When are we allowed to get excited about Wieters?

I know he's started hot in the past, but I've never seen him hit like this from the left side of the plate before. His swing and pre-swing batting stance remind me a lot of Hardy when he's up there, he's made a noticeable adjustment. He seems to be able to get the barrel on the bat on pitches on the outside of the plate for the first time since I've seen him in the bigs. It has always been said that catchers take a longer time to adjust to hitting at the big league level, is this the year "the Switch Hitting Jesus" becomes the force we all dreamed of?

It took Yadier Molina 7 seasons to start OPSing in the .800's, and with this being Matt's 6th season can he make a similar leap? He was much more highly regarded as a hitting prospect, and has always had more power.

Similarly, lets say Matt OPS's .850 this year while providing stellar defense, do you go all out to keep him or Davis after their arbitration years? I think I'd lean towards Wieters.

Just for reference. Here are hist stats (per baseball-reference).

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://widgets.sports-reference.com/wg.fcgi?css=1&site=br&url=%2Fplayers%2Fw%2Fwietema01.shtml&div=div_batting_standard"></script>

On the one hand, Wieters had an .826 OPS in March/April 2011, and .937 in March/April 2012, so it is too early to get excited that he is headed for some big break-out. On the other hand, those two seasons arguably were his best two, so hopefully his hot start means we won't see a repeat of his disappointing 2013. He certainly does look real good right now.

I'd still rather either keep Davis, or trade them both this offseason, there I said it.

The thing is, it seems we have some good catching prospects in the minors while not much in the line of 1B with power. I think we can probably replace Matt easier than Davis (Clevanger, Joseph, Ohlman). Maybe I'm wrong and someone can correct me.

30 games seems about right to me to start to think that we might be seeing something different. Let's investigate the first few years of Matt's career, how he's looked after 30 games played.

2009 - rookie year, .722

2010 - .752

2011 - .725

2012 - .890 (finished .764), started to return to earth at around 40 games

2013 - .672

2014 - 1.034 so far through 11 G

So yea, i'd say be excited if he's still doing this kinda thing in mid-May.

You are allowed to get excited now. Just know it might not last. Its always good to be excited about the Orioles.

I got excited about Wieters 6 years ago.

I like his new batting stance. He's too tall not to crouch down some in his stance. When he stood straight up, he seemed to not be able to get down to the pitches lower in the zone and would roll over them and ground out to 2B a lot.

I like his new batting stance. He's too tall not to crouch down some in his stance. When he stood straight up, he seemed to not be able to get down to the pitches lower in the zone and would roll over them and ground out to 2B a lot.

This 100 times over. He's putting the barrel onto balls that he rolled over on in the past.

The thing is' date=' it seems we have some good catching prospects in the minors while not much in the line of 1B with power. I think we can probably replace Matt easier than Davis (Clevanger, Joseph, Ohlman). Maybe I'm wrong and someone can correct me.[/quote']

I think we'll know more after the 2014 season is over. However, I doubt that any of the three players you mention will be nearly as good an offensive/defensive combination as Wieters. Davis isn't easy to replace, either, so picking between them is not easy if it comes to that.

On July 31st at roughly 4:00pm.

On July 31st at roughly 4:00pm.

I was thinking July 15th, 20:00.

On July 31st at roughly 4:00pm.

Which time zone is this referring to? For Matt's west coast fans.

Hate to say it--and I think it's way too early to think this reasonably possible or likely, I was fooled already for a bit in 2012, not this time--but we would seriously regret that Jimenez contract of Matt turns into a .825-.850 OPS type player...

My main hope on Jimenez is that he can rebound, put up some decent numbers, and become a tradeable commodity...the many people that know more than me about the way the market works: is this at all a realistic possibility?