24fps

A QO would be in the neighborhood of $20 million or roughly 20% of the O's payroll - assuming of course that a hefty bump up in spending has already taken place, which is not at all guaranteed. I'm partial to keeping Santander for 2024 if the trade offers aren't there, but I don't see him having such a good season that offering a QO would be a reasonable gamble. Strategizing around qualifying offers is the working definition of "too cute".

4-5 nights a week in the French Quarter will get you plenty seasoned.

But the article is by Kade Kistner—a driving force in sports journalism. He holds the helm as publisher for Sports Illustrated's acclaimed feature, Rodeo Daily, and not only that, Kade is a seasoned alumnus of Tulane University. What next, accusations of him being just some rando?

Not good enough. It needs to be down Broad Street in Philadelphia the Sunday night after an Eagles loss at home.

Hays is a "Frazier like player" only better for roughly half the cost. If Santander is resigned then that will be a vote of confidence that he will continue to provide power in the middle of the order for an acceptable (albeit full retail) price. If that happens, then I would prefer trading Hays and spending the difference on pitching. There are worse gambles in baseball than giving Kjerstad an opportunity with Cowser as a fallback or vice versa.

What World Series would be worse for viewership, SF-Oak or Baltimore-Milwaukee? I suspect it would be the former because, even though the Bay Area is a large market, all the native fans would be concentrated in one area. I also think it's easy to overstate how much impact the small market factor will have on MLB. Manfred is on record regretting how he handled the Astros cheating scandal, so I suspect he's glad to not have to deal with that issue this time.

Which is more satisfying: Philly fan misery or Rob Manfred misery? It's a toss-up for me, but I think Astros fan misery trumps both.

I only need to see one. Two leagues, two divisions per league, one seven-game playoff for league champion and the WS. Baseball in November is also a joke, and a bad one at that.

The Dallas/Ft. Worth designated media area is #5 in the US (Houston is #8) and Phoenix is #11. While not ideal like LA vs. NY, it's very far from a disaster. Baltimore (#28) vs. Milwaukee (#37) would be a disaster.

I'm a little leery of giving up Kremer and minor league pitching talent this offseason because the organization is just too thin there. It's not whether a deal is fair, it's that the O's should deal from strength and bump up the budget to address the pitching situation. If ownership is unwilling to increase spending after 2023's success, then we may as well find that out sooner rather than later.

I was in Paris and the International Herald Tribune only came out twice a week so I got the news late. My girlfriend and I killed a bottle of good Burgundy in celebration nonetheless.

The O's only have one contract on the books for 2025 that I can find and that's the retainer deal to Bautista for $1 million. Other than that, $14.4 million in dead contracts for Davis, Cobb and Bonilla, then zip. It's not just a question of extensions for existing Orioles, but it's long-term deals for free agents and everybody else. 2023 has been a good year to witness the downside of trying to spend your way to a championship - Mets, Padres, Yankees and a few others - and I'm not suggesting the O's go that route, it wouldn't do any good anyway. But inflection points don't grow on trees and if the O's go into 2024 with nothing more than one-year FA contracts and arbitration raises, then that will send a very clear message about ownership's motivation, fancy explanations notwithstanding. I don't fully understand the nuances of the OPACY lease issue, but if the team turns out to be just a vehicle for JA's financial, community, political, ego, whatever ambitions then God help us all.

Yes to Mullins for Burnes Yes on Cease IF Kjerstad is not in the deal, otherwise it's too much to pay. Blackburn and his 3.7 BB9 doesn't seem that appetizing regardless of the deal. Cabrera's is 6.0 so pass there as well.

Nah, the Mets. Steve Cohen bought all the "it" factor he could find.

Dbacks are a terrific comp for the O’s and a perfect surrogate for the rest of the post season.

Stephenson made $1.75 million last year in arb 3, so he's sure to make more in 2024. The most expensive reliever I was able to find that Elias acquired is Coulombe at $1 million a year (I don't include Fuji who was only partially compensated by the O's for 2023). For the O's to sign Stephenson, they will have to break with tradition from the Elias years. I have argued that the O's will have more resources this offseason, but it also looks like RP has consistently been used to keep costs low. Given that, I'm not looking for Hader or Kimbrel to be pitching for Baltimore next year or any year; Stephenson maybe, but the O's will be picking from a smaller FA universe for relievers IMO.

Means will be 31 shortly after opening day and so far has pulled relatively little money out of the game. By the time the Orioles are comfortable offering him any kind of extension, Means will have had the time to decide whether to gamble on his health in free agency or not. If he stays healthy, my guess is that he would be looking for a guaranteed deal in the Chris Bassitt range or longer because it will be his best opportunity for a big payday.

This is the Orioles Hangout. Not only that, it's a thread on the Orioles Hangout started by Sports Guy. If people can't come here to theorize with a tone of complete authority, then what has the world come to? As to the thoughts of mine you responded to, of course they're speculative, but it's a long offseason and most of us believe the O's have reached an inflection point after years on the outside, so why not project a little? Mike Elias is a product of the Houston organization and so far his game plan for the Orioles has been remarkably consistent with Houston's established success. That could be coincidence, but unless you think Elias came to Baltimore solely to help further line John Angelos' pockets - and I don't - then it stands to reason that when the time comes, further resources will be made available as was the case with the Astros. We will have a much clearer understanding by opening day regardless. My original post was prompted by one of the things I don't love and that's all the reflexive cynicism on the subject of John Angelos, not that I'm suggesting you're guilty of that. I get it, but cynicism is lazy to it's core and I think it's a lot healthier to work a little harder to come up with some positive scenarios to build on this season's very welcome progress.

Should that happen - and I'm not saying it won't - then you can kiss Mike Elias goodbye the moment his current contract is up. I have to think that during the interview process, Elias sold John Angelos on the Astros rebuild game plan and five years later that's what he's delivered, step-by-step. The Astros' successful World Series push came after the first two winning seasons of the rebuild (2015-2016) and in 2017 they spent to win. 2016 OD payroll was 30th in the ML at $69 million and rose to $124.3 million in 2017 which was 18th. In 2018 it was 11th at $160 million. It's been above league average every year since. John Angelos knows the road map and he bought the trip five years ago. Of course, nothing in this argument guarantees that he won't try to be a cheap weasel anyway, but IMO it would be naive to think that the O's success hasn't been planned out with JA's full participation. So the 2023-2024 off season is the first clear put up or shut up time for Orioles ownership. The team has given him no place to hide; it's time to write a couple of checks. I think we fans might still be disappointed, but I don't believe we're in line for Gibson and Givens part 2.

Not as surprised as I was about Raffy.

While the OP and the link to the story was worthwhile, was there ever any doubt that this was where the thread would end up?

He doesn't hit for power, but then again he wasn't drafted to hit for power. He was drafted to get on base and then run while providing genuine CF defense the rest of the game. His OBP over three years at Vanderbilt was comfortably above .400 and over 77 PA at Delmarva it was .494. Smile - it's a good deal.

Risk is the elephant in the room. So far, neither John Angelos nor Mike Elias has shown much appetite for risk and until one or both leave their comfort zone, it's kind of a sterile discussion anyway. That we're discussing whether to re-sign Kyle Gibson at all speaks volumes and not in a good way. Wake me up when the discussion of Snell vs. Montgomery vs. ERod breaks out when the Orioles have skin in the game.

I completely agree. So far that makes two of us in regard to Mayo in RF.

I'm a big fan of what Gibson gave the O's in 2023, but the players put John Angelos on notice that it's time for him to make his contribution to the team's continual improvement. Is that a guarantee of anything? Of course not, but even in a continued state of neglect by ownership, I think that there are going to be better options available, either by trade or in FA, that will be affordable. Personally, I think there will be a bump of at least $20 million in payroll for 2024. It ought to be $40-50 million.