The All-Star break, which ends when games start today, is a time for the players to give back to the fans (or some such nonsense). It's also a time for baseball writers to fill inches with reflections on the half-season in the books, and with hopes and dreams, if not predictions, for the half-season that arrives in Oakland Thursday night. The first half ended on a high note for the A's, who swept a three-game series against the White Sox and ran their record over .500. And here's the thing about the streak that brought the A's from 17-32 on May 29 to 44-43 on: It coincided, more or less, with Rich Harden's, Nick Swisher's and Bobby Crosby's returns from the disabled list, and the team's being able to field its ideal lineup. In other words, we have reason to believe that the A's are, when healthy, this good.

As we check on the home team's progress, A's Brand Baseball will not be giving out "midseason grades." Assigning grades is part of what we "do" for a "living"; it is by a wide margin our least favorite part of our "job," and we are reasonably confident
that we speak for most of the teachers we know. We don't understand what pleasure other writers find in the conceit behind giving Marco Scutaro a B and Mark Ellis a B- (or something). It's arbitrary, it's not particularly descriptive, it's stupid--kinda like your grades were in school. We'd rather step back, take a look at some of the A's and offer, well, narrative evaluations of their first-half performance.

The outfield underwent a change over the All-Star Break; The A's traded fan favorite (we include ourselves here) Eric Byrnes and minor league IF Omar Quintanilla to Colorado for Ps Joe Kennedy (uh, OK) and Jay Witasick (really? Jay Witasick?). Then, they traded Chad Bradford to Boston for Jay Payton. We don't think Billy Beane is done making roster changes, but we find it encouraging that he's added payroll dollars so freely--GMs who don't expect to compete until next year don't trade for Jays Witasick and Payton. We're also sad to see Byrnesie go; when he's not with us, we're blue. We hope Coors field is kind to him.

Mark Kotsay has made great plays in centerfield this year, and after he extended his contract through 2008 he started hitting home runs. Bobby Kielty has a stupid nickname, but it's based on his very cool hair. Little Nicky Swisher, though he missed three weeks with a shoulder injury, is tied for the AL rookie lead with 11 HRs and seems like an early favorite to take over for Byrnes in the running-around-like-crazy, crashing-into-things department.

1B Dan Johnson is playing about as well as we could expect. He looks like he has a plan at the plate, he seems to have found his power stroke a little bit, and he fields the position adequately. Marco Scutaro is in his second season of being a pleasant surprise at second base, and every day that we find Mark Ellis in the lineup is a good one. Mark Ellis is cool. Johnson, Scutaro and Ellis have made ABs for Keith Ginter and Scott Hatteberg scarce (to say nothing of whatever's going to happen when Erubiel Durazo returns), but that doesn't really bother us.

SS Bobby Crosby is batting third like someone who belongs there. That's uncommon for a second-year player who hit .239 in his rookie season, no matter what postseason accolades he won. In 36 games this season, though, Crosby's line looks great: .324/.380./545 with 5 HR,
and making the A's look good at the game's glamour position.

C Jason Kendall is, frankly, something of a disappointment. He's not Mike Matheny-bad or anything, but Kendall has no homers and has thrown out 11 of 74 basestealers this season.

The pitching staff, which for some reason or another was a big concern heading into the season, has been remarkably good. Kid Canada has dominated his starts, Country Joe is coming around, Kirk Saarloos has outperformed everyone's expectations, and these statistics bear repeating:

Danny Haren: 121.1 IP, 13 HR, 35 BB, 90 K, 4.08 ERA
Mark Mulder: 114 IP, 14 HR, 34 BB, 67 K, 4.34 ERA

A's Brand Baseball is not a reliable source for impartial analysis of Barry Zito's performance, as our love for him knows no bounds. He continues to improve on his dreadful April, though. He's added a slider to that pretty, pretty curve of his; he's lowered his ERA to 3.91 (see: Mulder and Haren); he carries the AL's lowest opponents' batting average into the second half of the season. We're very proud.

Bill King has told Ken Korach not to "be an ass," Korach has waited until a road trip to make fun of him for it (King doesn't travel with the team and couldn't respond), and Ray Fosse has provided us with perhaps our favorite moment of the 2005 season: when a game was delayed because the Coliseum lights weren't on yet, Fosse sang. Ready for this? Fosse sang, "When the lights . . .go down . . . in the city . . ." The crowd went wild.

In our opening-day preview, we saved third base for last, and wrote that Eric Chavez is

The best player on the team, he's really cool, and if the A's contend for the division title--which it says here they will--he contends for the MVP.

That team takes the Coliseum field against Texas tonight at 7:05, on FSN and KFRC. Kid Canada (5-4, 2.53) vs. The Gambler (10-4, 2.54), who oughta be suspended for this game but doesn't know when to fold 'em. Go A's.