Pickles
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Posts posted by Pickles
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1 minute ago, Can_of_corn said:
And that's great.
But one divorce with child support attached and it's gone.
It's a wonderful thing to have for sure, but it ain't a panacea.
Then don't get divorced. Problem solved.
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2 minutes ago, SteveA said:
Interesting article on mlbtraderumors.com on how cancelled games could affect service time. Obviously, this would be negotiated in any settlement. But if we play a significantly shorter season so that players can't get 172+ days of service time, under existing rules that would mean free agency would be delayed for a year for a lot of guys, such as Trey Mancini for example. Obviously the players wouldn't stand for this and somehow it would probably be worked into the eventual settlement. But if it wasn't, a whole ton of players would find themselves under team control for another year.
Surely the players will get those concessions.
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2 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:
Can you read?
I was responding to the idea the other poster was positing.
I was not saying that was, or should be, the actual current situation that those former players will find themselves in.
Seriously, take a second and think next time.
This is what you wrote:
"But if you play MLB for five years you shouldn't have to be bagging groceries when your 60 to pay off your used car."
It's a laughably moronic thing to write and believe.
If a guy who makes a few million in his mid 20s playing baseball ends up bagging groceries at the age of 60 to pay for his used car, no amount of money will fix what has obviously been a decade long series of terrible decisions.
It's a moronic hypothetical. Sorry.
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2 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:
It impacts it sure, but it is hardly the only, or even necessarily the biggest, factor.
With 12 teams making the playoffs I think it is mostly a convenient excuse. Every year lower payroll teams make the playoffs.
You can show me a factor that corresponds more closely to winning than revenue?
I bet you can't.
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2 minutes ago, LookinUp said:
Man. The one wow thing about Wieters' game was his arm. At his best, you couldn't steal on him unless the pitcher was really slow to the plate. Lightning quick release. Rocket arm. Great accuracy. He was awesome in that part of the game.
Indeed.
And in all the words written about him as a prospect- much of it rhapsodic praise about his offensive potential which turned out to be excessive- I can't recall a single evaluator accurately predicting how good defensively Wieters would be.
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Just now, Can_of_corn said:
Yea, that is going too far. Thank goodness no one is saying that.
We had one poster who was suggesting that a five year career shouldn't be enough to "set up" the rest of your life. The rest of us were responding to that idea.
You literally just suggested a man who makes a few million in his mid 20s, and is given lifetime healthcare, will be forced to bag groceries at aged 60 to pay for his used car under this system.
You said it.
It's laughable.
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1 minute ago, Can_of_corn said:
I think the Orioles spending a reasonable amount while making sound decisions will make a much larger difference in their competitiveness than anything they do to curb the Yankees spending. With 12 teams making the playoffs why do you want to focus in on beating the Yankees anyway?
Because revenue is directly correlated to winning. It isn't a mystery.
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2 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:
They need to earn a reasonable fraction of the revenues baseball generates. Nobody should expect that they make enough to comfortably transition to a new career when this one is over no matter what field they're in. Minor leaguers don't get any cushion, nobody helps them transition back into the non-baseball world. There are 10th round picks who got a small bonus, made $1500 a month for the regular season part of six or eight years, then got released and they figure it out. NFL players make $660k (min) and have shorter careers than MLBers.
MLB brings in roughly $10B a year, and let's say the players should get half. There are 30x26 = 780 roster spots. That means about $6M per roster spot, which is of course heavily weighted towards better players with more service time under current rules. That's about what they should expect, it has nothing to do with injury rates, or transitioning to a new career, or anything else.
Women's soccer league players in the US make like $50k a year and don't get any stipend to transition to something else or dispensation for higher injury rates. That's what league revenues can support.
The average ML salary is over 4 million per year. I notice you also take no conisderation of the considerable costs in running a ML franchise. With that taken into the equation, we're getting awful close to what they should expect according to you.
I mean the players have a right to try to get more of the pie. And I make no strong comment on the current round of negotiations.
But this idea that retired players are being forced to live in boxes and eat cat food after retiring from baseball because of the pernicious greed of the owners is going a little far in this thread.
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7 minutes ago, Hallas said:
Part of the reason I am taking the players side here is because while I would prefer to see baseball being played, it's pretty clear that some teams (Orioles) are abusing the current rules and are fielding substandard teams that I have no interest in watching. I want to see baseball being played, but I want to see competitive baseball, not the AAA Orioles getting curbstomped by the Yankees 20 times a year, and I feel like the rules proposed by the PA would help in this regard.
So you think raising the Competitive Balance Tax and lowering the penalities for exceeding it would make the Orioles MORE competitive with the Yankees?
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4 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:
I'm not talking about set for life.
I'm talking not having to work again.
I think I'm considering a lower standard of living then you are.
I'm expecting them to have a realistic budget and to make sound financial decisions (which of course they won't all do).
But if you play MLB for five years you shouldn't have to be bagging groceries when your 60 to pay off your used car.
Lol. Get real dude.
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58 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:
I don't remember Wieters ever getting a scouting report that his defense was weak, especially his arm which was plus-plus. Game calling was always Wieters downfall but modern catchers don't really have that issue because they now have cards to tell them what to call in almost every situation.
In 2011 and 2012, Wieters had 5.2 and 4.1 seasons and had only one more season where he was worth more than 1.2 (2016 at 1.9 WAR) so I could buy Wieters was a Franchise two player for two years, but overall he was more of an average major league catcher. Not bad, but not what I think we expect for a 1-1 pick like Rutschman.
I will tell you now that Rutschman is better defensively than Wieters was though he may not have the raw arm strength that Wieters had. Wieters won two GG and rightfully so because he was outstanding in 2011 and 2012, but his defense fell off by the time he hit 27 years old.
You said you would be happy if Rutschamn repeat's Wieters best years but even over those two great years, Wieters slashed .255/.329/.443/.771. I think those numbers would be a disappointment for Rutschaman after his rookie year.
I don't think Wieters was a failure as a 1st round pick, but I had to grade his Orioles career based off his draft status and minor league numbers, I'd say C to C-.
I think the critiques of Wieters' defense were mostly about his size and length, and whether he could be compact enough to set a good target and get a good pop time. And it was almost always what was cited under weakness, as nobody would criticize any aspect of his bat. Admittedly, that would have taken a brave scout considering Wieters' performance in the MiLs.
All I can say is reading your reports here is quite exciting. If I were betting I'd take AR for the over of Wieters' career. My inclination to temper my expectations is based not on my evaluation of his talent, but rather simply based on probabilities.
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8 hours ago, Tony-OH said:
The one thing you have to remember is Wieters got overhyped due his minor league numbers which were off the chart until AAA. When drafted, Joe Jordan gave Jason Varitek as a comp. After his minor league seasons everyone thought more like Johnny Bench.
Rutschamn has always had a Johnny Bench type comp as a plus offensive and defensive catcher. I do think Rutschman was higher ranked prospect and is the better prospect overall.
We have to hope that Rutschman well outperforms Wieters at the major league level since Wieters even undershot the Varitek comp by 6 WAR over their careers.
All of this is fair.
As is pointed out after this post, for two-three years Wieters was a "franchise" player imo. I think I'll be happy if AR replicates that, with better obp, and is able to maintain it for a longer period of time.
One thing I am eager to see is how well AR's defense compares to Wieters'.
Nobody- and I think you'll admit he exceeded your expectations- predicted Wieters to be the defensive player he was. In fact, Wieters' defense was the one thing most scouts pointed out as a weakness, almost obligatorily so. He was a legitimate Gold Glover.
If Rutschman turns out to be the good defensively with another 10% of offense tacked on (to Wieters' best), I'll be thrilled.
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2 minutes ago, Frobby said:
Depends when you’re measuring them. On draft day, Rutschman was considered a better prospect than Wieters was on his draft day. But I’d say Wieters after the 2008 MiL season was considered very close to where Rutschman is rated now.
Sure. It's always a "snapshot in time."
But going into their ML debut season, they're about equal as prospects.
As you probably know, Wieters was considered the best positional prospect of his draft class. Rutshcman was seen as the best overall prospect. I think it is fair to say Rutschman was a better prospect at the draft, but Wieters "slipped" to 5 overall because of Boras/money.
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3 hours ago, Frobby said:
Well, I think most (like me) feel that Rutschman and Wieters were about equally hyped prospects but are hoping that Rutschman will have a better outcome. I won’t be dissatisfied if Rutschman = Wieters, but I will be disappointed. The franchise really needs a cornerstone player and Rutschman is the most likely candidate.
I won't belabor the point but there have been some pretty prominent posters who have declared- without a doubt, cut and dried- that Rutschman was a better prospect than Wieters.
I'll confess to being a bit "disappointed" in Wieters' career. And I"ll share the same feeling if Rutschman has a career of similar value.
I'd probably take the over. But even with that said, a catcher being a true middle of the order hitter is a rare thing. If he's an 850+ OPS bat, I'll be thrilled- and a bit surprised.
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12 minutes ago, Chuck A said:
I still believe Wieters was a helluva good ballplayer for the O's. I understand to a point that he wasn't what many expected but when you set your expectations so high, there is only one result most likely to occur. I liked Matt as an Oriole and still commend his career.
Oh, I don't disagree. My post wasn't meant to be a criticism of Wieters.
Many have made the argument that AR is a better prospect than Wieters was.
He isn't.
I think Tony chimed in and gave a slight nod to AR, based on his power. I'll concede that. But the idea that it's a hands down no comparison, is flat out false.
There was a thread from this past summer in which poster after poster basically predicted AR was going to come up and be Johnny Bench immediately.
He won't.
I think he'll end up as Wieters with better OBP skills.
And I'm fine with that.
Anybody expecting more than that is, imo, likely to be disappointed, and unscientifically, that seems to be a majority of the board to me.
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21 minutes ago, LookinUp said:
Thus why depth in a farm system is absolutely critical.
It's why Keith Law has us #10.
Depth in a system is critical. Our best players, borderline all-star guys, never appeared on any of these lists. It's likely that we have a player(s) in our system who will have a long and productive career that is completely under the national radar.
That said, I'm not sure Keith Law has made a very strong argument that our current system is unusually top heavy.
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A lot of people are going to be disappointed.
Wieters should be fresh on people's minds.
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1 minute ago, waroriole said:
I don’t see your point. Salaries increase over time. They should, at minimum, increase with inflation.
But inflation is irrelevant here. What’s important to compare is how salaries are increasing when compared to revenue. That clearly is not matching up and the owner’s refusal to have it match is why we don’t have baseball.
The bolded suggests you do see my point clearly:
Inflation is irrelevant to the discussion here.
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Just now, waroriole said:
Inflation can’t give you a higher salary. Your boss can.
Sure. And inflation doesn't "cut" your salary either. Only your boss can.
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Just now, Can_of_corn said:
I'm guessing some folks can get away with asking for inflation +2.5% pay increase.
If you had an in demand skill set and could prove you were in the top .1% of your field.
Well, doesn't seem to be working.
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1 minute ago, Can_of_corn said:
That's a different issue now isn't it?
The fact is inflation is 7.5% right now.
Demanding a 10% raise because of inflation isn't going to work for anyone, even ball players.
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1 minute ago, Can_of_corn said:
If your raise doesn't keep up with inflation it's actually a pay cut.
Blame inflation for that.
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I doubt we sign him as I believe he'll be able to get the same money in a "better" situation for him.
That said, he was the FA I said made the most sense in the beginning of the offseason, and I advocated for a front loaded contract to take advantage of our non-existent payroll for the next few seasons.
Signing middling FAs to middling contracts isn't going to move the needle for this team. Those kind of deals make sense for a team with a solid competitive foundation. Obviously, that is not our situtation.
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5 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:
There is certainly some recency bias with Beltre vs. Brooks. But Brooks' case is hurt a bit by having about seven seasons where he wasn't very good. The Orioles started calling him up at 18, and he wasn't anything like a HOF-caliber player until 23. Then his age 38-40 seasons he hit .201 with a .539 OPS.
Beltre actually had more career PAs than Brooks, and was at least reasonably productive almost his entire career.
Of course I love Brooksie, but it's hard to make an objective case that he's better than Beltre.
I think you can make a pretty solid case that he had a better prime.
MLB Lockout Thread
in Orioles Talk
Posted
If Tyler Wilson is an example of a guy getting screwed by the labor practices of MLB, let us all be screwed in such a way.