Yesterday Frank Thomas signed a one-year, $500K deal with the A's, switching teams after 16 seasons with White Sox. The question with Thomas is his health. His last full season was 2003. He has played a total of 108 games in the last two years though he remains productive when healthy (151 and 131 adjusted OPS's in 2004 and 2005 respectively).

As Alan Schwarz writes, Thomas, if healthy and, "Depending on the money, that's a valuable player. My guess is that any hurt that Thomas inflicts in '06 will be more on opponents, particularly those who passed on him, than his employers."

I know that White Sox have both Paul Konerko and Jim Thome to cover the DH/1B spots, but it's a shame that a future Hall of Famer with 16 years in Chicago couldn't finish his career there. I remember when I was a young whippersnapper that the serious rumors swirled that the Phils were about to trade Mike Schmidt to the Cards (shades of Rolen?). Of course, the deal never happened, and Schmitty finished his career a Phil, but there's a parallel universe somewhere in which Michael Jack ended up in St. Louis and Schrodinger's cat is still alive, and there Schmidt's image is tarnished, at least in Philly, and so is the Phils', though their image is so sullied that they could soak in Tarnex as long as Madge and it wouldn't matter. At least Thomas got a ring in Chicago.

Thomas's departure made me wonder how many other players had left their first team after at least 16 seasons to start off fresh elsewhere. The two that came to mind were Ty Cobb, who became a good luck charm for Connie Mack's team, and Dewey Evans, the long-time Red Sox player who ended his career with the O's.

Here's the full list. Keep in mind that the player has to be active for those first 16 years. I, however, did include those players who served in the military during his stint with the first club:

The only players who has substantial roles with the new clubs were Greenberg, Cobb, Rice, and Evans. Though they all had longer stints with their first club than Thomas.

By the way, Cobb's 22-year gap between switching major-league teams is not the longest in baseball history. Paul Schreiber came up with the Brooklyn Robins in 1922, played the next season, and then disappeared for another 22 years until the wartime Yankees let him pitch two games and 4.1 innings in 1945. Oddly, he was the third youngest player in baseball in 1922 (19 years old) and in 1923 (20), and in his next season, 1945, he was the oldest player in the game (42).

Here are the other players who took 16 seasons to play for his second team but didn't play continually for his first team before switching:

Cromartie went to Japan in the middle of his career, and Nuxhall came up as a 15-year-old with the Reds in 1944 but they kept him in the minors until 1952.