Tony-OH

Where are you getting 10 starts for Mancini? The Orioles got McDermott and Seth Johnson for him. The Rays were the winner of that 3-team trade so far. Jose Siri has been worth 3.3 rWAR for them. The book is not written on McDermott yet and Seth Johnson did help get Soto. I 100% wonder why Flaherty was such a zero for the Orioles when he's been pretty good since.

A 2023 8th rounder, Bragg has been fairly unimpressive this year up until last July when it appears he's put somethings together. Over his last 6 starts, the 23-year old our of Dallas Baptist University has a 0.57 ERA with an otherworldly 42 to 3 K to BB ratio in 31.2 IP. He's held batters to a miniscule .172/.200/.224/.424 slash line over this period. The 6-foot-2 righthander has a three pitch mix with a 94-95 MPH fastball, sweeper and change though he's mostly a fastball, sweeper guy. While I think he's a bullpen guy due to the lack of changeup (I never saw one), his sweeper has a lot of vertical movement and his fastball gets swings and misses in the zone. At 23-years old, almost 24, he probably needs to get that promotion to Aberdeen. Worth keeping an eye on though.

The Mancini trade has netted one start from McDermott and part of the trade that brought Soto. The good part of the Mancini was getting rid of Mancini, who was about to become a pumpkin (And I take no satisfaction in saying that because of Mancini's story). You always eventually judge the trades by the results. It doesn't matter if the idea was sound, if you trade for a guy and he doesn't perform, that ends up a bad trade. That's like saying the Glenn Davis trade was sound because the team needed a power hitting first baseman.

They did need a starter at the time because Povich and McDermott had been tried and left the team wanting, Suarez and Irvin had struggled, and Kremer was 2-4 with a 4.97 ERA and 5.27 FIP over his last 6 starts. They basically felt good about Burnes, Eflin and Grayson, two of which went down shortly after the trades, proving the team needed more starting pitching depth. Thankfully, both Suarez and Kremer have pitched better, but Rogers being a pumpkin has put the team in a bind because now both Povich and Irvin are in the rotation and Burnes has struggled.

You do realize that the person who wrote this is in the extreme minority and that not a single person in this thread is using the Rogers trade as a "basis' for anything besides that it has not been a good trade so far. Don't conflate the two. Clearly very, very few people think Elias should go, even if some of are critical of how parts of the organization are run.

I know I'm getting up there in age (54) but this is why I despise Tiktok (besides it being a tool to collect data for the Chinese government). Why would anyone think that needs to be recoded and put online? And call me old school, but why would a major league baseball player be doing stuff like this in season? I mean I get this is off time, and I'm not expecting him to be crying in a corner when he gets home because he's in the middle of his worse slump of his life, but it's not a good look when your struggling to be worrying about doing dumb TiktoK videos with your girl. Now saying all that, do I think this has anything to do with his awful slump? No, I do not. Do I think he should keep a low profile on Tiktok videos with his girl in season, yes I do.

Perhaps not. But why not wait until the offseason to try and trade for him then? Why make moves at the trade deadline for a player that may not hep you this year too? In theory that players should still be available this offseason and the team would still have Norby and Stowers for depth for this year's run. That's why I do think it was for this year and the fact that he was under contract for two more years made it that much better. The problem Elias has is Peter Bendix out played him at the trade deadline just like Kim Ng did to him when she got Tanner Scott for ash and trash in her system. Eflin might end up his best trade deadline acquisition assuming he comes back healthy. Up until then, the Lopez trade was his best deadline trade.

What I see in the numbers are a guy who was getting lucky and who's peripherals and expected stats suggest he was even luckier. I know you look at the statcast and expected numbers as well, and that chart is atrocious. That is not a guy who was going to have success pitching in the AL East or the AL in general. Also, I never said there was anyone better. I have no idea who was available. All I know is if I was scouting for the Orioles, there is no way I'd recommend Rogers based on the stuff I saw and his expected stats as well as the trending down of his velocity. Trading two guys who have a chance to be everyday big leaguers for him is not a good value trade, now that I've seen him pitch. Now both Norby and Stowers were flawed players who are the kind of guys you move in the right deal, no doubt. Just after looking at all the data and watching him pitch, Rogers was not the guy to pull the trigger on in a pennant run.

As a full fledged member of the Elias and Orioles orange colored glasses brigade, even you have to admit the trade is not looking good for THIS year, right? Like I said when the trade happened, the concept of the trade made sense until I saw Rogers' stuff. I didn't go back to see how he was throwing in his last few starts with the Marlins, but if his stuff and command looked anything like it was with the Orioles whoever did the scouting/analysis should be let go.

While true in principle, what we do know already that it has not helped this team get better within the last month. What we can say is that Rogers stuff was very underwhelming and going back to AAA and getting hammered didn't make it look any better. With Norby and Stowers (.387/.441/.613/1.054 over his last 10 games) hitting well, I think it is valid to grade the trade on THIS year. The trade has been an utter failure for THIS year so far. By the way, isn't interesting if you keep running a guy out there every day, they may hit better than getting one start, collect a couple of hits, then ride the pine for a three games like Stowers was used with the Orioles. Now, will Rogers find a magic pill and come back next year and be a solid starter, perhaps. The trade can not be fully graded right now, that is true, but as a deadline deal to improve the team this year, the trade has failed.

If that's the case, then why bother to trade Norby and Stowers for him at all? Norby would look pretty good as the 3B or DH on this team right now. I think the system or scouts that thought Rogers was going to help this year is flawed. Unless they shut him down or rebuild him back into something, he's no better than Irvin, Povich or Zimmerman. All of whom were in the system already.

I sure hope you weren't referring to me. So Rogers was pitching good before he got here, huh? Here's his statcast percentiles: In his last 10 starts with the Marlins he had a nice 3.48 ERA, but his 4.37 FIP and .268 BABIP, and his 61% strike rate and 8% swinging strike rate all suggest he was getting lucky. Add in that velocity on his fastball had decreased over this span and there were major warning signs that he was going to be a good buy for this year. As I've said, I had no problem trading Norby and Stowers, but would have preferred them to be moved for a better starter. I think this highlights how hard it is to trade hitting prospects alone for good starting pitching. Both Burnes and Eflin cost pitching too.

Has every other organization made drafting college hitters their main selections in rounds 1-5? That's really my point. If you are going to use this draft strategy, then you have to hit on more of these guys. If you're not going to use much high draft capital on pitchers, you are going to have a wasteland of useable pitchers in the upper levels, and will be scanning the AAA opt out wire for pitchers. Unfortunately, with the way the Orioles use their relievers so often, these guys end up pitching in tie or one run games.

The thought behind the trade made sense, but after seeing what Roger's stuff looked like, I do think they need to address the professional scouts or system that thought Rogers would help this team in a pennant drive. I mean, without scouting Rogers, I thought just looking at the overall numbers that he might be better than Povich and is retainable so why not? Westburg and Mateo were still healthy and playing everyday so there didn't appear like many PAs available for Norby or Stowers this year. But when I watched his first game I was shocked by the lack of stuff. Not just velocity, but only the change was vaguely a major league pitch and he was struggling to command that pitch. So I thought, maybe it was just that start. Then he came out and was that guy again. Then again. That's when it hit me, that's who this guy is right now. What made them think he was an "adjustment" away from being successful in a pennant drive? That goes back to the question, has the team ever acquired a struggling pitcher at the major league level during a season and made him better? Flaherty and Fuji say hello. Eflin was already good, and Dominguez and Soto have been who they were, talented but inconsistent relievers that you never fully have confidence in during one run or tie games. This is where I think the Orioles think they are smarter than they are. And for the love of God, I wish Elias would stop trading with the Marlins or picking up their cast offs. Their GM must have an Elias shrine built, and every time the phone rings he must hope it's Elias on the other side.

Probably more years honestly. No one should ever doubt Elias' role in turning this franchise around. The question that we will need to ask at some point (not even close to now), is he the guy that can take the team to the next level or sustain this level of success over 5-7 year span? He's now judged on his success on the major league diamond. He will be judged by how far his team goes in the playoffs. Now this season, depending on who returns from injury, I'm willing to give him a bit of a mulligan because of the injuries. He looks to have improved his team at the deadline with Eflin (assuming he doesn't miss significant time) and the two Phillies trades for Dominguez and Soto. The Rogers trade though looks like he should fire his professional scouts, and the fact this team needs to to play Eloy and Slater speaks to its lack of depth at the upper levels in the hitting department, despite drafting mostly college hitters with his first 5 rounds since 2019. Either way, I think we all agree that the Orioles, despite two months of absolute mediocrity, are still going to the playoffs and as we've seen, if they get hot then, no one will remember or care about these two months.

You are surprised that people still support a GM of an organization that was once a laughing stock, but is now in it's second pennant run in two years despite a multitude of injuries? All because the team has played slightly below .500 baseball for two months? You asked the question, you got the responses. Changing it to something completely different, something I've already have a thread on (drafting and development) is not going to change that you asked a question that is going to get little support, even by the most frustrated of fans.

The simple answer is no. This team has been decimated by starting pitching injuries and the team is still in a battle to win the division despite the fact it has played so poorly since late June. Now, saying that, do I have questions about things on how Elias and his staff does things? Absolutely. I've been a vocal opponent of his draft strategy of not drafting pitching very high which is why the system is barren of help right now. I'm also not convinced despite the technologies they use, that they develop players and pitchers all that well. I've certainly detailed my concerns with their drafting and development of pitching in multiple posts. Think about this, Elias has spent a lot of draft capital drafting college hitters since 2019, yet this team still has Eloy Jimenez and Austin Slater getting PAs during a pennant drive? We've seen multiple rookies come up and just out right stink. Not struggle a bit, but have historically bad starts to their major league careers and it makes me wonder if the hitting approach taught is something sustainable at the major league level. We've seen Elias bury players like Ortiz and Westburg (for half a season) last year, and Norby over the last few years, only to see them success once given an opportunity at the major league level. Norby, who always had a major league bat, is hitting well for the Marlins, but the worse part is they've converted him to 3B where he's done pretty well. The Orioles tried to shoehorn him to 2B where he was never a good fit and then gave him some outfield time, but barely ever gave him 3B reps. Why? Yes, I know Mayo is playing there, but Mayo continues to struggle with his throwing so why is he still at 3B when you have Westburg already playing 3B? None of it makes any sense. Urias has been a disaster at 3B this season defensively so would the team be worse right now with Norby at 3B and Urias at 2B and Holliday back in AAA trying to get better? But Norby was sent away with Stowers (who has struggled but I still think will find a major league role) for Trevor Rogers, who's stuff was shockingly bad before getting sent to AAA where he's struggled. Now, that trade looks awful right now, but the bigger issue is not perhaps developing Norby correctly and making the wrong assessment on his bat. Norby has spent the last two and half years telling Elias that he was ready for major league pitching, so why was he playing positions that he was blocked at, and never going to be good at? Now, saying that, the Eflin trade as well as the Phillies trade are looking good (Go look at what Soto has done in his last 6 outings), but the reliance on AAA opt out and waiver claims for a contending team is a little concerning, and tells us about the true depth of his upper levels. So yes, that's a lot of negatives, but the results are what matter. A lot has gone wrong this season with Bradish, Means, and Wells being lost for the season along with Coulombe, Webb, Westburg, Grayson and even Mateo being lost for good bits of the season. That's a lot of guys expected to contribute this season in major roles. I believe Elias has absolutely done an amazing job of turning this organization around. He absolutely has led this franchise from being a joke to being what looks like an annual contender. Are their warts that are starting to show a bit? Yes. Has he shown he can put a team on the field that can go deep into the playoffs? Not yet. We also don't know what he can do with an offseason of having an owner that should spend money. Am I saying that it's valid to be critical of some areas of the organization? I do. Am I ready to say he should go? Absolutely not.

Jomboy does some great stuff, but he should have highlighted his work on receiving vs making this about Burnes' back and forth with the ump. Pretty interesting to see how much better 22-year old Francisco Alvarez (+8 catching Framing runs) is than 26-year old Adley (-2 framing runs). It also begs the question as to why the Mets are using advanced catching techniques and placement while it appears the Orioles may not, or at least don't seem to be in this situation covered. Besides blocking, where Adley is currently tied for the best with +3 catching blocking runs saved and the best in MLB with 13 blocks above average, it appears that every part of Rutschman's game has slipped this season.

That's kind of crazy to think McCann has been out performing Adley for that long.

First one was a cutter away which I get taking. The 93 MPH fastball down and in was his pitch. He must've been guessing slider in that part of the zone and it didn't break.

Gunnar with RISP and two outs: .149/.298/.277/.575. So yeah, it's not his strength at this part of his career.

Oh well, can't say I expected Gunnar to come through.

Once he had Rustchman down 1-2, he didn't throw a competitive pitch. That was a terrible job by Hudson more than a great at by Adley.

We need Hudson to keep missing by a bunch.

So balanced at the plate Adley is.. lol