Tony-OH

It's a good thing Irvin only cost the Orioles this guy: I was pretty skeptical of Hernaiz being anything more than a utility guy and had no issues with moving him for a guy who could potentially help in the rotation. This problem with Irvin is he went from this guy in 2023: to this guy in 2024: Don't worry though, we could lose Irvin because we have this guy in AAA who we gave up Norby and Stowers for:

Obviously teams that win are always more fun than teams that don't, and as the OP pointed out, this team has been below .500 over half a season at this point. The lack of hitting is pretty infuriating at this point. This is not a slump. This team has to be the least clutch team I've watched. When they get RISP with less than two outs you expect them not to score. If they get behind and it's late, you assume a loss. They do nothing that is enjoyable to watch other than pop a few homers. I honestly have a hard time watching them at this point. We all hope they will get healthy and get better, but it's sure is one of the more eclectic teams that I've seen over the years.

I think Holliday hit the ball more consistently harder than Sisco and he clearly is a much better runner. I think long term Holliday will be a better defender at 2B or maybe in the outfield where he'll be able to use his speed to his advantage. Holliday already has more pop than Sisco ever had.

Perhaps, but if so, that's a bad policy. You risk exactly what happened if a pitcher misses during a pitch around. Pitchers are not perfect, but IBB almost always are.

Sosa was much more raw then I was led to believe. MUCH MORE RAW in every aspect of his game.

I really can't argue that overall, though it's really tough to put the winning run on 2nd base with one out. I think the problem with that is Masataka Yoshida was on deck, and while he struggled against lefties overall, he does do a good job of situational hitting. At the end of the day, I'd feel a lot better pitching to him with only the tying run on 3rd, not the winning run on 2B.

The Orioles clearly value the pitcher's splits over the hitter's splits.

Hyde wears his emotions on his sleeve so he probably needed to get out of there because if we're frustrated, you can only imagine how he feels. The Holliday error was an absolute back breaker that changed the entire situation from 1st and 3rd with two outs (assuming they would walk O'Neill) and the Red Sox having two lefties coming up against Akin, to 1st and 3rd, one out, and Akin needing to face a lefty masher. When you're that close to getting away with a win, and your 2nd baseman can't make a simple, routing play, it was frustrating. He can't be seen screaming "WTF" so he ran into the dugout and probably screamed it in there.

I agree a lot of what you are saying here. I've been talking about the Orioles hitting development and every time I do, I get shouted down by the people who point towards Adley, Henderson, Westburg and Cowser to a lesser extent. To me, these guys are more about good drafting than amazing development. Saying that, I've seen a change in the Orioles hitting philosophy from a "make good swing decisions" approach to a "upper cut, do damage approach" and this is a apparent throughout the minor league where the Orioles hitting prospects have not exactly torn up the minors and of course with this major league team. When Elias took over, they stressed only swinging at pitches you can put a good swing on and I saw guys like Adley, Gunnar, Westburg, Cowser, Mayo and Holliday drive the ball to all fields. This season, it just seems like everyone is guess hitting. I've seen more awful swings this season than I can remember and it just seems like they are hunting certain pitches and swinging from their heels, regardless of the situation. I have zero issues with doing that early in counts, but the approach needs to change with the situation. In other words, batting in a 0-0 game in the 2nd inning may have a different approach then batting in a 0-0 game with runners on 2nd and 3rd and one out in the 7th inning. I don't see much change. I see guys with some huge upper cut swings. Heck, even Gunnar has been gotten beat with up and in heat because of his sometimes upper cut swing. Gunnar though flattens out his swing and will take what he's given. Personally, I thin they need to get rid of the entire hitting philosophy and get back to a more balanced approach. We thought we were going to get guys who worked counts, fouled balls off, and just put up professional at bats, instead the Orioles have turned into swing from the heal mashers who K or hit the ball hard. I don't know what study told the Orioles to change, but somebody needs to get more data points.

I would not if he's still playing the way he's been playing, but who know what the Orioles will do.

Interesting stats, thanks. I was wondering whether recency or familiarity bias was part of the perception, and it appears that it is to some extent. Obviously really poor at bat, fielding plays, and pitches stick in our minds a bit more, especially due to the Orioles struggles for more than a half season now. How are they overall with RISP? I'm sure they keep this somewhere in baseball references, but do they have stats for stranding runners in scoring positions with less than two outs? Like the percentage of RISP stranded by the team? I mean you don't have to do the homework if you don't want, but it would be interesting to know how they stack up there or if we just have more bias because they stand out to us as fans. Also, are these numbers across the season or can you break them down like 1st half and 2nd half. I may be off, but I'm guessing our two-strike hitting was much better over that hot start to the season than now.

Of course I would not trade Holliday straight up for Norby. Saying that, remember when I said I would trade Holliday straight up for Skubel? How would this team look with Skubel in the rotation and Norby in this lineup at 2B, even with below average defense there? I would have been willing to give up some long term value from Holliday for three playoff seasons of value from Skubel was because Skubel is a difference maker in the players as a TOR and this team is in a World Series window. Now this was before Westburg injury and my calls were before Mateo went down as well. I just felt we had 2B depth but didn't not have TOR or even top 3 starter depth. Now the trade for Eflin helped offset that some, but would I have still traded for Skubel for Holliday, yes I would have. A rotation of Skubel, Eflin, Burnes and Kremer/Suarez with Grayson in the pen this year sure would have looked pretty good and made me feel a whole lot better about the playoffs. Instead we have a scuffling rookie at 2B, Burnes looking a lot more like a 3rd starter than a TOR, Westburg on the IL, and a team that looks like it has little chance come October without a whole lot of guys getting healthy quickly and ready to contribute. Nobody wanted to trade one of the big-3 if they didn't have to, and I still think Holliday and Mayo are going to end up good major league players and Basallo has a chance to be the best of them all. But yes, I stand by my assertion that trading Holliday for Skubel (if the Tigers would have even taken that which is by no way certain) would have given the Orioles a lot better opportunity to win a World Series over the next three years.

I truly think the rest of the league knows how much the Orioles teach looking for certain pitches in situations, and they're pitching backwards to that. Now I have no basis for how much the Orioles do this any more or less than other teams, but watching this team take so many strikes on pitches they typically would not see in those counts, tells me they are sitting on pitches. We've also seen it in the pitch calling with two strikes. Teams seem to have a lot of success against Orioles pitchers with two strikes which tells me they have a pretty good idea of what is coming. I'm sure someone like @Frobby can find the team stats on this, but it just appears it more than a coincidence that this team seems to give up a lot of two-strike hits.

I know there are some that scoff at any concerns over Holliday, but what can't be argued with any sanity, is that Holliday's major league time this year and is anything but an unmitigated disaster so far. While he does not qualify, his statcast leaderboards shows him only to stand out on speed. Now the good news is his hard hit% and barrel percentage is above average, but his whiff% is so bad, he's basically missing or hitting ball fairly hard. That's what comes with the big upper cut swing he employs. His timing must be perfect because the bat is not in the hitting zone for that long. How bad has Holliday been at the plate? Well, let's take away that 10-game span when he first game back when he hit 5 home runs. You know, when some posters around here were taking victory laps and virtually high fiving themselves on how smart they are and how Holliday should have never been sent to the minors anyways because he had nothing else to learn. During that 10 game span, Holliday slashed .278/.350/.722/1.072 with 10 Ks and 3 BB in 40 PAs. Outside of that initial hot streak upon return, Holliday has gone 19-for-128 (.148) with 7 BB and 50Ks, with 2 doubles and 2 triples and 0 home runs in 140 PAs in his big league time. But heck, let's be fair and add in his ten game hot streak and let's compare Holliday's first 177 PAs with other notable young players who made their debuts at 20. Obviously the ones that stands out is Jackson Chourio, the presumptive 2024 NL Rookie of the Year. Chourio had a similar start with the bat, and then went on to slash .310/.368/.541/.909 over his next 323 PAs. I don't have any way of looking back at Chourio's statcast numbers at that 176 PA mark, but his numbers now look much better than Holliday. Cal had a similar slow start, but with much less whiff (In a much different era) but both Gunnar and Witt Jr. clearly had outclassed Holliday at the start of their careers. So all is not lost. Holliday has talent and while he's struggled mightily through his initial trial through the majors, Chourio should give Orioles fans hope a turn around might not be that far away.

Right, he's not a guy you want in high leverage. He's better earlier in games. But again, Holliday makes a simple routing play and he's walking that guy and going after the two lefties. Everything was set up for this to be as successful as possible. Holliday just blew it up.

Yeah, this team is the exact opposite of fun to watch.

What did Hyde do wrong? Did Hyde boot a routine ground ball hit right at him? Did Hyde score 2 runs on solo home runs through 9 innings?

Absolutely. The Kid was never ready for the big leagues and it shows. He was S-show in the minors at 2B and clearly showed he could not handle a ground ball hit right at him. Just can't choke on that play.

Well that was a well earned loss. Jackson doesn't choke, Akin would have been able to walk him. This team 100% deserved to lose this game.

If you are going to suck at the plate, you can't suck in the field.

Ah yes, Holliday with the heads up base running.

Ah yes, if he's not striking out, he's rolling over to second base for easy outs.

Ben: Red Sox pitchers are terrible since All-Star break Orioles: Well they haven't face us much!

You imagine how excited pitchers must be to face this offense? They're like, "Going get that ERA down!"

Martin is the new Phil Niekro or Gaylord Perry for looks!