Oakland A's fans are truly amazing. On Thursday, fan group Last Dive Bar announced a third former A's player that will be in attendance for the fan-led "Fans Fest" to be held on February 24th . As you can probably tell from the headline, that player is Ben Grieve, who will be joining Khris Davis and Mike Norris. It's been awhile since the A's have thrown their fans a party, but I can't really recall even the team bringing this many former players together for the Fan Fests they put on.
Grieve was the A's first-round selection (second overall) in the 1994 Draft and made his debut with the A's at 21 years old in 1997. His first full year came in 1998, and after hitting .288 with a .388 OBP and 18 home runs, was named an All Star and took home the AL Rookie of the Year award.
Grieve was a pretty solid player for the A's for four seasons, holding a cumulative 120 OPS+ (100 is league average) while batting .280 with a .370 OBP. One thing that started happening was that the lefty was grounding into a lot of double plays, and led the league in the category with 32 in 2000, his final season with Oakland.
He was part of a three-team deal with the Kansas City Royals and Tampa Bay Rays in which the A's traded away A.J. Hinch (now the Tigers manager), and Ángel Berroa to the Royals and Grieve to the Rays in exchange for Cory Lidle, Johnny Damon, and Mark Ellis.
Grieve spent three seasons with the Rays where his stats weren't quite as consistent and in 2003 he missed a large part of the season after needing to have a rib removed to treat a small blood clot in his upper right arm.
Grieve signed with Milwaukee for the 2004 season and was traded to the Chicago Cubs in August. He re-signed with the Cubs on a minor league deal and in the 23 games he played in when he was with the big league club, he racked up a total of 25 plate appearances, being used primarily as a pinch-hitter to end his MLB career.
Regardless of his career arc, A's fans will be excited to see Grieve on February 24th.
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