O's Fans Held Hostage - Day 26

[SrMeowMeow]

Just how long do we give these guys to develop? Until Markakis and Weiters are ready to hit free agency? Why not run them out there in a lost season? You can't have it both ways, which is how we got into this mess in the first place. Its been 11 years of stopgaps until Player X is ready for the show, and frankly its just a little old at this point. Run the kids out there or spend away, but the Paytons and Millars and Hendricksons of the world have got to stop.

Run the kids out there when it's for their own good, I don't see how people can be suggesting that their opinion on prospect development is more informed than people who do it for a career and actually have experience in the field. If MacPhail keeps Patton, say, in AAA when he's on fire so as not to hurt Hendrickson's feelings, that's bad. But throwing Patton to the wolves because we're gunshy of signing players that are over 30 because we're obsessed about the youth movement is silly - the 1.5M doesn't matter at all, and all it does is provide our pitchers with a safety net. If Hendrickson actually takes playing time from a young player who deserves it I'll yell as loudly as the next guy. But I like to see facts before I condemn.

[glenn__davis]

I actually agree with this. As overboard as some of his arguments are, his general point that signing Mark Hendrickson vs Mark Teixeira and pocketing the difference is exactly what is going on here. Anyone who doesn't see this is simply an apologist who will be saying the same thing in 2018 when we are on our 21st losing season in a row. Hendrickson is cannon fodder, no more, no less. They'll trot him out at fanfest and have Mark Hendrickson t-shirt night and the first 10,000 people in attendance will receive a free one. The real question will be what to do with the 9,400 of them left over...

I'm not sure if you're being facetious or not, but I seriously doubt the Orioles try to pass of Mark Hendrickson as some sort of major acquisition. They know he's nothing, we know he's nothing, and they know we know he's nothing. He's a warm body.

[LookinUp]

There's a silent majority on this site that is choosing not to throw stones. We understand that we simply don't know what we don't know; like what Teixeira really wanted; how the economy's affecting PA and MLB in general; player valuations made by our Front Office and scouts; when/if PA wants to sell the team; whether PA's pocketing the $$ he's not spending, reinvesting, or just not thinking it's wise to spend big money on a bad team this year; etc.

We like to root, but we're not comfortable with hating on people that we don't know, and we can't pretend to really understand their considerations with nothing more than rumors upon which to base our thoughts. Moreover, we generally think people are good and trying, so they get the benefit of the doubt in our eyes while they're in the middle of this rebuild.

We'll wait for the final product - in 2010 and 2011 - and judge this rebuild the most accurate way we can, in hindsight.

[glenn__davis]

He makes the product on the field better and you are fooling yourself if you think the Orioles are taking all the $ they would have put into FAs into scouting and development. I'd rather spend the money on improving the team and not lining Angelos' pockets, because those seem to be the only two options that we have...

I'm not fooling myself at all. I have no idea what the Orioles financial situation is. I hope they're spending a decent amount on improving their international scouting, but we have no idea if that's the case. You could very well be right and PGA is just laughing all the way to the bank. What I do know is that, even if he repeated his performance from last year, 16 million (at a minimum) for Jamie Moyer is a terrible waste of resources.

[Dwight Schrute]

I'm not sure if you're being facetious or not, but I seriously doubt the Orioles try to pass of Mark Hendrickson as some sort of major acquisition. They know he's nothing, we know he's nothing, and they know we know he's nothing. He's a warm body.

Yes, the last part is somewhat facetious, although you owe me a beer if he has a "Heroes of Birdland" video montage next year. But he is correct about Tex, as misguided as his logic is sometimes. We never intended to sign the guy, so why put on the show? And the "20mm is not a lowball offer" crowd is ridiculous. Someone on here said it best when they said something to the effect of "To you offering Donald Trump 20k to wash your car is not a lowball offer". And that is true. But it doesn't matter that the person offering the money doesn't think its lowball. It matters to the person receiving the offer and in context with the other offers the person received.

[Enjoy Terror]

Liz and Olson, sure. Why are we giving up on Patton and Bergesen and Hernandez just to avoid signing Hendricksons?

I am sorry for "yelling", too.

First, I don't think we are avoiding them. I think MacPhail wants to make Norfolk the natural place to stockpile talent, like all other teams do. Keeping everyone that's any good in Bowie is silly... why have a AAA team at all? This seems like a good way to start bumping out the John Leicesters of the world and replacing them with talent when the Orioles start fail around August.

Second, if left unsigned, Hendrickson will not be available on Opening day.

If you sign and start Hendrickson as the fifth starter, you can reasonably assume he'll throw for a 5.00ERA to finish the season. He will probably get himself 8-10 wins and be Cabrera-esque failure everyone hates. Either that or he does better than expected.

If you DON'T sign Hendrickson, and instead start Bergesen, you run the risk of Brad going out, pitching himself to a 108ERA in 2/3rds of an inning and say to yourself... well now I really don't have a 5th starter because Bergesen isn't ready for this and Hendrickson is off the board along with all the other free agent starters.

It's a risk management move. Andy MacPhail doesn't want to throw wildcards onto the field every five days. He'd rather be slightly below average and at least have control of that situation. If Hendrickson is absolutely terrible, he can at least demote or release him and then try Bergesen in his stead, and then you are at square one again.

That's just my take on it, seems logical to me.

[SrMeowMeow]

First, I don't think we are avoiding them. I think MacPhail wants to make Norfolk the natural place to stockpile talent, like all other teams do. Keeping everyone that's any good in Bowie is silly... why have a AAA team at all? This seems like a good way to start bumping out the John Leicesters of the world and replacing them with talent when the Orioles start fail around August.

Second, if left unsigned, Hendrickson will not be available on Opening day.

If you sign and start Hendrickson as the fifth starter, you can reasonably assume he'll throw for a 5.00ERA to finish the season. He will probably get himself 8-10 wins and be Cabrera-esque failure everyone hates. Either that or he does better than expected.

If you DON'T sign Hendrickson, and instead start Bergesen, you run the risk of Brad going out, pitching himself to a 108ERA in 2/3rds of an inning and say to yourself... well now I really don't have a 5th starter because Bergesen isn't ready for this and Hendrickson is off the board along with all the other free agent starters.

It's a risk management move. Andy MacPhail doesn't want to throw wildcards onto the field every five days. He'd rather be slightly below average and at least have control of that situation. If Hendrickson is absolutely terrible, he can at least demote or release him and then try Bergesen in his stead, and then you are at square one again.

That's just my take on it, seems logical to me.

I really think it's simpler than that; the FO can't bear to have another meltdown like last season, with pitchers who had no right to be there giving up 7+ runs a game. It might make them a little gun-shy of trying young pitchers, which is a shame, but I think any signings we make are more to stave off utter embarrassment if our kids aren't ready this season. Just my opinion, though.

I think we all agree that nobody thinks the FO considers Hendrickson or Izturis a substitute for Tex or is trying to hoodwink the fans, or even start another cycle of expensive mediocrity a la Payton/Millar/Mora/etc.

[Mackus]

I think the Orioles are being exceptionally obtuse by not looking at players like Salazar and Montanez for the team. I can maybe understand Reimold in AAA next year, but instead of shelling out the money for a 1B or a DH, go cheap with internal options who appear to have "figured it out".

Am I missing something?

So are we now blaming the Orioles for both being too cheap and spending too much money?

I'd like to see both Salazar and Montanez on our bench, wouldn't consider either as starters.

However, I think its unfortunately likely that we go with 12 pitchers, so we'll only have 13 offensive players.

OD starting C, Huff, Roberts, Mora, Izturis, Scott, Jones, Markakis will be the starting 8 position players from C-RF. That leaves 5 spots for DH and bench. Freel, backup C, backup SS, and two others. I think Montanez and Salazar would be great guys to have on the bench and some combination of Salazar, Montanez, and Freel would get most of the DH at bats (more likely they'd play in the field and one of the regular fielders, Scott or Huff or Mora, would slide to DH for a game).

[JTrea81]

First, I don't think we are avoiding them. I think MacPhail wants to make Norfolk the natural place to stockpile talent, like all other teams do. Keeping everyone that's any good in Bowie is silly... why have a AAA team at all? This seems like a good way to start bumping out the John Leicesters of the world and replacing them with talent when the Orioles start fail around August.

Second, if left unsigned, Hendrickson will not be available on Opening day.

If you sign and start Hendrickson as the fifth starter, you can reasonably assume he'll throw for a 5.00ERA to finish the season. He will probably get himself 8-10 wins and be Cabrera-esque failure everyone hates. Either that or he does better than expected.

If you DON'T sign Hendrickson, and instead start Bergesen, you run the risk of Brad going out, pitching himself to a 108ERA in 2/3rds of an inning and say to yourself... well now I really don't have a 5th starter because Bergesen isn't ready for this and Hendrickson is off the board along with all the other free agent starters.

It's a risk management move. Andy MacPhail doesn't want to throw wildcards onto the field every five days. He'd rather be slightly below average and at least have control of that situation. If Hendrickson is absolutely terrible, he can at least demote or release him and then try Bergesen in his stead, and then you are at square one again.

That's just my take on it, seems logical to me.

But these players are all taking up roster spots so why not see what you have with them? If they evaluate Bergesen based on one outing, then they have no business being ML execs anyway. And if Bergesen falters, then you insert Berken or Hernandez and repeat. Somebody is going to stick. And obviously you give Olson, Liz and Penn first crack as well as Patton because they are the most advanced.

Keeping these guys in the minors and trying to keep them away from ML pitching by putting Hendricksons and Reddings in the rotation isn't going to do the Orioles or these pitchers any amount of good. If you are going to put the Sheets, Moyers, Wolfs and Kawakamis in there, that's one thing. But if you want bargain bin pitchers, then you might as well go with the guys you already have on your 40 man roster because you'll get just about the same result and you get to see if they have a future in MLB...

[SrMeowMeow]

Keeping these guys in the minors and trying to keep them away from ML pitching by putting Hendricksons and Reddings in the rotation isn't going to do the Orioles or these pitchers any amount of good. If you are going to put the Sheets, Moyers, Wolfs and Kawakamis in there, that's one thing. But if you want bargain bin pitchers, then you might as well go with the guys you already have on your 40 man roster because you'll get just about the same result and you get to see if they have a future in MLB...

Do you see why some people here would rather have stand-ins instead of paying for players who could be hanging around our necks as millstones in 2010 and 2011?

[lovetoaster]

If I was in charge, things would already be this way.

Well, no offense ET, if you were in charge, then I probably would not be a member of the community.

I enjoy the "insider" takes this site provides. Sometimes they are right, sometimes they are wrong, but they provide insight that we otherwise would not have. And they always spark conversation. People just need to take them with a grain of salt and not get too worked up when the information is overly positive or negative.

It's the offseason, a lot of things are in flux and there are a lot of smoke being blown around by every team. You can not believe everything that you hear, but it is nice to have the insight into what the team may be thinking at the time, in my opinion.

I think it would be pretty boring without them.

[wickedwitch]

MacPhail is panicking? Really?

[JTrea81]

Do you see why some people here would rather have stand-ins instead of paying for players who could be hanging around our necks as millstones in 2010 and 2011?

I'd rather have the problem of having too many good pitchers on the roster than not. Good pitching is always tradeable. Look what Javy Vazquez brought back...

[Enjoy Terror]

Of course nobody thinks that, unless you are a true Orioles pessimist.

Considering our track record here was the starting five in 2008:
Guthrie (finished as a starter)
Cabrera (finished as a starter)
Loewen (finished on DL)
Burres (moved to AAA, finished in the MLB pen)
Trachsel (finished cut from the team)

Guthrie and Cabrera both made the DL once during the season. Loewen pitched four games and was on the DL for the rest of the season. Burres was demoted to AAA for over a month, then went to the pen. Trachsel was cut in June. Olson, Liz and Waters were three pitchers who were promoted to help replace those guys, in addition to Sarfate, Albers, Bass, Simon and Cormier.

Without a doubt, whoever starts the year in the Orioles rotation will not be there to finish it. Bergesen, Berken, Patton, and Hernandez will all be available to pick up the slack, and I think the result will be a much more pleasant end to the season than if we had used plug-n-play AAAA filler like Waters and Cormier like we did in 2008.

[Frobby]

But these players are all taking up roster spots so why not see what you have with them? If they evaluate Bergesen based on one outing, then they have no business being ML execs anyway. And if Bergesen falters, then you insert Berken or Hernandez and repeat. Somebody is going to stick. And obviously you give Olson, Liz and Penn first crack as well as Patton because they are the most advanced.

Keeping these guys in the minors and trying to keep them away from ML pitching by putting Hendricksons and Reddings in the rotation isn't going to do the Orioles or these pitchers any amount of good. If you are going to put the Sheets, Moyers, Wolfs and Kawakamis in there, that's one thing. But if you want bargain bin pitchers, then you might as well go with the guys you already have on your 40 man roster because you'll get just about the same result and you get to see if they have a future in MLB...

The Orioles have judged that Bergesen, Berken, Hernandez and Tillman are not ready for the majors yet, and that is a judgment we should not second guess. Then it merely becomes a question of what you do to keep them in the minors for the time necessary to get them ready for the majors.

For the 2009 team, it would be a lot nicer to have some solid pitchers in there instead of Mark Hendrickson and his ilk. (Keep in mind, the O's have not said they expect Hendrickson to be in the rotation, and it remains to be seen whether he will be). But putting in some mediocre-at-best veterans still may be better than throwing AA pitchers to the wolves before they are ready, both for the good of the team and the good of the players. And at least they don't require multi-year commitments or large dollar outlays that might prevent you from spending money on other needs or at another, more advantageous time.

I'm not advocating this necessarily, just explaining the reasoning. And I sure hope Olson, Liz and Penn show more in 2009 than they have shown in the past in the majors.