Tony-OH

I ranked Kjerstad above Cowser but I'll be honest, I could have built a case either way. Cowser's defensive edge, including a much better arm, really is what makes him stand out. Unfortunately, the concerns about him hitting velocity in the minor leagues was highlighted during his major league time. Cowser has a solid floor as a 4th outfielder while Kjerstad has a floor of a Ryan O'Hearn type. Both have considerably higher ceilings and solid "most likely" as regular everyday outfielders. The Orioles could do a lot worse than Cowser in LF and Kjerstad in RF one day. If I had to trade one, man it's close, but my concerns over Cowser hitting velocity and left handed breaking pitches probably means I send him off first.

I'm just catching up on this but we know how Elias and company share information outside of their inner circle. They don't. We've heard from players many times say they don't hear from the Orioles about promotions and so forth until they happen, so it's highly unlikely THEY told Povich anything. Now, saying all that, Povich may have talked to someone in the organization, perhaps a coach, who told him the organization likes him very much and has plans for him. Perhaps, they even "leaked" that they feel he's untouchable. The Orioles could gain an advantage by the player telling others including his agent and that gets back to the White Sox who now know if they really want Povich, they'll have to come down on the rest of the package. I don't think Huskerfan is making up anything when it comes to his "info" on Povich, but there is a lot of gamesmanship that goes on in these situations. We also know that Elias and crew are not telling a player when he's going to be promoted or when he's going to be with the big league club since we have multiple accounts from players who have been promoted and they all said the same thing, they never knew anything until it happened.

As much as I think Adley is one of the best catchers in baseball, who here would take him over Gunnar right now? I think it's fairly close, but I'll take an impact shortstop who is three years younger who's offensive upside is higher.

Very few people want to live in major cities anymore because they've become overwhelmed with crime, drugs, and corruption. Not to mention traffic, high tax rates in most, and an abundance of homeless people/beggars. Obviously the ultra rich like most veteran baseball players can escape some of these realities, but I think you are seeing these player live away from it all as much as possible. Besides, if you didn't have to work in the winter and made millions of dollars, why would you want to live in the Northern part of the united States in the offseason?

I agree with this statement to an extent, but I think it also has to do with the culture around the team and it's chances of winning. The kinds of money we are talking about with the top players makes the city less relevant in my opinion. Very few players live in the city in which they play in the offseason nowadays, especially not here in the Baltimore area. Now they may own a home during the season, but when they make 5 million plus, they probably have at least two homes.

It was like that long before Duquette's era, but yes, the change in development since Elias took over is immense.

The one thing we forget sometimes is that your prospects are nothing more than commodities that should be used to help your major league team to win. Whether that be for them to become cheap talent that helps you on the Orioles roster or by being traded to bring in talent that will do so, that's their roles. The Dodgers are not afraid to trade their young players for major league proven talent because they don't have time to risk a rookie needing time to adjust to the major leagues. This is one of the areas where Elias has a big challenge. He can't just take on the salary that the Dodgers, Yankees, Mets, or Red Sox can take on so he's got to figure out how to stage his young players coming to the majors. This was part of the reason why i was so dead set against the Adam Frazier deal because I thought last year was a great year to break in Westburg and Ortiz. As you could see, Westburg needed some time to adjust and never showed the power he's capable of at the major league level last year during that adjustment. I would have preferred that he got 400+ PAs last year at the major league level instead of just 228 because it would have made him better prepared for this year. Ortiz basically lost his major league PAs last year due to the Frazier signing. Now Elias has Westburg, Ortiz, Norby, Mayo, Cowser, Kjerstad, and Stowers all ready to play in the majors but only Westburg and Stowers to a lesser extent have any real MLB playing time under their belts. The Dodgers would take a few of them and trade them for an impact proven starting pitcher, 3B or outfielder. Elias is still trying to figure out how to do win and still have that depth, because he can't spend his way out of major injuries or poor performance like the big market teams can.

Rangers may have good young players, but they augmented them by bringing in those guys as well as impact starting pitching that heled them, especially in the playoffs. I'm not taking away from their World Championship, just saying they did spend heavy to turn it around so fast. But at the end of the day, they just happened to get white hot at the right time and that means more than anything else once you make the playoffs.

It certainly helps to win more games than not over a 162 game schedule with a huge payroll, but if the playoffs have taught us anything, it's that anything can happen once you get into 3, 5 or 7 game series. It bothered me more when the orioles were so far behind everyone else with development and use of analytics, but now, I kind of shrug my shoulders. The Angels had Ohtani and Mike Trout for cripes sake and hw did that turn out for them? Sure, we can point to the Rangers and how they bought their way to a Championship last year, but that was the Rangers first World Series ever. The numbers that @Moose Milligan pointed to really explains it all. Despite having no salary cap, baseball remains the most competitive for World Championships amongst the top sports in this country. Now, will it hurt when Gunnar Henderson or Jackson Holliday are one day playing for the Dodgers for a billion dollars? Sure. But hopefully Elias will continue to find their next versions or the Orioles will be bought be someone willing to spend to keep their stars.

When you see that you have to think development was the bigger problem than drafting.

Beck was a good kid and one of my favorites to interview and talk with back in the day. He was always smiling and having a good time.

I'm in no hurry to trade Cowser, but if he can headline a trade for a TOR starter then I'm ok with moving him. You have to give up something to get something and I really don't want to move the big three.

I still have him as the #5 prospect in a pretty deep system so I still think he's going to hit. I do still have some concerns over him hitting velocity though and that will ultimately decide his ceiling. Cowser certainly has more power than he showed in the big leagues and he's certainly a better hitter than he was during his awful trial last year. Saying all that, I think his floor is a 4th outfielder. Here are some AAA hitting highlights incase most of what you've seen of him was during his MLB time. https://www.mlb.com/video/00u7jzgkdtP9kH55c356/reels/colton-cowser?partnerId=web_multimedia-search_video-share Defensively he's better than he showed as well. He's got a 91.9 percentile arm and while he did come up with -1 OAA during his brief time, that was mostly from this one bad play (which had an 85 percentile chance of being caught) in left field. It's worth noting that Cowser had only played four games in left field this year with Norfolk which seems like a developmental error if you ask me because Cowser is a great fit defensively in Camden Yards big left field. Here's some highlights of Cowser's defense. Back to the question. No, I don't think the Orioles or other GMs have devalued Cowser off his major league time last year. I do think they probably share concerns over him hitting upper velocity, but I don't have his numbers from the minors. Either way, he's a guy the Orioles could reluctantly give up in a trade for a top starter, but they're not giving him away for sure.

Perhaps some people believe Elias undervalues pitching because of his lack of drafting them in the first three rounds of the draft until this past year and the fact that he's never been willing to trade for a TOR due to their prospect cost. Now there are nuggets of truth in this statements, but I don't think it's because he doesn't "value" pitching. I truly believe Elias and Sig believe they had a system that could identify and either develop or fix lesser valued pitchers. As several have posted, the Orioles pitching staff was pretty good during the regular season partially due to the second part of my first sentence. Bradish, Rodriguez, and Kremer were all developed within the system under Elias with Bradish in particular becoming a much different pitcher then when he arrived. I do think Elias is very serious about acquiring a TOR this offseason, but he's probably trying to do it without giving up Holliday, Mayo or Basallo which could be a tough sell. We'll see how it all shakes up, but I don't agree that Elias doesn't value pitching. He found a cost effective way of putting together a pitching staff last year that won 101 games last year and although it did not work in the playoffs (outside of Bradish), I do think he has to weigh the cost vs the addition. Unlike the Yankees or Dodgers, he can't swing and miss and just easily recover by buying his way out of his mistake.

Thanks Chuck. May you all have a blessed Christmas day with your love ones and family. We appreciate you all as Hangouters and amazingly knowledgeable baseball fans.

Thanks, but I really just pieced together highlights from the MLB filmroom and did a little editing.

For deepest condolences go out to his entire family and friends. It appears he fought a courageous fight against cancer, but unfortunately, cancer can sometimes be unbeatable. RIP Ryan. My prayers are with his family during this tough time. F Cancer!

It's fair to question him defensively at 3B because the fielding percentage most definitely has to improve. It did improve some at AAA last year but the biggest improvements was just his ability to play closer to the ball and his lateral movement, especially to his glove side thanks to learning a drop step. He's obviously going to be better at 1B, but I don't think he's unplayable at 3B. As long as Mountcastle is here though, I don't see him getting PAs at 1B and DH will be taken up by Adley when he's not catching, so if he's going to play this year with the Orioles, it needs to be at 3B.

Got post RZNJ. That improvement in his plate discipline and the defensive improvements at 3B are what really shone through this season and should have reminded all that's got a chance to be very special. I still think he's a bit undervalued and the fact that we haven't hear much from Elias on him like we heard about Holliday is a little surprising. Maybe nobody asked him about him, but I do think there's a very real chance of Mayo winning the 3B job out of spring training.

It will help with his relief floor for sure. But he convinced me last season to keep running him out as a starter for now to see what they got, even if he's starting to get up there in prospect age.

This is how to big league right here. Good on Adley!

I'm going to lock this. I don't think Roll Tide meant to send us to a obvious scam link but he sent us to a Nigerian scam site. Everyone please make sure you only post legitimate links.

Oy, that article reads like it was written by AI.

@Frobby asked and he shall receive. Here's a Chayce McDermott Highlight video. Please like and subscribe to the channel. Thanks.

Here's a highlight video I put together as a test. If you like it please like it, comment and subscibe to our You Tube channel. Thanks.