The move went official this week: the Athletics claimed Drew Rom off waivers from the Brewers, adding a 26-year-old left-hander who's bounced through three organizations in the last few years without ever really sticking.
Rom's path here is a grind. Baltimore took him in the 4th round back in 2018, then flipped him to St. Louis in 2023 as part of the Jack Flaherty trade. The Cardinals barely used him, giving him just 8 big league appearances before cutting him loose from the 40-man last November. He signed a minor league deal with Milwaukee in December, and that's where things started to click.
At Triple-A this year, Rom posted a 2.20 ERA over 41 relief innings with a 36.1% strikeout rate, and his fastball ticked up to 92.5 mph after moving to the bullpen full time, a notable jump from the 90-91 range he sat at as a starter. In limited big league time with Milwaukee, he struck out 11 in 5 2/3 innings. The Brewers' deadline additions plus an injury to shortstop Cooper Pratt squeezed him off the roster, and Oakland scooped him up with an open 40-man spot, no corresponding move required.
This is the kind of claim that won't move the needle for anyone outside Oakland's org, but it's exactly the type of move a rebuilding team makes constantly: cheap, controllable pitching with a real strikeout trick attached to it. Rom still has under 2 years of service time and a minor league option remaining, so the A's can stash him and let him keep proving the bullpen conversion is real before he ever has to matter in a big spot.
For now it's just a name on the transaction wire, but if the velocity spike and strikeout numbers hold up in Oakland's uniform, this is the kind of low-cost pickup teams love to point back to a year later.