Tony-OH

Haha, I like Etzel already more than I liked Hart and I'm not sure Etzel is more than a 4th outfielder.

It probably is very low on the list, but at some point, and that point is usually at this time of the year, those priorities are met. I highly doubt making an agreement with Johnson took away from Elias monitoring his cell phone for a Getz call or any other major move.

Why would there be bad blood between Mancini and the Orioles?

Just my hunch, but the Orioles seem to be very keen on having their two best OBP guys at #1 and #2. Until Holliday is deemed ready, I think those two remain at the top of the order. Once Holliday arrives, Gunnar probably move to #3 with Adley staying at #2.

Orioles HoF, sure, 1st ballot let's go. Regular HoF, not in the conversation. At just 32.6 rWAR and 106 OPS+, he was a very good player but not a HoF worthy player. Now don't get me wrong, Harold Baines' inclusion has watered own the HoF a bit (i know Drungo will now tell us 80 more guys who played that were worse but still), but Jones belongs in the hall of pretty good.

This is the time of year that these Veteran players will sign AAA contracts (probably with an invite to spring training) after they realize they are not getting major league ones. Spring training is only 3-4 weeks away so many of these guys want to start planning. Johnson looks like a decent depth piece who can play all three outfield spots. As some one pointed out, he looks like the Daz Cameron guy for 2024. I expect Elias will sign some more of these type, particularly at 1B/3B, middle infield, and maybe another outfielder.

Jim was always a great guy to talk to in the press box. He had such a long career that he knew just about anyone and everyone who came through that press box over the years. He was a smart baseball guy as well, but most importantly, he was one of the nice guys in there. As a quasi-press member for 20+ years while running the Hangout, I wasn't part of the "gang" per se of the local press because I wasn't in the box all the time. Then, because I was one of, if not the original, internet guy with regular press passes (until it was pulled by the Orioles new PR staff tow years ago), many were either dismissive or downright hostile towards me. Don't get me wrong, I wasn't losing sleep over some knuckleheads who thought they were better than me because they worked full time covering the team, but their attitudes helped highlight the genuinely kind people in the box. Jim Henneman certainly fit the category for me. He'd greet me with "Hey guy!" when he saw me, which I never knew was whether that was just his typical greeting or couldn't remember my name, but that's neither here nor there! But I sat and ate with him many times in the press lounge before games and he was always up for a good baseball chat. His knowledge of Orioles history was among some of the best I knew, right up there with Scott Garceau (another fine gentlemen). Either way, I'm happy for him that he's receiving this honor. It's well deserved, and I'm glad he was able to see this for himself.

I don't think is has anything to do with philosophical differences at all. If you are comfortable with a starter that may or may not get you five innings every five days (I know I've done the work before but his ability to get past the 5th in the minors is very, very low and that's against minor league hitters) then he's your guy. If you are comfortable taking a guy and have him become a mediocre starter because of lack of ability to cover innings, vs being an impact left-handed reliever, then he's your guy. You said, "We're talking about a high school pitcher who has 288 IP as a starter under his belt before last season where he was pitching without his real stuff for most of it." You do realize that's because he's not been able to stay healthy to compile those innings, right? You know he's a guy who's velocity has dropped off already from where he was in his first two years in the minors, right? You do know he's had back, shoulder, and even a strained forearm at points in his career, right? Most great closers probably could have been used as a starter and been at least effective enough to be a back of the rotation guy, but they found that their best role was in relief because it maximized what they are good at. Hall is very good at inducing weak contact and missing bats, but that leads to high pitches per inning because he's never had great command. In his 11 starts last year at Norfolk he was able to get past the 5th inning one time, and it took him 98 pitches to complete 6 innings. How many more pitches would it take against major league hitters? He had a 5.5 BB/9 in AAA last year at 5.7 BB/9 in his 11 starts. Some of you point to his improvement at the major league level when he dropped to 2.3/9 as a reason to be hopeful. Maybe the fact that he never pitched more than two innings of threw more than 27 pitches (not including his one long relief outing early in the year where it took him 75 pitches to get three 3 INNINGS!!) had more to do with that improvement than any sudden better command? As for McDermott, he has some of the same concerns and we'll need to see how he does in Norfolk this year before making a final call, but he did show more signs last year of potentially being able to stick as a starter.

Don't get me wrong, you an have any opinion you like and all things considered, I hope you are right and I'm wrong. but you mentioned how his development was interrupted, and it was, by injury multiple times. Guys with high pitch counts and haven't pitched a full season as a starter since Low-A ball, who are 25-years old, in an organization that needs him out of the pen, are all great reasons why the Orioles should shelf any ideas of trying to move him back to a starter's role. He's got a chance to be a Billy Wagner type closer and hopefully will have a nice long career like Wagner in that role.

Good Lord. I wanna take the time to regurgitate the 1000 reasons why Hall will not be a successful starter, but I just don't have the time. I'll just assume you disagree with the evidence or haven't read it. But if you want to throw some orange pixie dust and believe, feel free. No one is underestimating his ability to get big league batters out or his starter's repertoire. Those of us who accept him as a reliever understand it's not only about walk rate when it comes to being a successful starter so pointing to it as empirical evidence for him being the best option is just not well informed in my opinion. McDermott is similar in that his age, inconsistency of command from start to start, and amount of pitches it takes him to get outs are all concerns. The one thing McDermott has over Hall is better health record.

My post was in jest clearly, which is why it was so long. In all seriousness, if that's what we're going to do here, the Orioles have few 1B options in AAA and even fewer 3B options if Mayo makes the team or is tried in RF. Nevin makes sense as that guy. It's just a little amazing that he had to be acquired and put on the 40-man roster for it to happen. I'm 99% sure he will be DFA'd when room is needed is when they would have start paying like a 40-man guy vs a AAA guy. Maybe because of the Orioles depth, it's harder for them to sign these AAAA-type 1B-3B so the only way to get one is to acquire them through cash considerations. Truthfully, they still need another one because TT Bowen is not really a good AA player. Now they could play Billy Cook at 1B in AAA, but other hand that, the pickings are slim and behind Mayo, the 3B AAA options are not plentiful either. Now why the Orioles PR team decided to put out graphic with "Welcome back to Birdland Tyler Nevin" is still a bit perplexing. Is he getting a bobblehead next?

100%.. I'm telling you all now, he has to have some kind of pictures of Elias that he doesn't want to get out. Seriously, I think Tyler Nevin has broken Sigbot's computer. Like there is something in his statcast data that keeps telling it he will be a good player despite any actual performance statistical data to back it up. I mean, there is literally no logical reason why he should be on a major league 40-man roster. As AAA 1B-3B fodder, sure, why not, but why would you put him on the 40-man roster? I know this move means nothing other than to confuse any knowledgeable fan/scout/analyst or really anyone with a vague knowledge of what makes a player reasonably valuable. I do have a theory. Last year, Sigbot's computer told Elias to go sign Adam Frazier despite having both Westburg and Ortiz ready to take over at 2B. That dumb, unnecessary move was not good in just about any way, but the Orioles ended up winning 101 games despite the move. Nevin is this year's Frazier move. Acquiring and adding a player like Nevin to the 40-man roster on a team with actual good players at the positions he supposedly plays is so insane that it has to be the Frazier move of the 2023-24 offseason. My last theory is that Elias has figured out that you have to be able to give an offering to the baseball Gods by putting one guy on his 40-man roster than it is so terrible that the offering allows the Gods to give a blessing. A player with no redeemable baseball skill who is not good at offense or defense who allows the Gods to take pity upon the organization and give it good luck for the following season. Those are my three guesses. Pictures, Frazier move, Baseball Gods offering!

The thing about McDermott is he's a bit like DL Hall in that it typically takes him a lot of pitches to get outs. Part of that is a lack of command and another part is that hitters don't typically hit him very hard because of the quality of stuff, leading to a decent amount of foul balls. In two of eight AAA starts he didn't make it to the 4th inning, but one of those he was pulled after just 52 pitches. He's also still pretty inconsistent start to start. That's why there is a very real reliever risk to him. Now, saying that, he did have some very nice outs where he was able to get through the 6th and one start made it through seven on just 92 pitches so there are days where it all works. What he needs to do is show more consistency from start to start in 2024 and get deeper into games by pitching to contact a little more against hitters that can't really hurt him. He's still very much a wildcard for the rotation in 2024, but it would not surprise me if he ends up seeing a decent amount of big league time in the second half of 2024. Whether that's in the rotation or in the pen will be depending on need and how he's pitching. https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=mcderm000cha&type=pgl&year=2023

No doubt understanding the limitations of the team you are dealing with is crucial. I think that's partly why you hard rumblings of Elias saying they may consider Hall as a rotation piece again. He's signaling that while he's not going to be a player for a major free agent pitcher, he does have internal options. Honestly, if Getz won't come off Basallo/Mayo (assuming that is the hold up) as the headliner, Elias very well may need to start signaling that he's comfortable going into 2024 with what he has or start floating rumors he's close to moving for another option out there like Luzardo. This is a big offseason for Elias as he's in unchartered territory for this stage of being a GM. With his financial restraints, he's going to have to do it differently than how the Astros did it when they got to this point.

Which is why i think we've seen Elias change his draft strategy last year and why we may see more high picks starting to go towards pitching. I'd really like to see them go after a high school upside pitcher with one of three early picks. Are they volatile sure, but at some point you have to start investing upside pitching and not thinking you can acquire it because under Angelos, Elias is never going to have the budget to do so.

It's a two fold approach though this offseason. Obvious the first part is improving this team for 2024. That's most important. The second part is moving major league ready prospects that are depth for maybe some upside pitching prospects? Guys like Norby and Stowers come to mind. If Elias was able to get a Bradish out of an end of the line Bundy, somebody might be willing to part with an A-ball starting pitching prospect that could provide starting pitching depth in a few years.

Gotcha. Defense is one of the hardest thing to scout without data (statcast) or seeing a player often. A lot of national publications don't have the time or data to really judge defense so they go off a scouting contact that may or may not have seen the player all that much. So they regurgitate previous reports and run with it. I'll be honest, defense is the one area where I end up trying to do a lot of video work on players I really want to evaluate, but even then it's time consuming. There is no way to easily find defensive plays of minor league players so if I didn't see them a ton defensively while watching games, I usually end up going back and pulling up games in which he made errors. That typically at least let's me see what he struggles with. I wish MILB TV would add a search capability for defense.

That was going to be my choice but he actually never played with the Orioles. Plus he had some accuracy issues, but he had the best arm I can remember seeing arm strength wise. Guys who I remember having really good strong, accurate arms would be Ken Singleton, John Shelby, Adam Jones, Nick Markakis (early in the career) and Austin Hays.

Are your suggesting I don't take accuracy into account when I discuss throwing for outfielders. I hope not because I do take that into consideration. Here's the thing with Kjerstad, his throws are very inconsistent. He'll make a nice throw, then make a throw that would make Johnny Damon proud. Sometimes he's accurate, and sometimes he's not. I agree that pure arm strength is not the only thing to judge an outfielder's arm. Alex Ochoa had one of the strongest arms I ever saw, but I also saw him throw a ball about 15 rows deep into the 3rd base stands one time.

"Defensively, he did improve some at second base, but he's still a below average defender on the dirt. He did turn the double play better and he's got average second base arm strength but his accuracy is not always there especially when he has to throw hard on a play. He gets caught in short hops too often he seems to occasionally lose focus on making simple catches or pop ups.. He committed 16 errors this year in just 105 games at second base."

While I do think Kjerstad is a below average RFer overall, I don't think he's unplayable there. I wish there was a little more arm for RF and he doesn't have the jumps or top end speed to make up for it to play left field in Camden Yards. I wish he would have shown a little better at 1B because that would be a nice fit if he could hold his own there, but he looked pretty unplayable there in the minors.

No, my opinion has not changed. Wildcard has always believed sources like MLB.com over mine for as long as I can remember. To each is own. Norby is a well below average defender at 2B who will make some nice plays here and there, but will also make some head scratching errors. Has he improved some in his minor league time, sure, but I still feel he's a below average defender at 2B and would like to see what he can do in LF and even maybe some CF to see if he handle it as a 4th outfielder type.

Either way, he doesn't belong here. He's gone.

That's how I see it working once he's ready while Adley is here too. If he has another year like he had this year and ends up putting up Mayo like numbers in AAA this year, I would not be surprised if that's not by the start of 2025..

I agree that you really can't read too much into 4 games playing anywhere, but the fact that he struck out just once and had a .500 OBP showed that he was not intimidated or overwhelmed by the jump and that's impressive. In fact, Basallo has not been one of those guys that has needed a lot of time to adjust to different levels. That's one of the reason I bumped him over Mayo even though Mayo has done well in AAA and has an impact bat too. That ability to not stumble upon promotion and last year, even doing better, is what makes him that impressive.