After “Moneyball” lost best picture to “The Artist”, my Twitter time line exploded.  Every person who wasn’t an A’s fan had some stupid reference to make about the A’s losing just like the movie.

The A’s have actually won 9 World Series for the record.

Moneyball didn’t take home any Academy Awards, but the whole experience was fun to witness as a fan.  It’s not every day you are going to see Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill sporting an A’s cap, or even talk about the team.  (I’d like also to think that since working on the film they secretly root for them too).

If that’s still not enough to make you feel better about “Moneyball” going 0-6, only two other baseball films have been nominated for Best Picture and neither won.  Only four other actors from baseball movies have been nominated, none of them have won either.

The Academy doesn’t think highly of baseball movies, not even Gary Cooper’s portrayal of Lou Gehrig could get him an Oscar nod.

Thanks to Twitter, Susan Slusser, Jane Lee and Joe Stiglich we have a few notes coming out of Spring Training already:

Bartolo Colon says he is healthy and is ready to take on the leadership role in the Oakland clubhouse.  He Also says he is excited to play for Oakland and thinks they are going to be a “good team” this season.

After having Tommy John surgery last July, Brett Anderson is ahead of schedule and they expect him to return to the A’s rotation as early as August and he will be throwing from the mound on Monday for the first time since his surgery.  Anderson has also lost 25 pounds since starting rehab.

Catching prospect, Max Stassi, who had shoulder surgery back in May, says he is now back at full strength.  He also has lost 13 pounds through dieting.

Dallas Braden is now aiming to return to the rotation on April 16th.  He will be throwing with the other A’s pitchers, but not as often.  He, too, had shoulder surgery back in May and Monday will be his fourth bullpen session since he has started throwing again.

Bob Melvin says he thinks that the A’s will be adding more pitching and offense to the team by the time full camp opens, although he did not state any specifics.

We also learned today that the A’s are allowed to bring 30 players to Japan, only 25 are able to be active for the games, but they will have some flexibility.

Jane Lee also confirms the A’s are still very much interested in Manny Ramirez so this seems to confirm it’s just a matter of time before they sign him.

I have been going back and forth on this all day, whether I should or shouldn’t make this into a post and I decided that what Brandon McCarthy and his wife are doing needed some recognition.

The story is McCarthy had two extra tickets to the BCS Championship game and he decided to give them away, the kicker is he’s giving the tickets away to a LSU fan and their child.  In order to win you had to email him and tell him why it would be a special game to go to with your son or daughter.

Here’s a couple of the tweets they sent out:

I know this isn’t exactly baseball news, but I thought this was such a nice thing to do and I wanted all the fans to see this.  For those of you who don’t think this is a big deal, the cheapest ticket on Saturday was going for $1,199 on stubhub, the most expensive was valued at $10,000.

My name is Tamara and I’m a twitterholic.  Where else can you get all the news you need in 140 characters or less?  I also like the fact that I can follow my favorite baseball players during the off season, it’s like the legal version of stalking!  So I have put together a small list of the three must follow A’s players.

1. Brandon McCarthy (AKA @BMcCarthy32)

Brandon’s tweets are hilarious, especially the ones he sends back and forth to the other players on the team.  He makes insults sound like compliments and is by far the wittiest player on the team in tweet form.

2. Kurt Suzuki (AKA @kurtsuzuki)

Kurt was MIA for a while, but he’s back now in full force.  His tweets aren’t funny or clever, but he’s so positive about everything.  I don’t think I know anyone who uses as many exclamation marks as he does, but I like it.

3. Dallas Braden (AKA @DALLASBRADEN209)

Dallas is random.  Very, very random.

Honorable mentions: Jemile Weeks (@RealJemileWeeks), Andrew Bailey (@AndrewBailey40), Brett Anderson (BrettAnderson49), Jarrod Parker (@JarrodBParker) and Gio Gonzalez (@GioGonzalez47)