DrungoHazewood

Even Tom Emanski couldn't fix a 35 hit tool at the age of 29.

That was my first thought. Vaughn was only a few years older than me.

The only way I can agree with this is if you're just judging Martin and Beckham by their future worth to the next good Orioles team. Because right now Beckham is more-or-less an average MLB player, and Martin is hitting .182 with a .557 OPS and an okay glove.

Nick's overall numbers aren't that different than last year, except that he's hitting a lot more ground balls. He has Richie Martin's G/F ratio.

That's highly dependent on the type and effectiveness and maturity of the hitter. Joey Rickard walked in 13% of PAs in the minors, 6% in the majors. Ryan Braun, randomly picked him, 8% both majors and minors. Christian Yelich, 10.6% majors, 10.6% minors. Adam Jones 4.4% majors, 7.1% minors. Joey Votto 16% majors, 13% minors.

It's very unusual for someone to progress from 25 walks per 500 PAs to being a selective hitter. It would be outstanding growth if Mountcastle ever walked 50 or 60 time in a full season. When Chris Davis went from 6.5% to 13.2% that was almost unbelievable. I don't know that I've seen any examples of better growth than that. Maybe Sosa, but he was somehow slugging .737 and being intentionally walked a lot. Mountcastle is at 4.4%, which is about as low as any successful hitter can go. I think his realistic ceiling is 8% or so.

As a guy who's never walked 30 times in a professional season he's going to have to hit .300+ with power to do much better than Jones and Schoop.

There have almost always been good players who didn't walk much. It's hard to be a great player when you do that. Best players to walk in 6% of PA or less: Andre Dawson, Vada Pinson, George Sisler, Willie Keeler, Jake Beckley Best players to walk in less than 5% of PAs: Nap Lajoie, Pudge Rodriguez, Willie Davis. Adam Jones is 13th in WAR on this list. Frank Whte, Garry Maddox, Ozzie Guillen, Hal Chase make appearances. Best players to walk in 3% of PA or less: Dave Orr, George Wright, Cal McVey, Lip Pike. Mostly guys who played when it was eight or nine balls for a walk.

His major league career high in walks is going to be 41.

How long does he have to stay in Norfolk so that he's not a free agent until 2027? That's probably the date he's ready.

What's a "plug-in-play contract" player? There have been 287 players in MLB history to reach 1000 RBI. In value they range from Dante Bichette (5.7 career WAR) to Bonds and Ruth at 162. Median is 51 wins. 109 of the 287 are in the Hall. Seven active 1000 RBI players: Kemp, Encarnacion, Cruz, Braun, Cano, Cabrera, Pujols. The last three will probably go to the Hall. Eight players, including BJ Surhoff, got to 1000 RBI with an OPS+ under 100. Tommy Corcoran, a shortstop active from 1890-1907 got to 1000 RBI despite a 75 OPS+ and no seasons with more than 94 RBI. So if you retire with 1000+ RBI that gives you about a 40% chance of having had a HOF career.

Richie Martin is 24, played last year in AA, should have several years of growth ahead of him, and lots of people are talking about returning him to the A's because he's been terrible so far.

You seem to be mocking the idea of releasing a guy who is well into year number two of providing minus-$28M in surplus value. This isn't some SportsGuy special, a five-way trade involving compensation picks and six PTBNL and signing Mark Teixeira... This is releasing someone who's four wins below replacement in his last 1200 PAs.

Moments of Oriole infamy, numbers 4,588 and 4,589: August 14th and 16th, 2003. The Orioles lose two games to the Yanks, 8-5 and 5-4, with Deivi Cruz as the DH, batting 2nd despite a .278 OBP. He went 1-for-7, but inexplicably had two of the 13 walks he would draw in '03. He DH'd five games in the major league career, all with the Orioles.

I expect an exclusivity agreement, wherein all players born south of Key West, FL on or after January 1, 2001 become the property of the Baltimore Orioles in perpetuity.

I think you're right. On a related note, Casey Kotchman is only 36 years old. He's available!

Ohh... the 2012 Dodgers went 86-76 despite: - SS Dee Gordon OPS'd .561 - Tony Gwynn Jr. OPS'd .570 - James Loney OPS'd .646 as their regular 1B - Juan Rivera played 1B/LF, was a poor fielder and OPS'd .661 All were sub-replacement, along with several bench players and Bobby Abreu. None of them were full-time regulars, but that was part of the problem. Andre Either was the only player on the team to get more than 505 PAs. The 1966 Giants went 93-68. They had: - Hal Lanier, who OPS'd .546 in 149 games - Len Gabrielson, OPS'd .573 in left - Jesus Alou split time with Gabrielson in LF and OPS'd .587 - RF Ollie Brown OPS'd .622 - Cap Peterson also played some LF and OPS'd .590 In all they had eight players worth less than -0.5 wins. But also also Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Juan Marichal, and Gaylord Perry. The 1937 Cardinals had Bruce Ogrodowski with a 59 OPS+ as the starting catcher, Mickey Owen was the 250-PA backup catcher with a 47 OPS+, and Leo Durocher was the regular shortstop with a 38 OPS+. They went 81-73. the 1901 Phillies went 83-57, finished in 2nd place. Their double-play combination was Bill Hallman and Monte Cross. Hallman slashed .184/.236/.236 in 504 PAs. Cross slashed .197/.281/.236 in 547 PAs. But they had Elmer Flick and Ed Delehanty, two HOFers, in the OF along with Roy Thomas who'd hit .300 and walk 100 times a year with an 0.025 ISO.

You know, especially on a slow Friday, that's a challenge. Most exposure of < 50 OPS+ players on a winning team. Or maybe just most sub-replacement starters on a winning team. I started looking. No progress, but did note that the 1984 Rangers were amazing. Their 5th-best starter was Dave Stewart, who was a heck of a pitcher, and they still only won 69 games because they had six different position players with 250+ PAs and less than -0.5 rWAR. Four starters with a .613 OPS or less, plus backup catcher Ned Yost, 4th OF George Wright just cleared that but was a -13 fielder, and and utility guy Jeff Kunkel.

Agreed about the college stats. Now that it's there, just for a few days, I've used that multiple times. I'll have to investigate to see how far back it goes. (Partial answer: not back to the 80s, no Pete Incaviglia college numbers. Not to the early 2000s - No Markakis. 2013 might be the current start date.). The "Drew Jackson return was idiotic" posts seem to have died down while he's OPSing almost 100 points below the PCL average...

After he left the majors he spent a little time in Japan. Was last seen in the Atlantic League in 2017. It is surprising he's only 33. The last time he put on an Oriole uniform was before the 2012 turn-around. He was two eras ago.

Another benefit of an open league with promotion/relegation: Everyone already has a team at some level. No one ever moves (or almost no one - there's Milton Keynes Dons as the exception to prove the rule). So there's no blackmailing cities and taxpayers with threats of leaving.

If teams had some skin in the game this would never happen. In other countries where taxpayers usually have nothing to do with stadiums you'll keep one for a century, just doing renovations and upgrades. I think the US is pretty unusual in throwing away $750M, 50,000 seat sports arenas every 20 years. Tottenham Hotspur, my English football team, was in White Hart Lane from 1899-2017. And when they finally built a new one next door they paid for it! The resulting overruns and delays meant they couldn't sign any free agents for a full year. When it's somebody else's money you just don't care to be responsible.

If he's in AAA at 25, then back to the majors at 26... he's done. The average player peaks at 27, but is 90% of the way there at 25, 26. Sure, individual variation, blah, blah.... That's my issue with most Rule 5ers: if the plan is to send you to AAA after you've spent a year OPSing .550 in the majors you're best hope is to be a utility guy or something. Real prospects are almost never 25 or 26 in AAA, not without some weird backstory.

Right, it's only outfielders and catchers from what I can find. But there has to be some kind of tracking done on infielders? If not, why not?

Luke said players who profile like him (2:1 GB:FB) are rare in the majors. I have to think part of the plan here was to get him to change his swing. If that's true you have to give him more than spring training and 130 PAs to see if it's going to work. 2019 is all about the long game. The only way a .550 OPS matters right now is if the team is very confident that's where he's going to stay.