Players who played for the Astros and Athletics | Immaculate Grid Answers for Grid 115 July 26, 2023

Are you hooked on Immaculate Grid, the daily trivia game from Baseball Reference? We sure are! We’ll warn you right now—this blog post contains spoilers. But if you’re looking for a little help with today’s grid (or you already filled it out and want to know who else qualified) read on.

To fill out today’s grid, you need to choose a player who played for both the Astros and Athletics. There were 90 players who played with both Houston and Oakland Here are some examples:

Josh Reddick

Josh Reddick got his first shot at playing regularly in the majors in mid-year 2011, two years after making his debut, when J.D. Drew went on the disabled list for the Boston Red Sox.

Reddick was a 17th round draft choice by the Red Sox in the 2006 amateur draft, out of a junior college in his native Georgia. He was signed by scout Rob English and had a good start to his professional career in 2007, hitting .306 with 17 doubles, 6 triples and 18 homers for the Greenville Drive in the South Atlantic League, excellent production for a 20-year-old player with no previous professional or college experience. He also was called up to the AA Portland Sea Dogs for one game, going 0 for 1. In 2008, in spite of his success the previous year, he was back at Greenville to start the season, but he was so hot that the Red Sox had no choice but to promote him. He hit .340 in 14 games to earn a ticket to the Lancaster JetHawks of the California League. There, he took full advantage of the hitter-friendly environment to put up an eye-popping line of .343/.375/.593 in 76 games, during which he hit 17 long balls. He was named to the league’s post-season all-star team, but was not yet finished as he moved up to Portland to finish the year. There, he hit only .214, but with 6 homers in 34 games. Between the three levels, he had hit .311 in 124 games, with 19 doubles, 12 triples and 23 homers, while stealing 14 bases in 17 attempts.

Chris Carter

Chris Carter tied for the NL lead in home runs, belting 41 with the Milwaukee Brewers. The following season was, somehow, his last.

Carter was signed by the Chicago White Sox and scouts George Kachigian and Joe Butler as a 15th round pick in 2005. He made his debut with the Bristol White Sox, hitting .283/.350/.485 while leading the team with 10 home runs and 37 RBI. One problem was a .222 average against left-handers as he had a reverse platoon split. He led the Appalachian League with 7 sacrifice flies. He spent the majority of the next season, 2006, with the Great Falls White Sox and hit .299/.398/.570 while leading the Pioneer League with 15 homers. He tied Chris Valaika for the lead with 143 total bases, finished second in slugging to Danny Dorn, and led league first basemen in putouts (558), errors (16) and double plays (62). He was rated the league’s 14th best prospect by Baseball America, one spot behind Valaika, and was the league’s All-Star first baseman. He was with the Kannapolis Intimidators in 2007 and batted .291/.383/.522 with 25 home runs and 93 RBI, leading White Sox farmhands in the latter two departments. Baseball America rated him the best power prospect and 10th best overall prospect in the South Atlantic League after he finished third in homers and tied for third in RBI. He was named to the SAL All-Star team at DH.

Miguel Tejada

Miguel Tejada won the home run derby at the 2004 All-Star Game in Houston, TX, with a short-lived record of 15 in one round. That is just one of a number of highlights in a remarkable career that saw him win an MVP Award while being named to the All-Star team six times.

Signed by the Oakland Athletics out of the Dominican Republic in 1993, Tejada first reached the majors with the A’s late in the 1997 season. He came up when two other young shortstops were making headlines in the American League, Derek Jeter with the New York Yankees and Nomar Garciaparra with the Boston Red Sox. Both had won a Rookie of the Year Award – Jeter in 1996 and Garciaparra in 1997, so at first Tejada was a forgotten man in the relative anonymity of Oakland, especially after a sub-par rookie season when he only hit .233 with 11 homers in 1998. He blossomed, however, after hitting 21 homers and driving in 84 runs in 1999. In 2000, he hit .275 with 30 homers and 115 RBI to draw his first MVP votes, then repeated in 2001 with a .267 average, 31 homers and 113 RBI. He did not miss a single game during those two seasons. Still under the radar of most fans at that point, he burst into prominence during 2002, the A’s famous “Moneyball” season, when he made a number of key hits to propel comeback wins in the late season and his name suddenly became prominent. He played in the All-Star Game for the first time and finished the season with a .308 average, 34 homers and 131 RBI, scoring 108 runs. He was voted the winner of the 2002 American League Most Valuable Player Award, besting his two rivals Jeter and Garciaparra, neither of which ever were MVP.

Aledmys Díaz

Aledmys Díaz debuted in the majors in 2016.

He debuted for the Naranjas de Villa Clara in 2007-2008 by going 9 for 32 in a utility role. At age 19 in 2008-2009, Aledmis hit .301/.403/.482 but fielded only .930 as a regular infielder. He was third in the Cuban Serie Nacional with 24 errors.

Díaz batted .282/.348/.363 and fielded .950 as Villa Clara’s starting shortstop in 2009-2010. He tied for 5th in the Serie Nacional with 18 errors, having improved his defense. He was on the Cuban squad that won the Gold Medal in the 2010 World University Championship. He was 0 for 3 for the Cuban national team in the 2010 Pan American Games Qualifying Tournament, backing up Yorbis Borroto at short; it was his only appearance for the national team in a major event. He batted .294/.437/.433 with 16 doubles in 85 games in 2010-2011, fielding .954 with only four errors in 54 games at SS, taking over for veteran Eduardo Paret and also fielding .949 in 37 games at 3B.

He hit .315/.404/.500 with 12 homers in 2011-2012 and fielded .975, with 9 errors, splitting time between shortstop and third base. It was his last season in Cuba. He was 1 for 6 with an error as a backup for Cuba int he 2012 Haarlem Baseball Week.

Robbie Grossman

Robbie Grossman made his big league debut in 2013.

Grossman played for Team USA in the 2007 Junior Pan American Games, hitting .450/.478/.450 to lead the team’s starters in average. He hit 11 homers as a high school senior and committed to the University of Texas. Due to the college commitment, he fell to the 5th round of the 2008 amateur draft before being chosen by the Pittsburgh Pirates. Baseball America had rated him as the #49 prospect entering the draft. He was signed by scout Mike Leuzinger shortly before the deadline, for a $1 million bonus and a paid college education. It was a Pirates signing bonus record for such a late round.

All 110 Players

You can see all 90 players who played with both Houston and Oakland on Baseball Reference. Good luck with your grid!

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