NJOriolesFan

I like Mullins but if all things play out based on our system and our number one pick, he is probably our leftfielder, better than Hays but hopefully around as good as some combination of Stowers, Cowser, Kjerstad. Druw Jones should be our number 1 pick and centerfielder by end of 2024. An outfield of Stowers, Jones, Cowser, Hays as 4th outfielder and Kjerstad at DH would be a fine "plan". At that point, whoever doesn't make it, you buy a bat or two. If Mullins can get us a starting pitcher equivalent to him or a notch below and a shortstop prospect (or two top 5 org prospects and another just outside top 10, two of them pitchers) I would be all in but we may get a better return at the deadline from teams looking to make a playoff push. It is very likely four teams within our division are looking at trying to nail down a spot. There are teams that will have good use for even a .270, 20/20 guy with a .340 OBP and good defense at centerfield/leftfield. If we were in competing window he is exactly who we would want.

Since he gave up switch-hitting last year and his prior Lefty/Righty splits seem to indicate a slash line around .280/.340/.450 with good speed and defense and a likely 20/20 guy while not quite being a 30/30 guy every year. Entering the age 27 season with those kind of numbers with a chance of having the upside of last year. Better chance he falls somewhere in between. As far as what we could look for coming back would be interesting. There are playoff potential teams that could use a centerfielder. Centerfield is not great across the board in MLB. We need pitching and infielders. If we can "assume" Mayo, Cowser and Stowers are on the cusp and Rutschman is basically there, Hays can play centerfield and Mancini/Mountcastle can play 1b/dh. We need 2b and ss. I think the Mets could use a guy like Mullins. Do they matchup?

I didn't realize until I was at the Baysox game yesterday that Rutschman wears #35 with Bowie. I know uniform # doesn't mean much with minor leaguers but is this a number that Rutschman selected and would like to wear with the Orioles? This led me to thinking, since Mussina is in the HOF, 2nd best pitcher in Orioles history behind Palmer, better as an Oriole than a Yankee, does Mussina deserve to have his O's # retired? I would say yes. And that would put an end to any chance that Rutschman wears #35 with the O's. Thoughts?

I was at the game last night and his stuff was pure electric on many of the swings and misses. I think the combination of the umpire's very tight strike zone and Grayson trying to spot the ball by moving it just outside the black led to a few more balls that would have been desired. Four or five calls the other way on some questionable ball calls, has him sitting mid to high 60% on strikes. I don't know if he pitched to "just off the plate" by design or if he just missed spots but Rutschman did not move his glove a lot. But watching his body/build, his power stride, fastball hop and electricity, one name came to mind: Roger Clemens. Although not a fan of Clemens off the field, we can only hope that Grayson is every bit as good on the field.

44 by FanGraphs is pretty decent for #65

A combined group of Cal Ripken Jr, Steve Bisciotti and Kevin Plank would be fantastic.

The best bet is to build a deep, young group of players from the minors, draft and cheap, younger role players. Have 28 contributing role players and future all-stars that can be a good base and take us a year or two to be a .500 team. Then with a low payroll, and high draft choices, add what you need to be a playoff team after you see what develops. A bullpen does not need veterans. It needs young guys with electric stuff. Lots of them throughout the roster and upper minors.... Most bullpen guys 15 years ago were failed starters. Even now that is still a good place to get relievers. Other teams failed starters that are still young but throw well for short stints. If you have a 28 man roster with a payroll of $30 million and all controllable for 3 more years, that is when you add that #1 and #2 starter and maybe one veteran bullpen guy and a couple of bats. Continue to see what our outfield is and who shakes out. I'm sure we have at least two starters out there for a playoff team and one or two role players out there. Severino and Sisco may not be the top catchers in baseball. But they may be among the best backup catchers if we let them continue to play and Rutschman becomes an All-star. Mancini will not be on the next Orioles playoff team most likely but he may be a decent role player or somebody that gets us something via trade in a couple of years. Alberto, Ruiz, Nunez, Iglesias should not be a starting playoff infield but every team needs a couple of veteran backups. Perhaps Alberto fits that role nicely and we continue to draft and develop more infielders. Draft, develop, depth and deal from depth. And hope and pray that Rodriguez and Hall make it as at least #3 and #4 starters and we have Means, Rodriguez and Hall at the BACK of the rotation. Lately we have made the mistake of having guys like Bundy, Cobb, Guthrie, Lopez, Cabrera, Ponson, Bedard, etc.... at the front of our rotation and attempted to add behind them. Get those type of guys, develop them, bring them along as not the featured guys and then when we are really ready go out and get the Ace or Two. Kind of like Astros developing McCullers and others in their lineup and bullpen and then deal from depth and excess budget and get Verlander and Cole and Greinke..

So I don't like to post things politically anywhere although I will have open discussions. I respect individuals and in my opinion bad people do bad things and good people to good things. I am all for equality for all but I also do believe that respect is earned or rather unearned through evidence that it isn't deserved. I don't disrespect people for not earning my respect I just pay no attention to them. I think it is important to have calm discussions but that is impossible on a social media site. Every topic is polarizing. I have the right to my opinion but I do not have the right to enforce my beliefs on others. I respect and appreciate all Tony has done with his leadership on this site. I understand and respect his struggles with his ultimate decision. I always enjoyed this site, especially trade talk with SportsGuy, Statistical Analysis with Drungo and learning stuff from the past insiders. Hope to post again on this site...………..

This is the perfect example of why trading of draft picks should be allowed. Not for players either, just picks for picks. The O's could have gotten the player they really wanted between pick 5 and 9 most likely but they had absolutely no choice other than to take him number 2. The NFL draft trade chart shows that the #2 pick is worth 2,600 value points. The Blue Jays pick is worth 1,700 value points. The Blue Jays 2nd round pick (42 overall) is worth 480 value points. The O's would have had more coming to them. The Pirates may have been a better target as the value trade would have been O's #2 overall for Pirates #7, #31 and #44 picks. Now I understand the MLB trade value chart may look very different than the NFL trade value chart, but you have to think that the #2 overall pick is still worth that other teams high 1st round pick and at least an early pick (Compensatory or 2nd round) and another late or future pick. If you looked at just the MLB Slot Value, the #2 pick would have been worth the Pirates 1st round and Compensatory pick or their 1st round pick, 2nd round pick and 5th round pick.

I pretty much agree with the separation of such but mostly just because I'm an Orioles fan. There wasn't as much roster carryover from Browns to Orioles as there was from Senators to Twins. I really would have preferred to go with separate Browns/Orioles. That would take out Sisler, Clift, Williams and Stone and probably put in guys like Paul Blair, Don Buford, Adam Jones and either Jim Gentile or Chris Davis. Scott McGregor would replace Urban Shocker. Pratt, Wallace, Stephens and Jacobson would be replaced by Gentile/Davis, Nick Markakis, Davey Johnson and Mark Belanger.

I have my all-time teams for each franchise (actually still working on relievers). My emphasis is on 4 consecutive seasons with that franchise. I weight a few simple statistical categories which are normalized from Baseball-reference's neutral stats at the bottom of the Advanced Batting/Pitching of each player. For Position Players I use OPS, GPA (similar to OPS but more weight to OBP and in the context of batting average spread), Runs Created per game. From a career perspective, at bats, WAR and Win Shares are used. So I use a career factor (Win Shares, WAR and At Bats, WS and WAR is more like JAWS (Career combined with Top 4 Consecutive years)) and the Focus Year Factor is Consecutive 4 for WAR, WS, OPS, GPA and RC/G. I combine the Focus Years Score with Career Score all with that franchise and come up with a single score for each player. I do the same for pitchers but the stats are WAR, WS, WHIP, ERA, IP, W-L. I wanted to use strikeouts but found that the neutral stats did not change the strikeouts enough to make somebody like Jim Palmer with greater strikeout rates than Erik Bedard. That said, the Neutral stats just adjust for ballpark and offensive context (Runs per game). It did not take into account, how the game was played, etc. But it has to be something that worked for me. Only exceptions that I made were since AL teams were 1901-2019, I did the same cutoff for NL teams. I also chose players for only one franchise. I am still finalize things because I want to have things other than just numbers, break ties or close calls. And from a game playing standpoint, the Focus stats will lean more heavily than my "Career analysis". I will make a couple of teams of all 19th century players but not franchise teams. I plan on using these teams for Strat-o-Matic and/or Statis-Pro Baseball and maybe one of the computer game systems. In the day, I loved Lance Haffner games, if anybody know them. I've found downloads for each of the Haffner games that can be run on dos-box, but I digress. Anyhow, my Orioles team (16 batters-5 starting pitchers-working on relievers and an 11th pitcher): C-Chris Hoiles C-Gus Triandos 1b-George Sisler 1b-Eddie Murray 1b-Boog Powell 2b-Brian Roberts ss-Cal Ripken 3b-Brooks Robinson 3b-Harland Clift 3b-Manny Machado inf-Melvin Mora of-Frank Robinson of-Ken Williams of-Ken Singleton of-Brady Anderson of-George Stone I would have had Grich at 2nd base and probably bumped Mora but Grich went to Angels. If Frank Robinson was on the Reds instead, I would add Paul Blair or Don Buford. If I went to a 40 man roster (24 hitters) I would have added Matt Wieters, Del Pratt, Bobby Wallace, Vern Stephens, Don Buford, Paul Blair, Baby Doll Jacobson and Adam Jones. The starting pitchers were Jim Palmer Urban Shocker Mike Mussina Dave McNally Mike Cuellar I've done all 30 franchises to this point. Some Hall-of-Famers did not make their teams but again I'm refining the rosters to look into some of those things.

I loved a lot of the aforementioned, Singleton, Murray, Palmeiro, etc. But honestly, I thought Nick Markakis had the sweetest swing.

Only way Mets take Davis is if we take cespedes and cano, throw in some money and a prospect. And even at that I don’t think they want to put Alonso in the outfield.

Not until 2020

Can we put Jones through waivers and let him go if he is claimed? Or as a 10-5 player does he have the right not to be put on trade waivers?

Encarnacion is 14th on the Braves list and they have a deeper system than we do. I'm betting he sits between 10 and 15 for us. Zimmerman is not in their 30 but his numbers look solid. Let's see what he does when he jumps up a level. Phillips has some ability and Cumberland is a baseball player and we certainly need more of those guys, not just guys with raw skills but guys who know how to play the game. I think we did ok as we vastly overrate Gausman. I like Gausman but I think we have seen his peak. Of course he will pitch better for the Braves. He is in the NL rather than AL East and in a better pitcher's part and is a second half pitcher but Gausman has never made an All-Star team and likely never will. One of the guys we got just might.