American League
Baltimore Orioles
This team has plenty of questions, including whether any of its young players will develop any further. But after trading pitcher Jeremy Guthrie, the rotation is nothing but question marks. What will it look like come Opening Day? If guys like Brian Matusz can't figure it out, this could easily be a 100-loss team.
I say 66 Wins and not one more
Bowden gets dumped on here, but I agree with him. If guys like Matusz don't get it together, we're gonna have a burned out bullpen by June and awful starters for the rest of the summer.
OT, but his article on breakout stars could also easily be an article on failed prospects. I'm not overly impressed by him.
I don't see how this team could lose more than last season. Duquette has done a good job of adding pitching depth and bullpen depth. The pen should be much better than last season and if we have pitching injuries in the rotation we have a lot of major league ready depth. Be it they aren't that great, but depth is never really that good.
The bench is a lot deeper, Wieters has a good backup this season. Also Chavez is a respectable fourth outfielder and there is a lot of potential with Reimold, Davis and some of the infield depth we got this offseason.
We lost Guthrie but he lost 17-18 games anyway so it's not like we are losing a lot of wins, and the rotation could surprise a few people. Hunter did pitch on a American League Champion team, Britton and Arreita looked great at points and bad at other points, but they are young so that's expected. Matusz will be ready to go and not have the injury plaguing his season. Chen could be a respectable pitcher as well.
If players can start living up to their potential we got have a nice season next year. I'm not making the point that we will be good and there is no way for a 68-69 win season, but I don't think we can be any worse. The best case scenario is much higher than 100 loses.
Someone posted that Las Vegas has the Orioles' over/under at 69.5. BP has us projected at 72 wins. I think somewhere in that range is what is reasonable to expect. Matusz was awful last year and we didn't lose 100 games, so why would we lose 100 if he's awful this year?
Jim Bozo? There is a reason he is no longer a ML GM.
They haven't lost 100+ in a season since '88. That is a lot of losing between then and now without hitting 100. There is no reason to assume this team will be worse then the '10 team for instance.
Well, he did say guyS like Matusz...So, I think that assumes more than just BMat.Originally Posted by Frobby
BTW, I think he is right.
He isn't projecting 100 losses, he is saying that if some things go wrong(and they are realistic things), that this team could lose 100 games.
How is that incorrect?
That could be said for any team. Just a lot more would have to go wrong for some of them. Who guessed the Twins would lose 99 last season?
I think the O's will have the second worst record in the AL and four worst in baseball. But that is why we play the season. Predictions are as good as political pundits and retired generals. Frontline did a story on predictions before the Iraq war by those two groups and 76% of what they thought was going to happen was wrong.
How about telling us what things you realistically expect to go wrong.
Sure..but when most people think you are a 70 win team, you don't have much of a fall to 62 wins.
It has nothing to do with what I EXPECT...Its that there are several realistic things that could happen for this team to be really bad(and I am not even included a rash of injuries, which can effect any team):
1) Hardy goes back to being injury prone.
2) BMat doesn't get back to where he was.
3) Arrieta struggles to be consistent, ends up in pen.
4) Britton doesn't improve his command and struggles to be a #4 starter.
5) Davis is DFa'ed by June.
6) Reynolds, Jones and Reimold play poor defensively, collectively.
7) Wieters is a 750 OPS guy.
8) Johnson struggles as a closer again and is nothing more than a league average reliever.
9) Hammel is what he was last year.
10) Chen and/or Wada struggle transitioning to the major league.
Those are to name a few...Those have either all happened recently or are very realistic.
I am not saying I EXPECT these things to happen...but you would have to be a fool to look at this roster, look at the issues of the roster and not come away seeing a very realistic scenario where this team struggles to win more than 62 games.
People are jumping on Bowden here..Yes, the guy is a moron but what he said isn't wrong. He is saying that enough could easily go wrong for this team that they lose 100 games...Seeing as most people are expecting 88-95 losses, I don't see how saying they could lose 100 is something for people to cry about.
Some of those are legit and some aren't with regard to 100 losses discussion. BMat and Jake weren't all that good last year so getting similar performance wouldn't necessarily contribute to more losses. Wieters is already a .750 OPS guy... so unless he regresses, not losing much there. 1b was horrible last year.. can it really be worse?
Last edited by Fan4Life; 02-22-2012 at 03:23 PM.
Most of those same people, including Jimbozo, thought we were a much better than 70 W team last year. Why should they be any more right this year? Last season we had 7 pitchers combine for 121 ER in 109 IP. With this year's depth most of these guys wouldn't have had the opportunity to give up half as many runs. We could have saved 30-50 R just by not letting them pitch. Matusz alone gave up 59 R in 49 IP.
Posting Permissions
OriolesHangout.com is an unofficial site and not associated with the Baltimore Orioles and part of Hangout Ventures LLC. Copyright ©2011 | Privacy Policy | Advertise with us
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks