Tony-OH

Truth. He was like the other two weren't balls and I KNOW that one isn't.

Mateo ambushing a first pitch fastball

six

This umpire has a real wide zone

Aguilar has been about as worthless as he was with Miami. He's an Odor like pickup. Stowers sits on the bench while this guy is getting key PAs.

Computer program is spitting out lineups without him.

Considering all the amazing pitchers in the 60s, 70s and 80s, this is surprising.

They should be, they have one of the best teams baseball can buy!

That's my outlook, even though I feel there were better options.

When did you become Donnie Downer??

Damn, I'm guilty too. lol Let's get back to Gunnar and stop derailing his thread please with baseball cards and heckler talk.

Holy crap, it was an entire family of heckler losers! His first couple was funny but afterawhile, who does that, especially with their kid there? I just don't get it. A solid heckle here and there can be funny, standing there and continuing if lame if you ask me.

What is up with Palmer just giggling every time Henderson does something amazing? It's the best!

Ohangometer projections system: Orioles record since July 3rd: 33-17 Extrapolated over 162 games: 107 - 55 End result of the Ohangometer projections system: The Orioles are the best team in the American League and maybe baseball. There!

This from poster Buick McLane on the Facebook site. "The year is 2046. 2 time MVP Gunnar Henderson is being inducted into Cooperstown. His best pal and teammate for 4 World Series Championships, 3 time MVP and 2044 Inductee Adley Rutschman gives a speech in honor or Henderson. Meanwhile, in Baltimore, Rougned Odor is batting 6th and playing second base for the Orioles."

When you are running out sub replacement level player at 2B and you don't think Urias is the guy to replace him, then it made some sense for the rest of this year to have him play some 2B, even though longterm he's going to be on the left side of the infield. Perhaps. The Orioles are all about moving guys around in the minors leagues with just about everyone playing another position or two outside of their main one. It just seemed weird they didn't play him all year at 2B or 1B then 11 games before he gets promoted he plays 6 games at 2B and 3 at 1B only to have the manager say he's not going to play there much.

Well I'll put it this way, had he gone to college, he would have been drafted this year. Assuming he developed in college like he did with the Orioles, you have to imagine he would have been the 1-1 pick this year. Imagine a guy you drafted this season already as good as Henderson? So yes, I think its very possible Henderson ends up with a better career than Bobby Witt Jr. Witt is a year older, bats right-handed, and has been very poor by most metrics defensively this season. As good as Witt is going to be, and I believe he's a future star, I would not trade Henderson for Witt straight up.

Well then it totally made no sense for the Orioles to be playing Henderson at 2B and 1B so much over the last week. I mean we all get the Orioles fascination with Odor at 2B, so that's not really surprising, but why play your top prospect at mostly 2B/1B over the last 11 games then claim he's mostly going to play 3B and SS? It seems to indicate that the entire organization is not always on the same sheet of music as much as we like to think they are.

The biggest issue with Martin was his defense was never good enough to play SS every day at the big league level. If his defense was more consistent, you could live with the bat as a utility player, but he just makes too many easy errors in the field. Add in his penchant for bad base running despite being pretty fast, and you just have a guy who is not a consistent major league baseball player. The writing is on the wall with Martin. He almost assuredly will sign with another team at the end of the year (or earlier if the team just releases him after he clear waivers) as a minor league free agent with the glut of infielders who have surpassed him in the system.

Excellent post. Sums up my feelings 100%. Nobody is saying is a short 1B can't be good, but first base is the easiest position to teach and play, so the chance of finding a tall guy who can perform as well as a short guy there is pretty good. While we're talking first baseman's in the system, let me throw another name out there in Jordan Westburg. the more I watch Westburg's arm, the more I think his best position may end up at 1B. Can he play 2B and an adequate 3B, sure, but the arm strength is going to cost you those spectacular plays. He's got the hands and quickness (right now) to play SS, but again, don't expect those spectacular plays that require a strong accurate arm. At 6-3, he might be the best fit over there if the infield is taken up by Henderson, Ortiz and Norby eventually.

Which is why I don't really pay attention to any of these "predictive systems". Nothing that happened last year has any affect on how a player is going to perform over the next month. Pitchers may have different pitchers, hitter may have new information and you know what, somebody just might get hot because they happened to get hot. The best predictor for how a player will perform over the month is how they've performed this year, especially of the last 80 games or so. But even that has it's flaws.

Models can't take into consideration the coaching and the integrations of advanced analytics they are getting vs what other may be not getting. The one constant in all of the Orioles pitchers "playing over their heads" is perhaps the system they belong to. I've seen pitchers with new and improved pitches, better use of their repertoires, and he ability to attack hitters in the most conducive way of having success. No algorithm is going to be able to access that because they work of using mass amounts of data. I'll admit, I'm never cared much for any of the prediction algorithms like STEAMER or ZIPS or any other ones because there are too many human factors involved that can only be generalized across players not the individual. Now if Fangraphs had to give out betting odds on their low percentage, I bet we'd see a little more realistic odds for a team a few games out. This reeks of them trying to cover their butts for a system that is really unable to accurately access surprise breakout teams like the 2022 Orioles.

Hard not to like what I saw last night. Baumann sat 95-97, and was at 97 in the the 6th inning after 90+ pitches. His slider was diving pretty good and he was mixing in his curve and even a change on occasion. Mostly fastball, slider, he looks like he could certainly help out of the bullpen down the stretch.

The issue is not that a short player can not handle the fielding, scooping or throwing, it's that they provide less reach than a taller player, thus making height something desirable for a 1B. Think about how many close plays their are at first base or how many times a first baseman had to jump up to get a throw and maybe swipe a tag. Steve Garvey played 1B for a long time and was listed 5-10 and was probably 5-8. Of course he put up a -11.8 dWAR over that period, but at the end of the day, infielders like having those big and hopefully nimble first baseman to throw to. This, along with his below average foot speed, is what makes Stowers a good candidate over someone like Norby.

Well it appears the veteranosity of Odor was much too strong so Stowers goes to the bench, Henderson to 3B on day one. I don't know why I would look at things logically as long as Odor is on this roster. Honestly at this point I would not be surprised if the Orioles offer Odor a long term extension before the season is over.