While the Athletics have 12 players who are out of options entering the 2027 season, a number of them won't have a chance to make their case to be on the big-league roster during spring training, as they could be involved in offseason roster trimming. 

Meanwhile, three roster hopefuls — Max Muncy, Elvis Alvarado, and Brady Basso — each have aspirations of making the roster out of camp themselves. They also have the added bonus of being able to be optioned for one more season, providing the club with some roster flexibility.

When a player is out of options, if they are removed from the team's 26-man roster, they first have to go through waivers where any team can claim them. If no team picks them up off waivers, more often than not they will report to the minor leagues. 

What makes this a big offseason for each of those three A's is that this will be their final season to solidify their own spots on the 26-man roster before they enter the uncertainty of being a fringe player who's out of options entering the 2028 season.

The hard-throwing 27-year-old right-hander finished the year with a 3.90 ERA (4.56 FIP), aided by a 98.5 mph heater, along with a 31.4% whiff rate (89th percentile) and a 28.4% strikeout rate (86th percentile). 

After posting a 3.19 ERA (4.32 FIP) across 42 ⅓ innings as a rookie in 2025, Alvarado was seen as a potential closer candidate by many coming into the season. Halfway through April of this season he held an 8.22 ERA, earning an option to Triple-A Las Vegas, where he would get himself right over the next month and a half.

When he returned to the A's roster in June, he was throwing with more confidence, and from that day forward he led the team in ERA with a 2.96. His strikeout rate rose to 30.3% while his walk rate was improved to 9.7%, and he was trusted with seven save opportunities down the stretch, converting six of them. 

For Alvarado, 2027 will be about solidifying his spot on the roster from day one through the end of the season without an early reset needed in Triple-A. 

Muncy is in a much shakier boat. While the A's will be searching for pitching this winter, they have a pretty solid idea of who will be filling out the nine regular spots in the lineup, and right now, Muncy isn't one of those names. 

Muncy, 24, finished the year with left knee chondromalacia and a need to be reevaluated heading into the offseason. There has been no further update on his status yet. 

Across 82 games, Muncy hit .230 with a .296 OBP and an 82 wRC+ (100 is league average). While his walk rate increased from 2025 up to 7.4%, his already-high strikeout rate also continued to rise, sitting at 32% by season's end.

During the summer, A's manager Mark Kotsay noted that Muncy needs to work on his pitch recognition to reach that next level with his game. Entering the offseason with an uncertain injury status and an expected lockout that would keep him out of team facilities would make it trickier to improve that skill during the offseason. 

The A's new GM could also end up seeing Muncy as a potential trade piece to get some pitching, given that he doesn't have a defensive home for the club. 

Basso, 28, finished the 2026 season with 43 innings pitched in the big leagues, a new career high. In those innings he held a 6.07 ERA, but a much more respectable 3.64 FIP. His last three outings of the season took him from carving out a role for himself in 2027 to being a bit of a question mark heading into the offseason.

On September 9 against the Toronto Blue Jays he went four scoreless innings, lowering his ERA to 3.86. Over his next three outings (two starts), he combined for 5 ⅔ innings and gave up 13 earned runs, which raised his ERA to over six, where it finished. 

The simple answer for Basso and the A's here could be to use him solely as a bullpen option. The club needed left-handed relief help besides Hogan Harris all year, and Basso was helpful in that regard.