.

The A’s were in Oakland for 57 seasons through 2024, but plan to move to Las Vegas beginning in 2028. They’re using Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento, the home of the San Francisco Giants’ Triple-A affiliate (the River Cats), for at least three seasons until a proposed ballpark in Vegas is built.

Officially known as simply the Athletics in 2025, the team did take criticism for not fully embracing its temporary home. The “Sacramento” gold alternate jerseys could temper some of that criticism.

“The new ‘Sacramento’ jersey is our way of … saying thank you to the fans, businesses and community leaders who helped bring Major League Baseball to town,” A’s President Marc Badain said in a news release on Sunday.

The A’s will wear the “Sacramento” jerseys for Saturday home games and possibly other games as well next season.

They drew a major league-low home attendance of 768,464 for 81 games, an average of 9,487, down from a total of 922,286 and an average of 11,529 last year at the Oakland Coliseum.

Tampa Bay had the lowest attendance, drawing 786,750 for an average of 9,713 at Steinbrenner Field, the New York Yankees’ spring training facility, which served as a temporary home for the Rays this year following damage to Tropicana Field caused by Hurricane Milton.

While there were fears of extreme heat based on 2024 weather, the highest game-time temperature was 99 degrees (37 Celsius) for a July 10 night game against Atlanta, and just eight of 81 home games started with a temperature of 90 degrees (32 Celsius) or higher.

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/MLB

Now the Bay Area native is set to call the shots of his own.

According to ESPN’s Jeff Passan, Toboni is finalizing a deal to become the Washington Nationals’ new head of baseball operations. The 35-year-old will succeed Mike Rizzo, who was fired by the club earlier this season after a 17-year tenure leading the Nationals.

Toboni currently serves as one of five assistant general managers for the Red Sox, initially earning a promotion to the role ahead of the 2024 season. Toboni has served in the Red Sox organization in various capacities since 2015, starting as an intern and steadily working his way up through the front office, primarily in scouting roles.

Toboni was a baseball and basketball star at St. Ignatius High in San Francisco before crossing the Bay to join the Cal Bears baseball team. He was part of the same recruiting class as Marcus Semien and also played with Mark Canha.

Hip injuries limited the infielder to barely two dozen games with the Bears. After graduation, Toboni attended Notre Dame to pursue an MBA, but his career trajectory changed after he did a summer internship with the A’s. He landed another internship with the Red Sox and then quickly moved up the ranks.

By age 30 Toboni had been promoted to director of amateur scouting, which saw him lead the drafts that landed many of the club’s current young standouts, most notably Roman Anthony and Marcelo Mayer. Several more promotions followed, and he even interviewed for the Red Sox’s chief baseball officer job that ultimately went to Breslow.

Toboni was also believed to be among the candidates to serve as Red Sox general manager, serving as the No. 2 under Breslow.

Toboni will have his work cut out for him in Washington.

The Nationals are wrapping up a disappointing season, entering Wednesday last in the NL East with a 65-94 record. In addition to Rizzo, the Nationals also fired longtime manager Dave Martinez as part of a larger house cleaning, so finding a new manager will be among the first orders of business for Toboni.

Washington does have a lot of promising young talent, most notably 23-year-old outfielder James Wood and 26-year-old right-hander MacKenzie Gore, both of whom were named All-Stars for the first time in their careers this summer. The Nationals also held the No. 1 overall selection in this year’s draft, taking 17-year-old infielder Eli Willits with the top pick.

The Boston Herald contributed to this report.

NEW YORK  — Robot umpires are getting called up to the big leagues next season.

Major League Baseball’s 11-man competition committee on Tuesday approved the use of the Automated Ball/Strike System in the major leagues in 2026.

Human plate umpires will still call balls and strikes, but teams can challenge two calls per game and get additional appeals in extra innings. Challenges must be made by a pitcher, catcher or batter — signaled by tapping their helmet or cap — and a team retains its challenge if successful. Reviews will be shown as digital graphics on outfield videoboards.

Adding the robot umps is likely to cut down on ejections. MLB said 61.5% of ejections among players, managers and coaches last year were related to balls and strikes, as were 60.3% this season through Sunday. The figures include ejections for derogatory comments, throwing equipment while protesting calls and inappropriate conduct.

Big league umpires call roughly 94% of pitches correctly, according to UmpScorecards.

“Throughout this process we have worked on deploying the system in a way that’s acceptable to players,” Commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement. “The strong preference from players for the challenge format over using the technology to call every pitch was a key factor in determining the system we are announcing today.”

ABS, which utilizes Hawk-Eye cameras, has been tested in the minor leagues since 2019. The independent Atlantic League trialed the system at its 2019 All-Star Game and MLB installed the technology for that year’s Arizona Fall League of top prospects. The ABS was tried at eight of nine ballparks of the Low-A Southeast League in 2021, then moved up to Triple-A in 2022.

At Triple-A at the start of the 2023 season, half the games used the robots for ball/strike calls and half had a human making decisions subject to appeals by teams to the ABS.

MLB switched Triple-A to an all-challenge system on June 26, 2024, then used the challenge system this year at 13 spring training ballparks hosting 19 teams for a total of 288 exhibition games. Teams won 52.2% of their ball/strike challenges (617 of 1,182).

At Triple-A this season, the average challenges per game increased to 4.2 from 3.9 through Sunday and the success rate dropped to 49.5% from 50.6%. Defenses were successful in 53.7% of challenges this year and offenses in 45%.

In the first test at the big-league All-Star Game, four of five challenges of plate umpire Dan Iassogna’s calls were successful in July.

Teams in Triple-A do not get additional challenges in extra innings. The proposal approved Tuesday included a provision granting teams one additional challenge each inning if they don’t have challenges remaining.

MLB has experimented with different shapes and interpretations of the strike zone with ABS, including versions that were three-dimensional. Currently, it calls strikes solely based on where the ball crosses the midpoint of the plate, 8.5 inches from the front and the back. The top of the strike zone is 53.5% of batter height and the bottom is 27%.

This will be MLB’s first major rule change since sweeping adjustments in 2024. Those included a pitch clock, restrictions on defensive shifts, pitcher disengagements such as pickoff attempts and larger bases.

The challenge system introduces ABS without eliminating pitch framing, a subtle art where catchers use their body and glove to try making borderline pitches look like strikes. Framing has become a critical skill for big league catchers, and there was concern that full-blown ABS would make some strong defensive catchers obsolete. Not that everyone loves it.

“The idea that people get paid for cheating, for stealing strikes, for moving a pitch that’s not a strike into the zone to fool the official and make it a strike is beyond my comprehension,” former manager Bobby Valentine said.

Former Giants manager Bruce Bochy, a big league catcher from 1978-87 who now manages Texas, maintained that old-school umpires such as Bruce Froemming and Billy Williams never would have accepted pitch framing. He said they would have told him: “’If you do that again, you’ll never get a strike.’ I’m cutting out some words.”

Management officials on the competition committee include Giants chairman Greg Johnson, Seattle chairman John Stanton, St. Louis CEO Bill DeWitt Jr., Colorado CEO Dick Monfort, Toronto CEO Mark Shapiro and Boston chairman Tom Werner.

Players include Arizona’s Corbin Burnes and Zac Gallen, Detroit’s Casey Mize, Seattle’s Cal Raleigh and the New York Yankees’ Austin Slater, with the Chicago Cubs’ Ian Happ at Detroit’s Casey Mize as alternates. The union representatives make their decisions based on input from players on the 30 teams.

Bill Miller is the umpire representative.