Tony-OH

Only Santander and Mountcastle had a better wOBA than Stewart so I think Elias will want to see how much value he can get out of Stewart before cutting him lose so I think 2021 is the year we see a lot of Stewart at DH and occasional outfield. Saying that, Stewart did almost all of his damage over a nine game span so it's still up for grabs whether he can be effective at the major league level over an extended period of time. Saying that, I could see Diaz taking his spot if he struggles for a decent period of time to start the year, but I don't see Diaz winning a spot on opening day over Stewart, mainly because I think Elias would like to see Diaz put some numbers up at AAA while developing a better plan of attack against pitchers.

I think Elias is going to give a good report of the guy, but he's certainly not going to talk about things the player needs to improve. Of course he's going to be a little rosey on the guy since he just acquired him.

He's a bit of unknown for me still, but I do think he has a much better chance of ending up a 4th outfielder or lower Division starter rather than an impact bat or even an everyday outfielder. I don't see him as a guy you make playing time for but rather a guy who forces his way up due to his production. There is some talent there, but he's never been able to tap into his raw power enough and his defense in RF is adequate, not anything spectacular though he does have a sold avg right fielder arm.

I think this is the real key. The Orioles need to find playing time for Stewart and Mullins to see what they have in them. If Mancini is able to go next year, that pushes Mountcastle back to LF with Hays in CF and Santander in RF. That leaves Stewart DHing and Mullins as the 4th outfielder. Diaz should start the year in AAA and if playing time arises through injury or poor performance, as long as he's playing ok, he should be the next up for a shot.

Most of the scouting reports I've read is that his change is actually his 4th pitch vice 2nd pitch. But then again, what do you expect to get from a MASN report? Of course it's going to be glowing. Either way, we'll know more after hopefully seeing him next year in the minors. I'm hoping MLB will have a much better plan for the minors like complex leagues in Florida and Arizona even if this COVID restriction crap is still going on so we get some minor league action to watch and evaluate.

In case you were in the mood for a blast from the past moment, here are my Orioles Hangout notes from April-June 1999. It's pretty obvious I was no fan of Ray Miller. haha Just as a side note, I believed I moved from Ft. Bragg to Gambrills, MD in late June which is why this probably cuts off. I'll have to see if I can find the rest of the year. ******** June 22nd Orioles Sign two more first rounders The Orioles secured two more of their first-round draft picks, including Clemson pitcher Mike Paradis, the 13th overall selection, who had agreed last week to a $1.7 million bonus. Also signed was outfielder Keith Reed, the 23rd overall selection, for $1.15 million. Paradis, 21, went 6-1 with a 4.43 ERA at Clemson. Paridis is a sinker/slider pitcher who reportedly throws in the mid-nineties. Reed, 20, was named the Big East Player of the Year at Providence after hitting .398 with 17 homers and a school-record 79 RBIs. Amazingly, they both played on the same American Legion team in Auburn, Mass. and now will start their professional careers together in the Rookie League at Bluefield. The only first rounder not to sign yet is high school left-hander Richard Stahl. The 6'7" stringbean is the furthest from the majors, but could have the highest ceiling of any of the 1999 draft picks. June 22nd Orioles Place DeShields on DL, Recall Hairston After receiving treatment, Orioles secondbaseman Delino Deshields could only be classified as "doubtful" for the rest of the week. The Orioles decided to replace their hot-hitting 2B with Red Wings secondbase/SS Jerry Hairston. Hairston was batting .268 with six home runs and 28 RBIs with 14 stolen bases in 70 Rochester games. Hairston will be ready by tonight's opening game against the Red Sox. - Catcher Lenny Webster will start a rehabilitation stint with the Rochester Red Wings tonight. Once Webster is re-instated to the 25-man roster, the Orioles will probably try to send catcher Mike Figga back to the minors althoug he must clear waivors first. Miller likes Figga's ability to frame pitches and Webster may be a prime candidate for trade once he's deemed healthy. The Los Angeles Dodgers are the most interested in Webster since they are struglling with Todd Hundley who is batting .230 and has only thrown out 13% of the runners attempting to steal. June 7th Orioles Place Fetters on DL, Recall Kamieniecki Early in the day on Monday the Orioles placed Mike Fetters on the 15-day disabled list with a strained right elbow and recalled Scott Kamieniecki from Rochester to fill the empty roster spot. Kamieniecki did little, if anything, to justify the recall. In four starts with the Red Wings this season, the right-hander is 1-2 with a 5.09 ERA, 23 innings, 23 hits, five home runs, six walks and 14 strikeouts. But, the Orioles were facing a decision on what to do with the veteran, under the terms of his demotion on May 18 and Fetters injury saved them trouble of deciding what to do with Kamieniecki...for now. June 2nd Orioles add Figga to backup Johnson With Lenny Webster's ankle injury taking longer then expected to heal, the Orioles went out and claimed former Yankee catcher Mike Figga off the waivers. Figga has been on the Yankees 25-man roster all season but did not bat, which might tell you what they thought of the 28-year old catcher. Last season, Figga hit .280 with 26 home runs and 95 RBIs with the Yankee Triple-A team in Columbus. Obviously with those type of numbers, he's a pretty brutal catcher. In 100 games last season he made nine errors and 16 pass balls. Figga may be an adequate backup for a while and if you look at this pick up like we traded Willis Otanez for him, it makes losing Otanez for nothing a little easier to swallow. June 1st Ripken reaches milestone Lost in all the hoopla of the Mariners smashing home runs records, Cal Ripken collected his 2,900 hit last night. May 18th O's Send Kamieniecki to Minors The Orioles sent embattled starter Scott Kamieniecki to the minors and expect to recall Jason Johnson to start on Thursday. Kamieniecki had the opportunity to turn down the demotion but choose to get himself straightened out in Rochester. Kamieniecki was 0-2 with a 23.40 ERa in two starts this season. Johnson was 4-2 with a 3.65 ERa in eight Triple-A starts. He has struck out 47 in 44.1 innings pitched and has held opposing hitters to a .212 batting average. His only problem has been occasional wildness which has caused him to walk a team leading 27 batters. May 14th O's DL Webster add Davis The Orioles placed catcher Lenny Webster on the 15-day disabled list and promoted Catcher/1B Tommy Davis from Rochester. Webster injured his ankle when Doc Gooden threw an inside fastball on a webster sacrifice attempt. Webster hurt the ankle trying to avoid the ball. The Orioles brought up Davis after considering Bowie catcher Tim DeCinces. Decinces has shown much better discipline at the bat then Davis over the years and bats lefthanded, but the Orioles went with Davis who has just converted to catcher last season and has played less then 50 games at catcher in his career. Neither one is known for his defense and Davis probably won't see much playing time anyway. Davis was batting .234 with three home runs and 14 RBIs at the time of his promotion while DeCinces was hitting .273 with three homers and 13 RBIs at Double-A. DeCinces has walked 24 times and has a .414 OBP, Davis has walked 10 times and has a .289 OBP. May 13th O's activate Ripken; send Pickering back to Rochester The Orioles activated Cal Ripken after a successful stint at their minor league camp in Sarasota, Florida. Ripken will immediately start at thirdbase. The Orioles have been suffering at thirdbase lately as Willis Otanez has struggled offensively and defensively at third in Ripken's absence. It was so bad that Ray Miller, who looks for any reason to bury a rookie, started playing Jeff Reboulet at third. For this reason, and this reason only, it's good to see Cal back. The real good news in all of this was the Orioles demotion of Calvin Pickering. In one of the most idiot moves ever by the Orioles orgnization, they promoted their best hitting prospect and then allowed Ray Miller to rot him on the bench. Now Pickering can head down to Rochester and regain his stroke while hopefully awaiting the call that will allow him to PLAY at the major league level. May 7th O's go with Kamienicki; send Coppinger back to Rochester The Orioles activated pitcher Scott Kamienicki off the DL and sent Rocky Coppinger to Triple-A Rochester. Coppinger started twice, going 0-1 with a 13.50 ERA, but pitched better in his second start. Kamieniecki will make his first start todau against the Tigers. Kamieniecki has made two rehab appearences, one at Bowie, and one against the Cubans. He didn't look good in either appearence leading many to wonder why the Orioles would activate him. Kamieniecki has even stated that he hasn't thrown the ball well, but the Orioles would rather see the 35-year old fragile Kamienieck start instead of young pitcher like Rocky Coppinger or Jason Johnson. Apparantly the O's current five-game win streak has snapped them out of their "youth movement". May 4th Pickering recalled; Garcia sent to Rochester The Orioles officially recalled 1B Calvin Pickering today and demoted INF Jesse Garcia. Pickering, 22, was batting .297 with one home run and eight RBIs in 11 games. He missed just over a week with shoulder strain but was hitting the ball well since coming back. Big Pick should pick up most of the firstbase action until Will Clark comes off the DL. Pickering has tremendous power but is no Dave Kingman. He's cut his strikeouts down considerably in the minors and actually has walked (10) more time then he's struck out (7) at Triple-A this season. His major drawback is his defensive wakenesses. His three errros against the Cuban team may foreshadow a future problem with the Orioles. With Willis Otanez and Pickering on the corners, the Orioles defense will keep you on the edge of your seats. Luckily, both can have you on the edge of your seats when they bat too, because both can hit a ball out of any park at any time. If Pickering shows the ablility to hit during his stay here, don't look for his return to the minors when Clark returns, but look for him to move to DH, leaving Harold Baines as an awesome pinch hitter. Garcia, who is a much better player then Jeff Reboulet, was sent back dwon to Rochester and should become the Red Wings shortstop and part-time secondbaseman. May 3rd Orioles lose to Cubans, but who cares? Ok, the Orioles lost to the Cuban 12-6. Who cares? Well, the Cubans sure did. Playing in the best ballpark they'll ever play in, the Cuban team outhustled and out-played the 7-17 last place Orioles. Did you expect anything else. Anyone that follows the Orioles know they would care less about this game. The team needed a day off way more then they needed to play a bunch of hungry, underpaid and underappreciated (at least in the US) amateurs from Cuba. AS much as the Cubans cared, the Orioles did not. Listening to the remarks after the game, it was plainly obvious. "We didn't want to play today," said Orioles center fielder Brady Anderson. "We would have preferred the day off." "I didn't want to be here," said reliever Mike Fetters "It probably meant more to them than to us," said Orioles starter Scott Kamieniecki. "…I wasn't ready to pitch. I didn't prepare myself very well." These are major leaguers? Whatever happend to professionalism? Whether the game meant anything or not, you would like to think a professional baseball player is going to go out and at least give his 100 percent effort. But, these are the 1999 Orioles, and they definitely did not care. ESPN certainly did not care either. The Orioles-Cuban game was about the tenth story in, and the best highlight they showed was the secondbase umpire body slamming the protestor that ran onto the field. Lastly, the Orioles fans and baseball fans overall really didn't care. Most people paid little attention to the game and fans at the game used it to boo Ray Miller and at any given chance. Peter Angelos gave into pressure and didn't allow American flags into the game but their surely were flag waving Cubans there. So the fans booed, and then they left early, they just didn't care. The fact that Calvin Pickering made three errors and went oh for three while Gabe Molina allowed a home run in the ninth, just finished off a horrible day for the Orioles. So as the Orioles lost a meaningless game to the Cuban national team, the only question that begs to get asked is "Who cares?" April 30th Orioles Release Slocumb; promote Molina In what could be the first of hopefully several moves, the Orioles released embattled reliever Heathcliff Slocumb and promoted 23-year old righthander Gabe Molina from Rochester Triple-A. Slocumb has struggled all season, but the final nail in his coffin was when Miller left him in for a seven run beating in last night's game. He appeared in 10 games in relief for the Orioles, going 0-0 with a 12.46 ERA (8.2 IP, 15H, 12ER, 8 BB, 12K, 2HR). Opposing batters lit Slocumb up for a .395 average. Amazingly Slocumb said he didn't see it coming. ''I felt like I had a bad game last night. Other than that I thought I was throwing fine,'' Slocumb said. ''It's definitely a surprise to me.'' The Orioles finally promoted a rookie pitcher with Molina getting his first big league action. Molina was just about untouchable as the Red Wings closer this season collecting four save and posting a 0.00 ERA while allowing just five hits and five walks in 10.1 innings pitched. Triple-A batter were hitting just .152 off him and had struck out 10 times. Molina was the Baysox closer last season 3-2 with a 3.36 ERA and 24 saves. He struck out 75 in 61.2 innings last season and has struck out 237 batters in 193 minor league innings. Molina was the Orioles 1996 21st selection out of Arizona State. Molina throws in the low nineties consistently although he can get into the mid-nineties when he reaches back and has an oustanding slider. He's can throw either pitch for strikes but can get hurt by the longball when he gets the ball up. Could this be the beginning of the house cleaning this team needs? We can only hope. April 25th Looking for the Orioles to turn it around? If you are looking for the Orioles to magically turn things around, take these numbers into account (NUMBER's from John Eisenberg's fine article in the Sun? - They have lost 24 of their last 30 games (.200 winning percentage) and 35 of their last 49 dating to last season for a .286 winning pecentage. - They're five games under .500 since sweeping the Braves 277 games ago in June 1997. - Ray Miller is now 34 games under .500 as a manager. Now you know why you are so frustrated with them. This is not a bad streak, this is a definite trend. This team has not been good since June of 1997. Firing Miller won't solve the teams problems, but it's a good start. At least now you know why you are so frustrated... And that's a start. April 19th Ripken could go on DL;Clark out for at least six weeks - Cal Ripken could go on the DL for the first time in his 18 year career witha lower back problem. Ripken, who's play at the plate and field this season has been erratic at best, could find himeslef placed on the DL after his examinations by a specialist this afternoon. Willis Otanez would become the starter in Ripken's absence. The Orioles will disable Will Clark today, a day after he broke his thumb. There is no word on who the club will promote but Calvin Pickering would be the first thought although he has been fighting through a sore shoulder at Rochester. If the Orioles DL Ripken, they will promote either a pitcher, or most likely Jesse Garcia. April 11th News and notes - Jesse Garcia hit a single on the first major league pitch he saw. - Mike Mussina lowered his ERA to 3.00 and has both the Orioles wins this season. April 8th News and notes - Cal Ripken missed a start due to an injury for the first time since May 29, 1982. - Delino DeShields is back from Sarasota and will start his season off with the Bowie Baysox in a rehab assignment on Friday. - Willis Otanez went two for five yesterday picking up his first major league double and home run. - Rich Amaral is the only player on the roster who has yet to appear in a game for the Orioles. - The Orioles have racked up 13 hits in each of their two games this season. The 10 runs they scored on opening day matched the 2nd highest output in team history on opening days. - The O's bullpen has allowed 5 runs in 9.2 IP in the first two games. All seven relievers have appeared. - Cal Ripken will not start his second consecutive game tonight.... - Both Wade Boggs and Fred McGriff have hit .385 off tonight starter, Scott Erickson, during their careers. April 6th Johns arrested on Marijuana charges "Doug Johns, you made a major league ball team despite having no stuff, where are you going?" "I'm going to go out a get drunk and smoke some weed!" That's the exchange I can imagine. Instead of going to Disney World, he's going to got out and endanger the people of the city he plays for. Johns was stopped last night on suspicion of being intoxicated while driving and after a a bag of marijuana was found in his vehicle, he was arrested. Johns, who probably shouldn't have made the team anyway, should immediately be either sent to the minors or even better, released. As of now, neither Johns or Orioles have said anything publicly, but the O's have to open up a roster spot for Doug Linton on the 11th and Doug Johns just gave the Orioles all they need to take him off the roster. Either way, the Orioles must do something. They must show the baseball world and Orioles fans that they won't stand for such bahavior. Release Doug Johns!!! April 5th Bullpen shaky in opener First the good news, the Orioles won their season opener against the Devil Rays thanks to some great hitting. The bad news? It took five relievers to hold on to the lead. Lets 's start with Ricky Bones. Bones started the sixth for starter Mike Mussina and promptly hit the first batter he faced. A hit, a fielder's choice , and a walk later, Ray Miller brought in Mike Fetters with the bases full. Fetters promptly walked Jose Canseco to make the score 6-5 before settling down by striking out Fred Mcgriff swinging and getting John Flaherty to ground out to second to end the threat. Arthur Rhodes was brought in and threw two great innings, but after the Orioles scored four runs in the bottom of the eighth to make 10-5, Miller decided Rhodes would finish out the game. Rhodes though was out of gas, and after allowing a homer to Flaherty and a single to Wade Boggs he was gone. Miller brought in Heathcliff Slocumb, who promptly hit Quinten McCraken and allowed a long double to Miguel Cairo plating Boggs and bringing the tie run to the plate. After being up 10-5 and with four relievers already used, Miller went to his closer Mike Timlin. Timlin got pinch hitter Bobby Smith to groundout to third and then struck out Randy Winn to end the game. So overall, Bones showed that the move North didn't do anything for his pitching. He couldn't get anyone out this spring and so far, no one out this year. His standing could be in doubt when the Orioles have to bring up Doug Linton to start on the 11th. Slocumb struggled, but Fetter worked his way out of a jam and Rhodes pitched well until stretched into a third inning. Timlin came on and pitched like a closer should, so that was good to see. It'll be interesting to see if Ray Miller uses his bullpen this way all season. With the off day tomorrow, it's not a big deal that he used so many relievers, but he'll need to have more faith in his relievers in the future or he's going to run his bullpen into the ground. Now I know why he wanted 12 pitchers. April 4th Ledesma's injury allows Tampa to keep Lamb A thumb injury to Aaron Ledesma ended up being the break David Lamb needed to stay in the majors leagues. Lamb, who was selected in the Rule V draft, has been rumored to be the player to be named late in the Clyburn-Johnson trade but as it stood, he would have to be offered back to the Orioles if he did not make the major league squad. Until, Ledesma's injury, it appeared he was not going to make the team. Either way, Lamb is nothing more then a utility infielder so he had no role with the Orioles anytime soon.

Some blasts from the past. thanks Frobby. I'll have to see if I can find some stuff on old hard drives and maybe post some others. As for me, I've been doing the top prospects lists since that end off 1996, but the very early lists were done completely off stats and with me knowing very little at the time about age vs level vs league dynamics (If i remember right, I have Mike Berry pretty high based off his High Desert year haha). It's interesting to look over these lists and know how I've learned and improved as an evaluator. I will say in between 2000 and 2003, I was seeing 50-70 games a year between Bowie, Frederick, Delmarva and Bluefield a few years. I was one of the few people doing player evaluations outside of BA and maybe John Sickels back then. That was when I knew every manager and coach had direct access to many scouts in the system and some out of the system. It's too bad there wasn't much talent back then, Maybe I should go back and do a revised top ten with some thoughts on guys and what happened tp those that didn't make it to the majors and even some that did?

Anyone find it's interesting that the Angels never pitched their 2019 draft picks after signing them that year but now have traded away their 5th, 6th, and 8th round selections to the Orioles. I'm guessing Elias was a big fan of their draft.

Here's one scouting report of him from BA "89-91 mph fringe-average fastball plays up because of his plus control and advanced command. He also has shown he can throw his average slider and average curveball for strikes as well. He will flip in a below-average change regularly to keep hitters guessing. Stallings doesn’t have enough stuff to miss even SEC bats, but he knows how to pitch in traffic and he is quite steady and reliable—he finished the seventh inning in nine of his 15 starts as of late May." I did read that he tunnels his pitches well and has a good feel for pitching. Saying that, he sounds like a guy that needs to prove it in pro ball before getting too excited. While I could easily move him into the back end of the list and take off Nevin, for now I'll say he's just off my list.

Yeah, I don't want him there either, especially for any kinda of length of time. But I can say that about Alberto and probably Urias who has been left out of this conversation by most.

Add in defensive in from of SS and you would right. I don't think it's very likely that Iglesias will come anywhere close to repeating his offensive performance last year, but I do think he provides up the middle defense that will be helpful to the young pitchers the Orioles will be trying out at the major league level in 2021. Perhaps Sanchez will be fine there, I don't think anyone knows because he has so little experience at SS at the major league level. Listening to Elias' comments, it sounds like he knows he needs to find a SS now which tells me Sanchez is a back up play at SS and primary option at 2B.

Tango and Daren Williams are really guys who have made this advanced information digestible.

Probably about 30 outs at a minimum. Mountcastle should have never have been shortstop in the minors. They wasted development time at a position he was no equipped to ever play at the professional level due to a lack of arm strength.

His defensive value has fluctuated and personally I think he's solid at second base. He doesn't have a ton of experience at 3B so it's to say. If this was a contending team, I'd be semi-happy with him as a utility job, but I'm ok with seeing what he can do next year with everyday at bats unless better options show up. Alberto, Ruiz and Bannon are not better options in my opinion. I don't know whether he could keep up the pace he was on last year over a whole season, but if he fails, you dump him with no foul. better than running out guys we know don't have value for the future or a guy who has things to prove before he gets a MLB chance (Bannon).

Part of Sanchez's value in my mind is that he's going to bring GG caliber defense to second base. It's certainly not his bat that keeps him in the big leagues. Now maybe Sanchez can be effective there, I can't say for sure he won't, but I doubt he'll be gold glove caliber and if you are going to bring a below average bat, you better bring above average defense.

You really don't like Valaika, do you While I'm not a huge Valaika guy, I'm still open that he could be a late bloomer and provide some value. I don't see Bannon as an an everyday option either though. He'll need to prove to me he won't get his lunch handed to him up in the zone by big league pitchers.

The Orioles play that infield only if they are planning on tanking in 2021.

We'll just have to disagree. Valaika has some upside with the bat and could be a late bloomer, and also has the ability to at least not kill the team at SS for short periods of time. Most likely, both are place holder players and considering Valaika is cheaper, he gets the nod.

But was he allowed to sign him because he assured them he could be traded for some value? Getting a 5th round pitch and a DSL guy is better than not picking up a guy's option and losing him for nothing. Iglesias had value at his price tag so there was little doubt Elias could get something for him.

This. The only way to spin this in a good way is if Elias really thinks that much of the 5th round pick guy and the 5-foot-11 DSL pitcher. For me, this was just another penny pinching move that hurts the team in 2021, particularly their up the middle defense which is important while developing young pitchers.

In other words, "I don't care about wining yet."

Does it, or is his given budget requiring him to make these decisions?

Let's just say I disagree, especially on Sanchez at SS. Iglesias is one of the best defensive shortstops in the game still. Sanchez has under 100 innings of experience at SS in the major leagues.

Yeah, it's December and we'll have to let things play out, but it's disappointing. As a fan, I'm tired of this team sucking. I just am. I understand fully about a rebuild, but it's time to start a transition. Getting rid of good defense up the middle just sucks, especially when he's getting two more pieces that are so far off.

Sorry, Elias just traded his defense up the middle for a 5th round draft pick and 5-11 DSL pitcher. There is no one ready to play SS everyday in the organization. Iglesias was the perfect stop gap for this team, but it appears either Elias is not worried about winning this year once again, or that ownership is forcing him to be extremely cheap.