LookinUp

I really wonder how I might react if I was a top prospect in a great organization (LAD) that got traded to an organization like the O's. It's like checking out of the Four Seasons and moving into a Motel 6, and your coaches are mad that you don't like it. I'll give the guy a minute with the new regime. Hopefully competence breeds contentment.

That would be really good (to the point of really hard to believe) for all of those guys to end up next year at those respective spots. I do think others also have a chance to make that jump. Also possible guys like Mountcastle, Diaz, Akin and Hays lose their eligibility. If not, we could potentially load up the back-end of top 100 lists.

The strong odds are he'll be terrible and gone. However, he had a five year stretch putting up 1.7, 6.5, 1.7, 5.3 and 3.3 WAR. He wasn't always a complete and total stiff. I'm not predicting a turn around, but I'll be rooting like hell for the 5% chance that Crush can bring some joy to OPACY this year.

Haven't you all ever heard the phrase "Hope springs eternal?" It's spring freaking training. Stop with the Firestone doom and gloom. Drink the offseason kool aid.

I want 2 WAR from him this year. An every day player who is at all passable can get there, or close. That's what I want. I hope it's not the pipe dream most probably think it is.

How many pitches do they usually get when they enter a game? Five is not substantial. Was that meant to say five more than normal?

I know you know this, but to the sporting industry, the breaks and lengths of game are features, not bad at all. They allow more commercial revenue. Baseball has too many games and too many stoppages, but that's part of the reason why it makes so much money. Any changes that break that up, or contract teams, are missing the point. The game isn't frequently exciting enough. That's what drives people away. Some of your ideas (and others) about limiting the roster for pitchers are what I like the most in this thread. Bring the strategy back and try to limit the max-effort 1 batter 100 mph guy who has become increasingly hard to hit. The other stuff makes great academic sense, but poor financial sense, all things being equal.

Nitpick, I think this has more to do with MLBs revenue sharing model than it does the salary cap. With NFL-style revenue sharing, everything would be different.

Fair enough. Poorly phrased by me. I still don’t understand how scouts expected that out of him if they saw him live. My guess is people got caught up in the numbers and the hype, and that better scouts had more reasonable projections. What stunk is that fans were led to believe he was something that he was not. He never had the contact ability of Mauer, so the power was good, but didn’t play as much as we were led to expect. If instead Wieters was projected as an average or better OPS guy with above average D, he’d probably be much better liked by O’s fans. Instead, he was a let down. That’s really not fair to him.

I definitely remember some publication set probabilities that equates to 50% likelihood of HoFer. My guess is it was an extrapolation of his scouting grade (e.g., 80 = HoF). I don’t remember the specifics but definitely remember being taken aback and telling my father about it. I’d wager we discussed it on this site and that it was when he was in the minors, not pre-draft, if you’re looking for proof.

All of this is true. It's also true that I was at his first ML game, saw his first ML at bat, and immediately came away surprised at how over matched he looked. Maybe his swing wasn't technically slow. Maybe it was long. Or maybe it was late pitch recognition. I don't know. I just know that he was billed through the draft and then through his minor league career as a HoF hitter and it was obvious to me from the first day I saw him that he was not (unless there was an injury or something I didn't know about). The guy never had an OPS above .778 except for one injury shortened year where he started out on a tear. Yes, he ran into some home runs, but he was a #6-7 hitter billed as a #3 guy. I also readily admit that a lot of his value came on defense, but I'm skeptical about dWAR in general and specifically about the value Wieters supposedly added since he wasn't a pitch framer and stolen bases are exiting the game. I'm not killing the guy or the pick. He turned out pretty good, but even though he was 9th in WAR out of Frobby's 54 year look back, I can guarantee that the other 45 teams were hoping for more out of their #5 pick.

I once read a projection that Wieters was 50/50 to be in the hall of fame. Then I saw him hit. Slow swing. Very slow swing. Makes me really wonder how he ever posted the college and MiL numbers he did.

Random thought: I was just looking at the number ratings in the OP of this thread. Man, an evaluator would really have to have some cajones to grade someone as a 75 or 80. I suppose certain tools, like speed, could be graded there, but I can't even imagine a prospect being graded that highly. Not Harper. Not Machado. Trout maybe?

I'm not sure about the Astros guys. One of them looks like a solid-average ML outfielder, if I remember correctly. Doing that a year earlier would have saved even more money. Still, your larger point is correct. The salary relief was probably worth it. Add the fact that two of the arms may be low probability, but at least have upside for a new developmental team to work with, and it could turn out ok.

Any sense of where either of them would slot into our system?

Every player has aches and pains. The DL gets used all the time for marginal issues. Hell, the Os could declare his problems mental (thinking attention issues) and put him on the DL. It would probably be correct, or at least defensible. The more important part is having a plan to identify and approach the issue. I would rather not have him in the middle of a swing rebuild while on the 25 man roster, but that’s probably exactly what will happen.

Really? I think Davis would accept that given the fact he knows he’s stealing money at this point, particularly if he believes in a plan to rebuild his swing. I’m not talking about some demeaning roster move. I’m talking about creating and executing a plan aimed at saving the guy’s career.

If I’m Elias, I work hard to salvage Davis but I never commit a 25 man spot to him until I see he’s at least fringe worthy of it. I assess him in Spring Training. If he’s not ready, he gets a mysterious Oblique injury, goes on the DL and reports to Sarasota for instructionals. I give that a few months and make the roster call then.

Yep. Fingers crossed. It is encouraging, IMO, that we have a pretty significant number of guys who really do look like future ML contributors. We might take for granted some of the guys in the 10-25 range, but this organization hasn't traditionally extracted much value from that ranking area and now it seems like we may be able to. We still need the shiny objects, but we might already have a fair number of future glue guys in the organization.

Our system isn't high-upside, but it's not terrible. The problem is any champion needs elite ML players. We have the looks of a system that can fill out maybe 15-25 of a great team with a couple sprinkled higher, but definitely in need of some MVP/Cy Young type talent.

I read somewhere on this site that Dean Kremer’s results improved dramatically when he was informed by the Dodger’s analytics. One thing Dan and Rajics (sp?) have done is add a lot of arms over the last 12-18 months. It sure would be great if our new leaders are able to help them get better.

Is he gone after the end of this season? I’d have to say yes. Here are a few reasons why. 1. He’s old. I’d imagine him wanting a job like the Nats (if they paid), not a multi-year rebuild with kids. 2. He’s expensive. We’re cutting costs. Results almost don’t matter the next two years. I think we save the money with a younger, cheaper staff. 3. Our pitching development has failed outside of a couple of bullpen arms. I’d imagine we want to rebuild our pitching approach beyond the players. 4. Our hitting approach is counter to the rest of baseball. Power is great, but the first pitch outs are counter to what MLB is doing. 5. Much like the NYY and Arizona, he may have worn out his welcome. Buck is beloved in this town, and rightfully so (IMO), but whatever magic he brings may now be falling on deaf ears. One could easily make the case that Buck knows how to win and would be better than any other manager leading a rebuild. Still, is there any way Buck is part of this rebuild after the end of this season? I don’t think so.

To your point, it would be really nice to see the O's let someone really get their feet under them at a level before promoting. If Sedlock, for example, is allowed to stay in Frederick and really gets on a run through June or even July, that would bode well for both Bowie and more generally for the future. With a solid run like that, I'd be more willing to let him move quickly from Bowie. If instead we promote him sooner than later, then I'd really want to see a solid, long, run in Bowie/Norfolk before coming to the O's, but that's just me. In reality, I expect the O's to promote him quickly and I expect him to be on our roster before 9/1 for a playoff run. We will definitely need the arms by then, and the O's aren't shy about pushing, for better or worse.

Does anyone know the full injury history of Hunter Harvey? My impression is that he's been battling this forearm/elbow issue for a long time. He's basically been in injury purgatory with this one injury rather than an injury prone guy. From that perspective, it was sort of a relief that they finally decided to get it fixed rather than continue to tinker around the edges. I understand his and our motivation for waiting for surgery, but it's good that he's able to move on. With that said, the surgery happened at the end of July. Is there any reason to expect he won't be able to begin pitching next year, including some regular season and full instructionals? That would put him in 2018 pretty much full go. I'd expect him to start in 2018 in AA and to have a chance for a call up mid-late season. He would just be dealing with the injury limitations. This kid's a top prospect who will be a difference maker when he gets here, barring further setbacks. For Sedlock, I think people need to remember that the kid really put some stress on his arm this year. I want to say his last 3 (or was it 5?) starts were all 9 innings or more. For that reason, the O's are not likely to push hard at all through the end of this year. I like that Sedlock's a horse. I like that he has a 4 pitch mix. I just don't think he has special written on him a la Bundy, Harvey and Gausman. He should be good if he can stay healthy though, so I'm happy he's ours. Let's hope he stays healthy and progresses fast. If he does, he may make Harvey's full-time arrival come after his for sure.

I must have missed the report that Sedlock is a great prospect. Glad if that's the case. I think Harvey is going to have a meteoric rise once he starts pitching again. He's closer to Bundy's upside than Gausman's, IMO. Just have to be patient on his health.