Hey, did you know some pitchers were traded? That’s crazy.

Anyway, with arguably the best left-hander of the post-Johan era out of the division and Oakland’s ace-til-he-gets-hurt on the move, the initial discussion has all focused on the impact on the NL Central race, even though we could have saved a lot of time and energy by summing both up as “Cubs get a little better, Brewers get a lot better.”

Meanwhile in the American League, at least four teams’ fortunes reversed in either direction and two divisional races just became a lot more boring. How so? Let’s take a look:

BILLY BEANE IS SMART IN WAYS PEOPLE SEEM TO OVERLOOK

On the surface, Oakland should be in no position to be dealing away their best players. The Angels only have a five-game lead and play the A’s nine more times this season. In a four-team division so widely divided between the top and bottom, it might seem foolish to throw in the towel so soon.

But look closer at the A’s and you see a deeply, deeply flawed team marred by injuries and playing way over their heads. Add to that a pitching staff anchored by a recently-traded ace pitching more than 45 major-league innings for the first time since 2006, and chances are Beane realized it was best to sell high and concede that his team won’t play .545 ball for an entire season.

THE ANGELS WERE GOING TO WIN IT ALL ANYWAY

It’s not like they had a lot to overcome to begin with, but suddenly what little stood in their way is gone and the Angels can think about getting that last piece of the puzzle – most likely a bat, although it’s unclear who exactly they should move to make room, or who is really on the market that would represent a substantial improvement over their perfectly average offensive skills.

DETROIT AND MINNESOTA MAY BE WISE TO GAMBLE

It’s certainly not the Twins’ style, but with the AL West all but over and the White Sox not an undefeatable team, either of the Tigers or Twins may be licking their chops over the Indians dropping out with seventy-three games to go. The Indians play the Twins nine more times and Tigers another ten; figure each just got another two all-important intradivisional victories with the departure of Sabathia and that the Royals are just as out of it as they always were. Figure also that if Cleveland is going to start unloading, they’d be wise to go all the way with it despite the continual man-crush most mainstream sportswriters insist on keeping alive; in fact, if Mark Shapiro is the genius most columnists insist he is, the only way to prove it is to dismantle the core of his Indians team still poised to dominate the long-since-over 2007 season and rebuild while he can still get something back for the likes of Paul Byrd, lest anyone think merely getting Travis Hafner and Victor Martinez back for 2009 will make all the difference after, oh, you know, shipping out the best pitcher the team has seen in at least a decade.

They’d both have a long way to go, but it’s not out of the question for either to be working the phones right now – especially when the team at the top is having such a hard time finishing off the team at the bottom. Thirteen innings? Go-ahead balks? This is what first place looks like? Maybe Beane is onto something here.