Tony-OH

We know the Orioles should make him worthy. If Davis spends any time on the active 26-man roster before September it will be a black mark against Elias. No way should he see an active roster this year. He should be placed on the 60-man IL for his back problems and then sent on long rehabs if he ever feels "good enough" to try to play again this year. The Davis ship has long sailed and although it appears ownership refuses to let Elias release him in the offchance there's a work stoppage and they can save a few bucks, Elias' job is to find ways to keep him off his active roster.

Just to be clear here, I have never said that Rutschman can't hit good fastballs. I do think it's tough to evaluate any amateur hitters against good consistent heat as well as major league offspeed pitches because they non of them see that before they get into pro ball. I 100% agree with you that a full season of games against pro competition will tell us a lot more than anything we have right now with Rutschman. From what I've seen and heard from other player evaluators, Rutschman just needs experience and from my perspective, some approach adjustments. I don't know what McGregor was basing his comments from, but I do know the man has seen a lot of baseball and knew what to look for in hitters as a pitcher. Now maybe that was an offhand comment based on his ABs this spring, or maybe it was after hearing from others how he looked in his pro debut and at Bowie last year at the alternate camp. Saying that, I heard Adley was the best hitter at that camp "by far" and he was facing some pretty good heat with DL Hall, Grayson Rodriguez, Kremer and Akin throwing at him to name a few. It is worth keeping an eye on this year and if for some reason he struggles at Bowie, I'll be paying extra attention on whether guys with good velocity give him struggles. If I had to guess right now, I'm betting it has more to do with his approach and outthinking himself at the plate while also perhaps pressing a bit to make a great impression. His stats this year should give us a much better understanding.

Well hell, 2-for-2, congrats! lol

In don't think anyone is in panic, but how do you assess him against the good fastball in college where he was pitched around and walked most of the time?

Giants seem to like our guys better than Elias does. Maybe Goudeau can say hi to Yaz.

Well at least we have our 1-2 pick from last year that not one of the baseball people have ever seen play baseball as a professional yet. Long way to go with both, but as I always say, special players do special things early on.

Wieters' expectations went through the roof because of his dominance in the minor leagues. I always bring up the fact that Joe Jordan said he's similar to Varitek when he was drafted, and although he may have under shot Varitek's bat a bit at the major league level, it ended up not a bad comp.

By 23-years old Johnny Bench was already a rookie of the year, MVP, and 4x All-Star so no one should be suggesting Rutschman is the next Johnny Bench.

Yeah, I'm not sure why he wasn't given more ABs this spring unless they were hiding him a bit. I'm still trying to figure out how Elias likes to do things with his top prospects and it's been hard to tell because of this damn COVID crap. Hopefully this will all quiet down when he goes down to Bowie and puts up some great numbers, gets pushed to AAA and finishes off the year with people wondering whether he's #1 or #2 overall prospect in baseball once again.

You use this same philosophy every time you discuss 1st round picks, but all 1:1s aren't the same. Especially when you take into consideration the huge busts of mostly high schoolers that bring that WAR average down. Anything less than a career with multiple All-Star berths for Rutschman would be a hug disappointment for everyone. If he ends up Wieters, I'll say it, he would rate as a bust as a 1:1 pick in my opinion. Saying all that, we're way to early to start getting concerned over his professional start due to the circumstances. If he puts up a dud this year at Bowie then we can start talking Wieters.

That's fair. At 1-1 and the highest bonus ever given to an amateur, the expectation should be rightfully much higher than Wieters' career.

Waaaaayyyy to early for that.

I don't think this is anything to freak out about yet either, and I'm not overly concerned yet. One thing to remember is if guys are guessing fastball they can hit velocity most of the time if its in the middle of the plate. The guy that barrels the good fastball on the inner 3rd of the plate in a breaking ball count usually is the one that has those quick wrists and generates that well above average bat speed. I wish we had more data and videos of at bats to go off of so really we need to wait and see him at Bowie this year.

Well since the college league I pitched in back when I was 20, I don't have any experience throwing balls by guys either, but I do know when I see a guy that can't catch up to good fastballs. I imagine that McGregor has seen a lot of baseball over the years at all levels. Again, not saying he's right, but special players tend to do special things right off the bat. This has been a weird start to his professional career between mono after he was drafted and then missing the season with CVOID last year, but besides walking, I'd like to start seeing him put up some good hard consistent contact. Rutschman is 23-years old and has six Ks in 15 PAs this spring with zero homers and is slashing .250/.400/.417/.817 Bobby Witt Jr. is 21 and has 10 Ks in 35 PAs with 3 homers and slashing .303/.343/.576/.919 Again, these are small samples sizes but is shows the Royals have given their a guy a lot of chances and he's shown some pop. Meanwhile Rutschman has gotten just 15 PAs by the Orioles and hasn't exactly lit things on fire, just like he didn't during his first taste of pro ball in 2019. This doesn't mean I think Rutschman is not going to end up special, I just think he needs to really put up some eye popping numbers when he gets to Bowie to alleviate some of these early lack of production. It was just two at bats that I saw in his last game, but I was not happy how he let two fastballs for strikes in his second AB after the pitcher was struggle to throw strikes the batter before. That approach was way to conservative. He ended up swinging through two two-strikes fastballs and from what I've seen, he seems to swing through and foul off a lot of hittable pitches this spring. Maybe he's a guy that needs some timing adjustments early on. Either way, I'd say my concern level is about at level 2 on a scale of 1-10, but he really needs to put up some great minor league numbers this year at Bowie and higher. I can say one thing, Elias's 1-1 and 1-2 pics have not exactly come into pro ball with a roar.

Thanks. Most of the time it's last minute with Terry but I'll see if I can remember. Appreciate the offer to help though.

In the Pressboxonline.com's interview with former Oriole and former Orioles minor league pitching coach Scott McGregor, McGregor tossed in a less then thrilling assessment of Rutschman quipping, "He needs to get into high levels to see if he can hit some fastballs a little bit because they're throwing it by him right now." I thought that was an interesting comment from the former 20-game winner. Now I haven't seen enough of Rutschman's PAs but I did see a few of his strikeouts in his last game and both times he was burned on inside fastballs that he swung through. From what I've seen in limited PAs is his lack of aggressiveness early in counts where he seems to dig himself into a two strike hole often. While I never heard bat speed as an issue in any scouting reports, I did find the comment interesting and worth noting and discussing. Again, I'm not saying I agree with McGregor since I haven't seen enough of his at bats to say one way or the other, but it's worth watching.

If you looks at the statcast information available for a few of Lopez's outing and they are very similar to his stuff from last year. He's the same guy so I don't take anything out of his spring stats, especially since he's not gone more than three innings. Saying that, I do think he's worth a look in relief where he can add some length to the pen. I see him making the team but unless Harvey gets hurt, I see him in the pen instead of the rotation.

Guess someone in MASN or the Orioles finally decided how embarrassing it would be to not broadcast one spring training game when every other team is doing so. It's still an embarrassing decision on MASN's part to not cover the team this spring. Two games over the last two weeks of the season is throwing out a bone, but doesn't take away from the ineptitude of the decision makers within MASN. Of course we get out coverage cut in half with the Nationals. Both fan bases deserve their own network and MASN should go away. MASN still thinks games from last year count as "classic" games. Just a purely lazy network run apparently on a nickle and dime.

Hays' injury history is certainly always a concern until he can get through a season without IL time. Saying that, I really think Hyde wants Mullins in CF as much as possible. Hays is an average defender out there so it's not like he's trying to keep him out of that position, but Mullins is one of the best at covering ground. Either way, I think the 5 of them will rotate through the four spots with Hays playing a lot of LF and RF along with CF and could even DH at times if Hyde is trying to give him a semi-day off but wants the bat in there.

Thanks Steve. Anyone on this board probably won't be surprised by anything I say on the radio since it's typically the same things you guys read from me daily. Appreciate your recap though.

I think you know that they are one trick-pitch pitchers that would not even be pitching in A-Ball if they took those pitches away. Apples and oranges.

I think they plan to use Shaw a lot in LF with Nevin at 1B most of the time. Nevin is the priority play and I agree with you that he might see some time in LF as well.

At this point I just want to see these young men playing games that matter. It's great to see guys putting good numbers up while improving, but the results in the games are what matters.

Yes, that was a very interesting comment. They did something similar to Brenan Hanifee and we saw the terrible year he had 2019 after looking like a breakout guy in 2018. They certainly seems to be looking for a very particular type of pitchers with the high spin 4-seam fastballs, but I still think guys with good sinkers that get ground balls can be good as well. It seems like they basically were willing to risk losing Pop because he doesn't fit the mold they are looking for and it will be very interesting to follow this line of thinking and see how successful these guys are in the big leagues and who go to other teams and find success.

Not sure why it's a dumb thread. Mancini is coming off a missed season and undergoing treatment for cancer. The fact that he is a power hitter and has no extra base hits is something to keep an eye on. I haven't been able to watch his BPs this year so I can't tell his overall strength, but I'm not sure why it's not worth a thread wondering if his strength has recovered or not. The OP did not make any grand proclamations, predictions or concerns over the Orioles chances to compete if Mancini's power numbers are down, but just started the conversation. Sometimes I think some of you just are looking for a way to jump on someone for starting a conversation when that's what this board is for. As always, if you don't like the thread, you can just skip it and move on. As for the question at hand, yes, I've noticed Mancini has no extra base hits and up until the other day, neither did Santander and I believe I actually mentioned that at some point when discussing how the team hasn't hit very much tis spring barring a few players. While I'd like to see some extra base hits start to come over the second half of the spring, I'll be concerned if we're 14 or so games into the 2021 regular season and he still doesn't have an extra base hit. Either way, Mancni is going to get a long leash this season and I've been happy to see him at least getting some consistent knocks so far.