Jammer7

I liked what I saw from Urias last year in limited looks. His swing is simple and he drives the ball more consistently than Alberto, and he does so with the entire field. He has more arm and range than Alberto, but the jury is still out on his hands. He looks above average at times, and he’ll make some flashier plays with his glove. And then, he’ll clank one that was hit right to him. It may be a lack of focus at times. We’ll see. Alberto could make a lot of contact, certainly. Overall, I think Urias has more tools and a more rounded game.

No thanks. I don’t think he is any upgrade to Urias or Valaika. Odor stinks. ?

Austin Hays, without a doubt, is the most exciting player on the roster when healthy. He has been my favorite Oriole valor a few years.

The only thing I can figure is maybe Ruiz is out, or Franco goes to the Alternate site initially. That would mean they take 15 pitchers on OD and make a move in a week or two. I know, it sounds odd. But so does re-signing LeBlanc and then cutting him a few days later. Or maybe there is an injury to a pen guy we do not know about yet. Maybe Sceroler has a sore pinky toe or such. IDK

You are absolutely correct, but we are operating as if a small market, though I do not agree that we are. Maybe not that we are, but we should not be. And it depends on how much all of the initial capital outlay is.

That quote is just noise, low hanging fruit for those who do not agree with Elias’ development model. Of course they are not signing the better minor league free agents. Many of them would block the prospects we have at AAA, or even in AA. You have to have roster spots for prospects, and those prospects need innings to develop. We have many actual prospects in AAA for a change. Why waste money on guys who will not play here? I think it smart to maximize what we already have here and cherry pick a few reclamation projects. Makes me wonder if he disliked the shrinking of the scouting department and has a personal axe to grind. I get the impatience with losing at the major league level, but we know the money is being spent on infrastructure improvements and technology. Elias has not gone half in, he is all in. This is the management of our team we have been waiting for most of our adult lives. I was 15 years old in 1983. I was used to winning baseball. I took it for granted.

Yeah, I agree. I think Longenhagen was referring to the fact that they discouraged pulling the ball at all. At least, that was what he said, IIRC. Generally, I would want someone who plays a power position, such as 3B/1B/LF, to be able to get to his pull side power. Not all players have much opposite field power, even at Coors. When I coach kids, I teach a gap to gap approach in general. But I do encourage them to go out and get the pitch middle-in to do damage. You want to be able to attack that pitch, especially if you’re ahead in a fastball count.

Nunez was cut by the Tigers. https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/detroit-tigers-set-opening-day-roster-renato-nunez-out-harold-castro-akil-baddoo-in/ar-BB1f1PXD?ocid=uxbndlbing Núñez appeared in 11 games before last night and went 5-for-26 (.192) with two doubles, one home run, no walks and 10 strikeouts. https://www.masnsports.com/school-of-roch/2021/03/more-thoughts-on-spring-training-roster-trends-and-surprises.html It’s too bad, seems like a good guy. Got maligned for his poor defense again.

@wildcard I just want to give you credit for calling this. A little surprising, but he really struggled two nights ago and earned a demotion. As some have alluded, it may be attitude and/or fitness related. But it turns out your argument was sound.

Longenhagen talked about Nevin. He had some comments about the Rockies being “a weird organization” and telling Nevin to not pull the ball, and to use the entire field. Said he was told the Orioles want to see him get to the pull side power more.

Yep, Bob Wade did.

I don’t hate him. He just talks too much, and mostly about things I don’t really find that interesting. I would rather he kept his color commentary about the team and the game.

Yeah, I think that is all just rhetoric from Hyde. Like SteveA said, they know who they want. Tony alluded to Akin being out of shape, and I am sure that did not endear him to Hyde and Elias.

Or he could be the fifth starter. Edit: López was named the Friday starter, so LeBlanc likely not the fifth guy. Good.

This is from last week, and I thought it was an hour well spent. Longenhagen talks a lot about his Fangraphs prospect list.

Let’s not over-analyze things. Akin is in, unless he is injured. He has been throwing in B games, sim games and side sessions to improve his command and delivery. We have not seen him throwing, but he is not behind as far as innings progression. Hyde and Elias have been consistent with putting their young arms in positions to be successful. They will initially pick spots for Zimm to get lengthy innings. It does not matter if we think he has “earned it.” Who cares if he starts right now? Why does that matter? If Lopez or LeBlanc comes in and starts, and Zimm follows them with 4 innings, who cares? It is all about the long term growth right now. I will say that I wanted Zimm to start before the Matt Harvey signing. And for me, if it means that I can keep a R5 guy, make Zimm a starter, sure. The R5 guys are the wildcard. Not many arms in the pen that are optionable, and some with options are Scott, Fry and probably Zimm. Maybe they make Lopez a starter to keep Wells. No way they keep both R5 guys, right? But Sulser looks to be in trouble. Lakins is solid, but he could be optioned and come back often. Abad could allow the team to option Fry as well so he can ride the shuttle. Lots of things in play right now.

I will say that Dave Johnson talked way too much. He seemed to feel the need to not have any infilled air. It was not a pleasing telecast to listen to. I much prefer Kevin Brown, Geoff Arnold, Brett Hollander, Ben McDonald, Brian Roberts, Jim Palmer and Melanie Newman. Garceau is such a nice guy, but makes a lot of mistakes. Johnson is certainly knowledgeable, but the game has passed him by. He makes Mike Bordick seem like a good announcer as he over-boogies his telecasts. Enjoy retirement, Dave.

I get what you’re saying. I think you have to watch the actual zoom to see how much of this is journalist interpretation. I think he has been quite honest and patient. With Davis, Hyde acknowledged it was possible Davis would begin the year on the 60 day IL. In the link below, Hyde says it a little differently about Felix. More of a wait and see how it goes after the side tomorrow.

Seems we can agree that Means, Kremer and Harvey are definitely three starters. Akin seems to be fairly solid at another slot, and I think they have had him working to try to get his breaking ball and change up refined while not exposing him too much to our AL East opponents. Also, maybe getting him to cut some weight. The fifth slot comes down to Zimmermann, LeBlanc and Lopez; although I will not dismiss what Wildcard has been saying since Winter Ball that Valdez is a realistic fall back option as a starter. Zimm has been a great story. I wanted him to start all offseason and coming into Spring Training. Hyde’s comments lead me to believe he starts in the pen for his best development. I do not think three rookies in the rotation to start the year is appealing to Hyde. But maybe he is the guy. LeBlanc is what he is, and his track record isn’t great these past few years. But with Felix hurt, I think LeBlanc will be the fifth starter. He will generally go five innings and he’ll go out and compete to keep his team close. If they can get 6-8 weeks out of LeBlanc, great. He’ll end up with his usual poor stats, but he is buying time for the young guys. Lopez may have blown his shot to be a starter, giving Hyde some hope before his last implosion. Lopez still may be the guy if they want to keep someone in the pen and exclude LeBlanc from the OD roster. Personally, I would cut him. I think he is soft and leaves too many pitches over the middle of the plate. But they need him for now, and who knows, maybe they can get into his head and convince him to compete through adversity. Valdez as a starter...It remains a possibility, but I wonder if it is the best idea to have him face hitters 2-3 times in a game. We’ll see. A true dark horse candidate. My guess, the rotation is: Means, Kremer, Harvey, Akin and LeBlanc. And the pen is: Scott, Fry, Tate, Armstrong, Valdez, Lopez, Zimmermann and Abad. If they keep 14 pitchers...Tyler Wells.

Here is one link, and I think there is another where he says the same things. Around the 6:25 mark. Not as definitive as I remembered. And he spoke about Zimm getting 5 “ups” in a B game. Listening to his comments again, Hyde seems hesitant to start him right away, but I don’t think he rules him out completely.

It was a several days ago in a zoom call. He was asked about Zimm and his role. He immediately compared him to Means and his role as a rookie in 2019. He recounted how Means began as a length option and became a starter fairly quickly. I will see if I can find it and post a link.

Mike would not likely give much of an answer, certainly not until Pop is either returned or has satisfied the R5 requirements at the end of the year. And even then, we are likely not going to get an in-depth explanation of their evaluation process. We all want to know. Dan Connolly, Jon Melli and Rich Dubroff would certainly ask when appropriate.

Akin is always a little tubby, but you cannot be David Wells and Sid Fernandez, or even Sidney Ponson, these days. It is a year-round job now. I figure he’ll be a pen guy at some point, but I was hoping he would be able to start this year until Lowther and Baumann are ready. Akin’s breaking ball is too inconsistent and he telegraphs the change up mostly. He has flashes, but maybe the answer isn’t more Chris Holt until he gets more Jenny Craig. Jokes aside, perhaps he has been working in things and getting his innings in on the back fields. IDK. Seems like Means, Kremer, Harvey for sure. After that, I want Zimm to be there, but Hyde pretty much said he’ll start in the pen for length. Lopez had been good, but he had some minor leaguers slap him around the other night after an error. I do not think he deals well with adversity, kinda soft. LeBlanc is what he is, and he probably makes it at this point. Not that I want him to, but I think that he will be decent for a month or two until some others get themselves squared away. Felix should be headed to the Alternate Site for now, still on a minor league deal. His arm action concerned me before the injury, so not surprised he had an elbow issue. We’ll see how long it takes for him to heal and ramp back up.

I remain a skeptic when it comes to DJ. But I did like the charts. We’ll see. Strictly a DH for me. I would like to have the Walsh or Candelario. Walsh reminds me, just a little, of Adam LaRoche.