Oakland Athletics

The Oakland Athletics will open their 2019 season Thursday on first baseman Matt Olson's 25th birthday against the Los Angeles Angels, but Olson won't be able to celebrate on the diamond. 

The team announced Friday that Olson has undergone a "successful" hamate excision surgery on his right hand after injuring it Thursday against the Seattle Mariners in Tokyo. Olson's injury came on a foul tip. 

Last season was Olson's first full campaign in the majors, and he played in all 162 games for the A's. The 24-year-old earned the American League Gold Glove for a first baseman, becoming the first Athletic to take home the award since 2012. Olson's 29 defensive runs saved were 19 more than any other player, per MLB.

The A's will start this season banged up elsewhere, too, as top pitching prospect Jesus Luzardo has been shut down for four to six weeks with a rotator cuff strain, per Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle.

Per Daniel Brown of The Athletic, Luzardo was progressing toward making the A's starting rotation.

Oakland will turn to 30-year-old Mark Canha, who has been with the A's since 2015, in Olson's absence. Canha appeared in 122 games in 2018, batting .249 with 17 home runs and 52 RBI. For reference, Olson's batting average last season was .247 to go with 29 home runs and 84 RBI. 

However, evidenced by the Gold Glove Award, the A's will miss Olson most on defense. Olson led the league in 2018 with 1,403 putouts. 

The A's were a surprise in 2018 with a 97-65 record, eventually losing to the New York Yankees in the AL Wild Card Game. Olson was a huge part of Oakland surpassing expectations and will continue to be a foundational piece once he's healthy again.

Per the Orthopaedic Journal of Sports Medicine (h/t Jessica Kleinschmidt of NCS Sports Bay Area), injuries to the hamate in a total of 41 baseball players resulted in players returning within three-to-seven weeks with a median return of five weeks. 

On a cloudy Sunday afternoon in early February while pitchers and catchers throughout the land report to big league camps, Bruce Maxwell is on a high school baseball field in the spring chill, being shadowed by a spirited schoolboy named James. The afternoon is full of smiles, and it is difficult to tell which of them is helping the other more. Probably, it's about equal.

James is there with the high school's Best Buddies program, an international organization founded in 1989 for the purpose of helping those with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

"He's amazing," Maxwell says. "He's got a lot of energy. I love doing stuff like this. It's good for them, and it's good for us."

Maxwell and a handful of minor leaguers who are represented by Sports Management Partners—owned by former pitcher and executive Dave Stewart and his wife, Lonnie Murray—are part of the group that's conducting this baseball clinic for the Best Buddies kids. Slowly, over the next several days, Maxwell will lose his minor league mates as they drift away to spring training.

Left alone and still scrounging for a job after six years as a professional is the only man ever to kneel in protest during a national anthem in an MLB uniform.

Colin Kaepernick phoned him shortly after he made his stand, and Kaepernick still checks in with Maxwell regularly to make sure he's OK. Maxwell knows there is the possibility he's being blackballed, but he also knows his circumstances are different than those of Kaepernick.

"I feel that, with everything that comes along with me, it plays a small part in how people view me, or how people might view my career," Maxwell, 28, says in his first extended public comments on what happened in his life since he kneeled. "At the same time, all I can focus on is my work and preparation.

"I've used this time to dig deeper into my personal being and make sure that when I do get that opportunity, I'm prepared for it. Whether it be in Triple-A, the big leagues…wherever it is, be ready to contribute."

It was Sept. 23, 2017, that Maxwell reintroduced the idea of social justice to baseball. Before a game between Maxwell's A's and the Rangers, the catcher knelt during the playing of the national anthem to protest racial inequality and police brutality. The decision brought words of understanding from many in the sport, and even those who wished he hadn't knelt said they respected his choice.

A few weeks later, Maxwell received another blast of attention; this time for all the wrong reasons. That October, he was arrested at his home in Scottsdale, Arizona, and charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and disorderly conduct. He pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct, the weapons charge was dropped and he was sentenced to two years' probation and community service.

Though the A's kept him in 2018—he played in 18 MLB games and then 51 with Triple-A Nashville following a June demotion—the club designated him for assignment Sept. 1, and he became a free agent. In an already frigid market—veteran catchers Matt Wieters and Martin Maldonado remain unsigned—Maxwell's phone has been silent.

"Catching right now might be at its all-time worst," Stewart says. "And when I say all-time worst, I mean there's a big need for catching. A huge need for catching. And this is a young guy. He's not yet in his 30s. He's a good catch-and-throw guy—potential to hit, left-handed bat. All the things that you look for."

In 127 major league games in his career thus far, Maxwell has hit .240 with five home runs and a .314 on-base percentage, though he did show that potential to hit across 60 Triple-A games in 2016, batting .321 with 10 home runs and a .393 OBP. 

Looking for a fresh start, Maxwell hired Sports Management Partners in December after he left his former agent, Matt Sosnick. SMP had a couple of nibbles on Maxwell late in the winter, but those fizzled.

"When we took him on as a client, I told him it wouldn't be easy getting him a job but that we would get him a job playing with an affiliated team," Stewart says. "So I'm kind of surprised now that [we've reached] spring training and we don't have a job for him.

"What I can tell you is this: In talking to teams about Bruce, the knee is not an issue. [Clubs] question more about the weapon than they did the knee."

Maxwell knows this, and he will not hesitate to explain his side of the story and fill in some blanks that he says never made it into the public discussion.

While Ubering home after watching football with friends on an October Saturday in suburban Phoenix, Maxwell, who admittedly had been drinking, ordered food delivery via Postmates. Disoriented at the time, he initially told police that he had canceled the delivery before later saying he simply forgot he had placed the order.

Having absorbed several weeks' worth of social media vitriol and death threats after kneeling—and death threats directed at his family, too, he says—Maxwell says he had descended into a "dark place." So when a loud knock hit his metal-grated door, he says he was startled.

"I was struggling," he says. "I didn't want to go outside. I didn't want to go to lot of public places. I just wanted to stay in my house and play my video games and take care of my business.

"People in Arizona don't come to my house. I have two people with keys to my house, and they're a couple, and they tell me when they come over."

Maxwell had two handguns in his home and, according to both him and the Scottsdale police report, a concealed carry permit. Not that the last part matters in Arizona: The state's gun laws are considered some of the least restrictive in the country. Any person who is not legally prohibited may carry a weapon—open or concealed—without a license.

"Me being on the edge; me having all those things going through my mind—my family getting threatened—I answered my door with my weapon in my hand," Maxwell says. "Once I saw who it was, I was startled. Obviously, I startled the young lady.

"I apologized to her, told her to hold on. I went and put [the gun] away. I came back and told her I'm sorry; I'm going through some things right now and I didn't know who was at my door. She was like, no, it's fine. We had a short little dialogue. She walked away. I told my lawyers that the last thing I'd ever want to do is have a woman feel threatened in my presence. I grew up in a house with two older sisters, a mom."

According to the police report, the delivery woman said the entire interaction lasted "less than 60 seconds," and she dialed 911 upon leaving. The police report described the victim as being "visibly upset and crying when I initially contacted her" and adds that the victim said that when the door opened she was "staring straight at the barrel of a silver handgun" and was "in shock."

During the food exchange, the police report added, Maxwell "held the gun to the side of the door inside the residences as it appeared he still had the gun in his hand."

When police arrived, they phoned Maxwell and ordered him to exit his apartment with his hands raised. He did so, shirtless and shoeless. Officers commanded Maxwell to turn away from them and walk backward toward them, which he also did.

It was when they commanded him to then get down on his knees that Maxwell "verbally refused to comply and asked why he had to," according to the report.

A rifle was pointed at him. He was handcuffed.

"Nobody told me until the next morning why I was being arrested," says Maxwell, who adds that the police refused his request for a shirt and shoes as well. "They booked me that night but didn't tell me what I was charged with until the next morning. I was like, how?"

Meanwhile, a body camera video appeared on TMZ that shows an angry Maxwell venting in the parking lot and, while cuffed in the back of the squad car, telling police, "Fuck the MLB" and "Fuck baseball." He says the video was cut and what you don't see is another twist: One of the 10 officers at the scene briefly was a minor league teammate of Maxwell's in the Oakland system.

"He said: 'We get it. You're [an] MLB player, Bruce,'" Maxwell says, adding that his response was not a swipe at MLB, but rather to emphasize that his job and his status had nothing to do with his reaction to what he felt was the culmination of a cascade of events that began with his kneeling.

"But when you see that clip, and it's cut to make me look bad, that's all you get," Maxwell says.

"I wasn't even posing a threat," he claims of his interaction with the police. "I was cooperating. I was sitting there talking. So for me to be treated like that, and I didn't even do anything. ... I knew exactly what it was for. It was a few weeks after I took a knee."

A friend of his had warned before he knelt for the anthem: Do what you think is right. I support you, but if you make a stand, you must prepare to be sacrificed. Were his friend's words now coming true? The police report makes no mention of recognition of his kneeling. A perplexed Maxwell believes it is no coincidence that his downward spiral started with him taking a knee and the chain of events that followed, from the angry responses he received to the dark place he fell into to the chaos on the night of his arrest.

"The night he kneeled, I happened to be watching the game on TV, and I tweeted: I don't know this kid, but I want to know him," says retired pitcher LaTroy Hawkins, whose 1,042 games pitched over 21 seasons rank 10th all-time. "I messaged him: You know what, dude, I'm proud of you. You don't know what you're getting into, but if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything.

"I said, 'Hey, if you ever need to talk, reach out, I'm available.'"

Maxwell did, and as he had with so many others as he became one of the game's most respected elder statesmen, Hawkins became something of a mentor to the catcher.

Hawkins told him: "Bruce, this might be one of the hardest things you've ever had to do, but you have to stay clean now. After you kneeled, people are going to look at everything you do and come at you. You're going to have to walk that fine line like a cat."

Walking that fine line is something Maxwell knows well. He was born on a U.S. military base in Wiesbaden, Germany, during his father's tour of duty in the U.S. Army. His paternal grandfather was a retired lifetime military officer, and his grandfather and an uncle on his mother's side were also in the military.

His family moved to Huntsville, Alabama, when Maxwell's father was stationed there.

"Kneeling in the MLB, it's a tricky thing," Pittsburgh Pirates right-hander Chris Archer says. "And I said this when Maxwell did it: He was the best person at the time to do it because he is biracial. His dad was in the military, so any of the backlash, he was able to combat it with: What are you talking about? My family's military, I obviously respect my family so I'm not disrespecting the flag or the military."

Growing up in Alabama, Maxwell says, he experienced various forms of racism, from simply getting the looks that those who are of biracial identity (his father is black and his mother is white) receive to outright acts of hostility. During his childhood, he remembers driving home from baseball tournaments late at night and seeing men dressed in sheets—Ku Klux Klan—on the side of the road walking toward the woods. Once, when he was nine or 10, he says, his travel baseball team, coached by his father, won an out-of-town tournament, beating the home club, after which a local man told them that they "better get outta here or they're gonna try to hang us." Maxwell says he and his father were the only two blacks on their team.

Though Maxwell had been considering taking a stance for weeks, the moment that pushed him over the edge came the night before he knelt, when President Donald Trump lambasted kneeling NFL players, declaring owners should respond by saying: "Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. Out! He's fired. He's fired!"

Trump was speaking in Maxwell's hometown of Huntsville at the time. So it became personal.

But before he acted, he first talked it over with his teammates, manager Bob Melvin and general manager David Forst. He told them what he intended to do and why. And he told them that if anybody had any objections, or if anybody was concerned that his actions would damage clubhouse chemistry or team morale, he wouldn't do it.

Nobody objected. And when the time came, infielder Mark Canha reached out and placed his hand on a kneeling Maxwell's shoulder in a show of support.

"I feel like we play one of the most diverse sports in the world, and we've got people from all over the planet that play this beautiful game that we love," says Maxwell, who faced the flag with a hand over his heart as he knelt. "I felt it was my duty to open everybody's eyes to the greatest game that will ever be and to understand that this is not above us as players. Last year African Americans made up 7 percent of all rosters. And I guarantee you the coaches and managers part was less than that."

It is largely because of that 7.8 percent figure that Archer and Yankees pitcher CC Sabathia both say they are not surprised that, more than a year later, Maxwell stands alone. Not one other MLB player has knelt in protest.

"It's a tough sport to try to make a protest when some of the other guys don't look like you," Sabathia says. "That makes it tough. But I think, regardless, the players, African American players and everybody, we're behind him."

Archer says that a couple of days after Maxwell knelt, a rival African American veteran player warned a Rays rookie, also African American, against following Maxwell's lead during batting practice before a game in Tampa Bay.

"He was joking, but serious at the same time," Archer says. "He warned him: Don't kneel. Just don't do it. It was like him being a big brother and saying, Hey, you don't want to have that on your reputation. Even if it dissolves and completely goes away, you just don't need that as a first-year player. You don't want to give anybody any reason to hold something over you.

"Not that they will, but at the end of the day, the owners and front office are making a human decision. So if they hear you're a good guy, they're more likely to sign you. But if there's a mark against you, they may shy away.

"You see it with Colin Kaepernick. Owners don't want that in the clubhouse."

Says Maxwell: "I had everything to lose. It was so big for me personally because I grew up through it, and my dad always taught me to keep my nose to the ground and just shrug it off.

"And I just couldn't do it anymore."

Between his September kneeling and the October 2017 arrest, there was an incident in an Alabama restaurant that made a gossip column-style splash when Maxwell told TMZ a waiter denied him service because he recognized Maxwell for his kneeling. The restaurant manager subsequently said to Fox News that Maxwell was lying. Maxwell told B/R that the waiter has since been fired, and a manager, Zack Gallagher, confirmed that Keegan's Public House underwent wholesale management and staff changes nearly a year ago, but not related to this incident.

The Athletics nevertheless were comfortable enough with Maxwell after the arrest that they stuck with him the next season. And this winter, for a second consecutive year, Hawkins got it cleared through MLB officials to invite Maxwell to its annual Dream Series—a camp and showcase for top minority pitchers and catchers—as a counselor.

"It's serious, but, man, you've got people who have done a lot worse," Hawkins says of Maxwell's arrest. "It wasn't like he was trying to rob her.

"It's disheartening, man. With the state of catching today, no way [under normal circumstances] he doesn't get a job if he was a big league catcher last year. No way."

Without an organization, Maxwell had little access to batting-practice pitchers and catching partners, so he moved in with his new agents in December. In fact, at this Best Buddies clinic, all of the counselors and SMP clients were living with Stewart and Murray—several in the guest house, Maxwell in the main home. They hit during the mornings, work on other drills in the afternoons and lift weights at night.

"Quite frankly, I like having him around," Stewart says. "He's been delightful.

"What's clearly understood, and Bruce and I have talked about it, is he's willing to take a step backwards right now to go forward. He'll do whatever it takes to get an opportunity to play. That in itself is admirable to me."

He's slimmed down some this winter after admittedly arriving in Oakland's camp overweight last spring. He's putting in his work and doing his part. Now, the man who says he had everything to lose can only hope he hasn't lost everything when it comes to the game he loves.

"I've been through a lot," he says. "I'm still standing. I'm still smiling. We're out here doing a special-needs camp in my free time, and I love doing it. There are things I want to do in my life, and baseball paves the way for that.

"I come off hard sometimes. I come off guarded sometimes. But at the same time, guys who really know me know I'm a big-ass teddy bear. I love people. I tell people all time: If you want to get to know me, call me. My phone's always on. If you want to have a conversation, just call me."

                

Scott Miller covers Major League Baseball as a national columnist for Bleacher Report. Follow Scott on Twitter and talk baseball.

The Oakland Athletics reportedly aren't willing to give up on Kyler Murray's baseball career just yet.

Murray appeared to call it quits on a potential Major League Baseball career when he announced "I am firmly and fully committing my life and time to becoming an NFL quarterback," but Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reported Oakland still believes the Oklahoma product could suit up for its team.

Rosenthal noted the A's have recently received "conflicting signals" from Murray and "believe Murray's statement was crafted by his football agent, Erik Burkhardt of Select Sports Group, to demonstrate an unwavering commitment to the NFL—the kind of commitment NFL teams wanted to hear."

Oakland selected Murray with the No. 9 overall pick in the 2018 MLB draft but signed him to a contract that allowed him to play football for a season with the Sooners.

Rosenthal noted the team always planned on allowing him to participate in the NFL Scouting Combine and still holds the "trump card" of being able to offer him a major league contract in addition to his $4.66 million signing bonus.

While that, plus the injury risk and lack of consistent guaranteed contracts in the NFL, would seemingly favor a baseball career, Jon Taylor of Sports Illustrated highlighted the financial benefits of playing the quarterback position.

He pointed out Baker Mayfield signed a $32.7 million deal with a $21.8 million signing bonus as last year's top overall pick, while even Lamar Jackson received a $9.5 million contract with a $4.7 million signing bonus as the No. 32 pick. Murray could also renegotiate his rookie deal after three years in football but would have to play six seasons prior to free agency in baseball even if he were immediately given a major league contract.

According to Jeff Passan of ESPN, Murray will return $1.29 million of the $1.5 million in signing bonus Oakland gave him last year and then give up the other $3.16 million by March 1. While the Athletics have the right to put him on the restricted list, they will not receive a compensatory draft pick.

Oakland allowed him to play football for the Sooners, and he took full advantage during the 2018 season with 4,361 passing yards, 1,001 rushing yards and 54 total touchdowns on his way to the Heisman Trophy and a College Football Playoff appearance. There are questions about his size, but he is the top dual-threat playmaker in the upcoming draft.

Bleacher Report's Matt Miller projected him to go No. 7 overall to the Jacksonville Jaguars in his latest mock draft. Ohio State's Dwayne Haskins (No. 6) is the only quarterback projected to go ahead of Murray.

The Oakland Athletics remain confident Kyler Murray will show up to spring training in just under two weeks after he declared for the 2019 NFL draft. 

Per Janie McCauley of the Associated Press, A's manager Bob Melvin said the team's expectation right now is for Murray to be in Arizona on Feb. 15 when position players report to camp: 

“As we’re sitting here right now we expect him to be in spring training. Now, look, he has opened up some doors for himself that the world is literally his oyster right now, and I will be for whatever he chooses to do. The football thing, you win the Heisman Trophy and you get drafted in the first round, how often does that happen? He is that type of athlete and he’s going to have a great career in whatever he chooses to do, and we will support whatever he chooses to do. But at this point in time we haven’t heard anything different and I’m expecting him to be in spring training. If something changes in the meantime then we deal with it.”

Murray is still deciding if he will play Major League Baseball or in the NFL next season. The 2018 Heisman Trophy winner took the necessary first step toward a career in pro football on Jan. 14 by declaring for the draft. 

One NFL scout told B/R's Matt Miller that Murray "could absolutely go first overall" in April's draft if he sticks with football. 

If Murray decides to forgo an MLB career, he will have to return the $4.7 million signing bonus he received in June. 

The A's remain in the mix to have their 2018 first-round draft pick play baseball. He could show up for spring training while still preparing for the NFL Scouting Combine, which runs from Feb. 26 to March 4 in Indianapolis.  

Kyler Murray has proved he's no fool.

Murray was drafted into Major League Baseball in June by the Oakland Athletics, who selected him as an outfielder with the No. 9 pick and promptly signed him to a $4.7 million bonus.

Since then, the 21-year-old has kept himself busy by playing quarterback well enough for the Oklahoma Sooners to become the program's second consecutive Heisman Trophy winner. That begat a big decision of whether he should declare for the National Football League draft by Monday's deadline.

Early in the afternoon, the man himself announced his decision on Twitter:

I have declared for the NFL Draft.

— Kyler Murray (@K1) January 14, 2019

As MLB.com's Jane Lee noted, Murray's decision was merely a procedural move.

He's still under contract with the A's. Things will get interesting in February, wherein the A's open spring training on the 15th and the NFL combine starts on the 26th. Because it's already been decided that Murray can't play both baseball and football, next month is when another decision will be in order.

Though MLB.com's Jon Paul Morosi reported Murray would have to give back his signing bonus if he spurns the A's and MLB, doing exactly that and going all-out for an NFL career is about as no-brainery as no-brainers get.

It's not that Murray's some slouch as a baseball player. He was a top-10 pick, after all, and he draws comparisons to some of the greatest talents in the sport's history.

"The big one is Rickey Henderson," said Murray himself in reference to the Hall of Famer and all-time steals leader, per Lee. "I've watched a lot of his film. Great player, great legend, obviously, but I'm pretty confident in my own skills."

According to Joel Anderson and Jake Trotter of ESPN.com, one MLB executive went with a current superstar who's won two American League MVPs: "[Murray's] that type of freak athlete, where the fact that he had a stunted development and didn't play for a couple of years might not matter. That's like Mike Trout-type athletic."

Per MLB.com, Murray's hit, power, speed and fielding tools rate as average or better. Ironically, the one that doesn't make the grade is his arm. But as evidenced by Trout, one need not have a rocket arm to become a superstar center fielder as long as everything else checks out.

But now for the catch: Murray's baseball talent is raw.

He played baseball well enough in high school that he might have been a first-round pick in the 2015 draft had he not opted out of it to pursue a two-sport career at Texas A&M. But after he transferred to Oklahoma later that year, he missed the 2016 baseball season. A year later, he played just 27 games with only 49 at-bats for the Sooners.

Though Murray rescued his stock last spring by slashing .296/.398/.556 with 10 home runs and 10 steals in 51 games, his rawness manifested in a 25.1 percent strikeout rate. A player like this is more high-ceiling than high-floor. That means the A's couldn't skimp on minor league development time for Murray, which in turns means he'd probably be looking at a 2021 ETA for his major league debut.

Murray would only be entitled to the major league minimum ($555,000) through 2023 or 2024. Only after that would he start earning bigger paydays via arbitration, but there would be three years of that before a (perhaps) bigger free-agent payday after 2026 or 2027. He'd be 30 years old in the latter season.

Last week, ESPN's Adam Schefter (via NFL reporter Dov Kleiman) floated the possibility that Murray could go as high as No. 1 overall to the Arizona Cardinals in April's NFL draft:

#Cardinals might be open to Draft Kyler Murray 1st overall and trade away 2018, 10th overall pick QB Josh Rosen, per @AdamSchefter pic.twitter.com/N0JO8XUvYv

— Dov Kleiman (@NFL_DovKleiman) January 10, 2019

It's not just Schefter who has suggested Murray is worthy of the No. 1 pick. Former Texas Tech coach Kliff Kingsbury gave Murray that much credit in October. This same Kingsbury is now the Cardinals' head coach.

If he's not the No. 1 overall selection, the sense Bleacher Report's Matt Miller got from 10 NFL scouts and executives is that Murray is a "lock" for the first round. Based on the numbers he just put up—4,361 yards and 42 touchdowns passing and 1,001 yards and 12 touchdowns rushing—that seems reasonable.

At either end of the first round, Murray would be in line for better money than he got from the A's. To wit, Murray's former Oklahoma teammate Baker Mayfield collected a $21.9 million signing bonus and $32.7 million overall as the No. 1 pick by the Cleveland Browns last year. Even all the way down at No. 32, Lamar Jackson got a $5.0 million bonus and $9.5 million total from the Baltimore Ravens.

Neither of them had to wait long to start. Chances are Murray wouldn't have to either. And because it's easier than ever for quarterbacks to succeed in the NFL—Kevin Clark of The Ringer has more on that—Murray could also quickly follow Mayfield's and Jackson's paths to early stardom.

It would soon be time for Murray to get paid even more. If his rookie contract resembled Mayfield's and Jackson's—four years with a club option for a fifth—he would likely become a free agent after the 2023 season. If he hadn't signed a big deal before then, that would be his path to one.

With football, there's the obvious concern of a serious injury ruining everything during or after Murray's career. But quarterback has always been a relatively safe position, and the NFL has been going to extremes to make it even safer.

Murray is thus in the best position possible for a long career in the NFL, and he could earn far more than he ever could as an MLB outfielder. Here's JJ Cooper of Baseball America with a helpful breakdown:

Numbers for MLB OFs
0 active MLB OFs have made $200m+
3 active MLB OFs have made $150m+
10 active MLB OFs have made $100m+
23 active MLB OFs have made $50m+
35 active MLB OFs have made $25m+
56 active MLB OFs have made $10m+

— JJ Cooper (@jjcoop36) January 14, 2019

In the face of this, all the A's can do in the next few weeks is try to entice Murray with more money up front. To this end, WFAA's Mike Leslie reported Murray's magic number is $15 million.

That isn't accurate, according to Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle. But in light of what he could earn via the NFL draft, $15 million might actually be a conservative estimate of what it would take for the A's to sway Murray. Mind you, any extra money the A's give him would have to come in the form of a major league contract and a spot on their 40-man roster.

Even then, though, Murray's timeline wouldn't necessarily be accelerated.

The only real stipulation (h/t Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times) is that he would have to be with the A's on a full-time basis by 2022, when he'd be in the last of four minor league option years. He'd still have to prove himself in the minors beforehand, and he'd still be six or seven years from free agency upon joining the A's.

To boot, baseball free agency could disappoint Murray. Big bucks have become scarce enough on the last two free-agent markets to raise concerns about a possible work stoppage in the near future. Perhaps the crisis will be resolved when MLB and the MLB Players Association negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement to replace the one that expires in 2021. Then again, perhaps it won't.

If Murray does end up choosing football, MLB will have some serious soul-searching to do about what it must change to have a shot at retaining similar exceptional talents in the future.

The NFL, meanwhile, should be more than happy to have Murray if he goes through its door. Football is what he does best, so he could be worth as many pennies as the sport sends his way.

   

Stats courtesy of D1Baseball.com and Sports Reference. Contract data courtesy of Spotrac.

The Oakland Athletics drafted Kyler Murray No. 8 overall in the 2018 MLB draft, and it appeared the Oklahoma quarterback's future would be in baseball.  

But with rumors circulating that Murray will instead choose a career in the NFL, the Athletics are reportedly making a pitch to Murray to reconsider, per Bob Nightengale of USA Today:

The Oakland #Athletics have a contingent, led by president Billy Beane, meeting today with Heisman Trophy winner Kyler Murray in hopes of persuading him to forego the #NFL and play baseball for them. They drafted him 9th overall last summer and gave him a $4.66 million bonus.

— Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) January 13, 2019

According to a report from Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle on Jan. 9, the Athletics have expected Murray to declare for the NFL draft and that the team "might consider allowing Murray to go the [NFL Scouting Combine], a move that would require the approval of Major League Baseball."

Per Slusser, Murray would have to pay back his signing bonus if he chose football over baseball, though the Athletics wouldn't receive a compensation pick for losing Murray.

"That's a huge problem, not getting a draft pick back," a source told Slusser. "That would be really bad."

A part of his agreement with the Athletics after he was drafted was that Murray would play one year at Oklahoma before reporting to spring training with Oakland. But Murray promptly emerged as one of college football's brightest stars this past season, throwing 4,361 yards, 42 touchdowns and seven interceptions while also rushing for 1,001 yards and 12 additional scores.

That earned him the Heisman Trophy and called into question which sport Murray would ultimately choose. The fact Murray is considered "a lock as a first-round pick in the 2019 NFL draft," per B/R's Matt Miller, further makes the NFL a viable option. 

As one scout told Miller:

"I've gone back and forth. I'm kind of stubborn and old-school, so I've said hell no for the last two months. But in today's game—in a wide-open offense—he has a chance. I mean, he's been the best player by far at every level he's played at, so I can't be surprised if he's a solid quarterback. His tape is hard to evaluate because it's so many 10-second plays holding the ball. He never sets his feet in the pocket and he's tiny. But in all honesty, I kind of think Baltimore would've been better with him than Lamar [Jackson] this past Sunday."

Another scout added that Murray had the talent to play in the NFL but his small stature—he's listed at 5'10"—could be an issue. 

Murray could also try his hand at being a two-sport star, though trying to balance the responsibilities of being an NFL quarterback while playing an entirely different sport seems untenable. Murray is going to have to ultimately choose, and all indications are pointing to him picking football. 

Reigning Heisman Trophy winner Kyler Murray hasn't announced his intentions for 2019, but the Oakland Athletics are anticipating he will give serious consideration to the NFL.

Per Henry Schulman and Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle, the A's are expecting Murray to declare for the 2019 NFL draft.

Despite the possibility of Murray exploring his NFL options, one source told Schulman and Slusser it would not be "contractually significant" if he declares.

The key date for Murray's baseball career is Feb. 15, when the Athletics position players report to spring training:

"He could still opt to be in the A's camp, but the NFL scouting combine begins Feb. 26 and any high-round hopeful would be expected to attend. That's when Murray would have to make a decision between football and baseball, and one source told The Chronicle that Murray, a likely first-round NFL pick, is leaning toward football."

Slusser reported Oakland gave its 2018 first-round draft pick an invite to MLB camp.

If Murray chooses the NFL over MLB, he will have to return the $4.66 million signing bonus he received from the A's. Sports Illustrated's Kalyn Kahler reported last month the Oklahoma quarterback is receiving an NFL draft grade from the College Advisory Committee.

The deadline for underclassmen to declare for the 2019 NFL draft is Jan. 14.

Murray won the 2018 Heisman Trophy after throwing for 4,361 yards and 42 touchdowns to help the Sooners win the Big 12 Championship and make the College Football Playoff.