btdart20

How did you find those threads? I was wondering if/how I voted! I enjoyed your 'project the OPS' posts too. It would be pretty cool to put those types of polls in a single pinned thread each year. (I know I blew the Hays OPS, but wondering how close I was otherwise!)

And now that my brain is going along these paths... Scouts have their types/profiles too. Law has been relatively low on Henderson (behind Adam Hall). And Fangraphs has Gunnar ranked 22nd currently. So maybe Law/Longenhagen's type is max velo and pull-side power. Which could explain his concerns with Jones...

No pull-side power, but the 'inside-out' power the other way is there. Is that the take? I really struggle with this a "bad thing" because that's exactly the swing that Trout strives for. Maybe I've got blinders, but it's not like he's getting beat with FBs. He's hitting them hard to RCF.

I'd be down for limiting the # of pitchers. And completely agree that known SPs are better for the game than unknown RPs. It would be interesting to see what type of stance the MLBPA takes on this (the few big names vs. more no-names). The trend is definitely toward limiting the number of times through the line-up (openers/middlers, piggybacks, etc.). Though I wonder if it would decrease the violence associated with maximizing velocity and spin. I suspect that's as much to blame for the injury risks as the workload.

Glad to see Gunnar get his due from the national pubs as well as the more Oriole centric guys! Pretty cool that (including Adley) we're drafting and developing some top tier talent. Orioles Top Prospects (mlb.com) - here's their Orioles top 30. They have Mayo as our 6th. I wonder how close to the national top 100 he is... I like Cowser better long-term. Mostly because I can see him slot into the #2 spot in the batting order, where Westburg is probably a #5-7 range. I have no idea where I'd put either of them on a national list though (though the gap does seem pretty big). This list is SS heavy with about 20% of the list - but maybe that also bumped Westburg down the rankings a bit. National lists can be difficult to pull together though. It wouldn't completely shock me if Cowser finds his way into the top 30 (by attrition and continued hitting) before the 2023 season. His .821 OPS is currently higher than 12 positional prospects ranked higher than him. And since 6/1/22 (when he made comments about be more aggressive hitting), he's got a .912 OPS. (Plus 2 pitchers ranked higher who have a 5+ ERA and another with a 1.50 WHIP.

What is this you speak of?

Height and body type matters. Height - The average 2B today is 5'11". But broadening the timeline, the average height for a HOF 2B is 5'875" (and most of the old schoolers were "scrappy", "hit 'em where they ain't", "rabbits"). Johnson would be on the shorter side. Yes, Altuve is smaller and is basically the exception that proves the rule. Only 27 of the top 200 HR list are under 6' tall. From a probability/projection perspective, size is an indicator. Body type - Body type matters less for hitting, but it does for everything else. I can't think of any 2Bs with thicker body types. The average HOF 2B weighed 170.4 lbs. The bar for body control and agility needed there is higher than other positions. 2B is less linear and more dynamic. Baseball Players: Does Size Matter? - AZ Snake Pit Starting with hitters, BA does not appear to be affected significantly by height or weight. OBP shows a weak correlation. That runs counter-intuitive to what you might expect: shorter players have a smaller strike-zone, more difficult for pitchers to hit [see Eddie Gaedel, below]. But it seems large guys do tend to walk more often, perhaps because they're being pitched more carefully. That would make sense, since in SLG, larger players have a clear advantage (they also K more often). This becomes even more pronounced when we look at just HR rate, where we see the largest correlations of all. Big guys hit more home-runs. I wonder why I had to look at stats to prove that.

There are at least 3 lenses to view the 2B decision through: maximizing the player value, maximizing organizational value, competitiveness 1. How do they maximize the Odor signing? Do they think they can get something for Odor? Maybe/maybe not. But trading him is the only way to get anything long term out of Odor. The trade deadline is likely the magical line in the sand for the Odor Decision. 2. Organizationally who else? Jones has played 16 games at Norfolk. Grenier and Vavra have 15 games logged. Long has 10. Westburg has 7. Jones - .212/.339/.343 = nope Grenier - .207/.335/.283 = nope Long - .211/.318/.276 = nope Vavra - .323/.423/.451 - missed 4/21-5/30. Rehabbed in A+ from 5/31-6/5. Babip in AAA is pretty inflated (.378 before 4/21 and .400 after 6/5). Westburg - .330/.356/.660 in 101 PAs. Even if they look beyond the SSS and think he's statistically ready, are they organizationally ready? My guess is they give Vavra a shot first after the trade deadline. Then maybe a cup of coffee for the last few weeks if he's still hitting. 3. Competitiveness? Odor has provided a few fun moments (game winning hits, a few good throws, etc.) and has been a great cheerleader. Beyond that, he has provided very little to hang our hats on as a contributor. Even his defense is pretty bad overall (-5 OAA, -4 RAA, -1 UZR). With maybe the exception of the tough to measure/isolate double play factors. None of that should prevent us from moving forward without him (and brings us back to the first two lenses). If we want to be competitive, we have to win as many positional head-to-head battles vs. our opponents as we can. Right now, 2B is losing (especially in division). Per Fangraphs: NYY - Torres (1.6 WAR) BOS - Story (1.8 WAR) TOR - Espinal (1.8) TB - Paredes (1.7) BAL - Odor (0.1)

Meh. It was last September and he’s throwing well now. Sounds like it was a minor procedure. I’m sure it has some impact to where any team sees his value. But it’s pretty close to full transparency. Rank him appropriately but I wouldn’t just completely disregard him. I would have no issues with him at #33 or later.

Elias spent $7m this year for Lyles. And $7.5m for Mancini. $14.5m isn't too far off of the $16m for Snell. Not saying it happens, but it's not completely unreasonable. Just reshuffling the payroll shells.

I'm still fine with trading: Mancini, Santander, Lyles, Lopez, Tate, and any IF who has a market. I'd be fine trade Mullins still too but doubt the market would support my hopes. Yes, trading them likely says we're not looking for that playoff push this year. But all things considered, were we expecting to compete at the beginning of the year? And are we expecting multiple big FA signings to fill the rotation or positional gaps this off-season considering the Angelos family turmoil? Which leaves stacking and developing minor league talent as the primary path to competition. Yes, we have some potential answers internally already. We have big SP gaps in the rotation and SP prospect list. Hall will be given every chance to start, but is he a 3-4 IP guy in reality? Bradish has been spotty at best in his ML starts. Can he adjust to the ML? Baumler (A) is just getting into it. No real SPs in AAA. Do we feel confident Wells and Kremer are legit?

Glad to see the trade chatter beyond on chat boards!

I'm not anti-Volpe. But he is the current flavor of the month for the NY hype machine.

Snell would be a good target. A solid lefty SP would counter LH hitters while the canyon limits damage to RF against RH hitters in OPACY. Snell limits HH%. The increase in BB could be related to increase in CB usage and movement (big change in that pitch profile from 2020 to 2021). If he can harness that and throw it for strikes, it would likely allow his FB to play up late in the count. Maybe even something a 'pitch to the middle and trust your stuff' would help.

Sort of. His walk rate was 9-10% in international play. Not crazy, but much better than the 4% he's shown so far in A+ and AA. The bulk of his high OBP was his high AVG.

Coming into the org, HR power hasn't really been his game. He seems to be more of a 'control the strike zone and hit a liner in the gaps' type of guy. The O's probably saw the hit tool and with the hope of a few of those 2B extended to HRs. Not sure he'll be more than a 10-15 HR guy. But even if not a 20+ HR guy but can carry a .280/.325/.425, then he should be an MLB contributor.

So, he had 3 hard hits in 6 ABs. Or a 50% HH%. For context, MLB average in 2022 is 35.7%. (No clue if any of his hits/outs qualified or not, but just for fun.) That's the type of thing the staff will be looking at more than something like AVG. Statistics support the logic that you hit the ball, then players don't have as much time to get to the spot to which the ball is hit. Throw in the launch angle, sprint speed, etc. and it'll tell you a bit more about expected outcomes (xBA, xwOBA...) In the grand scheme of things, I would feel much more confident about a player's future seeing 2 crushed liners right at players for outs than 2 lazy loopers just out of the 3B reach. That's where the 'eye test' and the advanced stats start lining up.

After a slow-ish start in Bowie, Prieto is adjusting. Last 15 games has a .333/.361/.435 (.796 OPS). Though it's supported by an inflated .355 Babip. For June, he's slashing .281/.333/.377 (.711 OPS) with a .303 Babip. About a 10% K rate and 4% BB rate in AA (pretty close to what he did in A ball too). Love the low Ks, but would love to see a few more BBs. 3 HBP in June, I have no context for normal but that seems high to me.

I waffle on Holliday too. Though we could do worse than having 2 Gunnar's on the left side of the IF. Boston has Bogaerts and Devers. Gunnar will likely be a better defensive 3B than Devers and at least breakeven with Bogaerts. But if the OPS/OPS+ matches what Bogaerts/Devers post, I think we'll have a little fun with that too!

I've seen Johnson has the lowest signing bonus demands of the top guys. Not sure if Collier was included in that group though. While Johnson has been pretty consistently ranked in the top 1-5 range, Collier's ranking has crept up from the teens and is still a pretty wide range of outcomes. Have you seen anything that says Collier's bonus 'demands' are lower than Johnson's? Could be based on the ranking range, but...

Never mind... looks like it's personal not team related. I doubt the Tigers are shopping him.

The 2023/2024 time horizon was probably in the context that it takes many rookies a half season to adjust to the ML and that not all of our prospects would be promoted at the same time. (It also did account for the success level of the BP reclamation project success.) I do suspect that Elias and other did anticipate the O's offense would be competitive (at least the top 5 + AR with the hopes of one of the rest working out). The Tigers is a fair comparison as far as rebuild path/expectations go. But the team OBP of .283 is woeful (29th ahead of Oakland). I love watching Baez play (especially in the field and on the basepaths), but the Baez signing wasn't smart for a team that had a team OBP .308 in 2021 (24th). The Ed-Rod contract looks/looked good. (I haven't looked at his stats in depth, but maybe Elias should make that phone call to see what it takes.) The Baez Blunder wouldn't have made origami of the Paper Tigers on its own had they not had 3 rotation pieces (Pineda, Mize, Manning) and 2 OFers (Riley Greene and Meadows) injured. Tork has had a really slow start and, quite honestly, looks lost. Lefty hitters take a while from what I understand, but I have to think the second half will be better for him. And Eduardo Rodriguez... well, I'm not sure what's going on with that but it's a mess.

Anchoring is a powerful psychological tool in negotiations!

MLB Draft 2022 bonus pools, pick values Here's my 'assumptions/math': 1.1 - $6.6m ($8.8m slot) - save $2.2m 1.33 - $2.3 slot 2.42 - $2m ($1.861m slot) - over slot by $0.2 2.67 - $2m ($1m slot) - over slot by $1m 3.81 - $2m ($800k slot) - over slot by $1.2m We can still go slot/Jones at $8m and get the first 4 picks (1, 33, 42, 67) plus the $800-850k allowed (but taxed) over-budget spending. It's that last pick that needs wiggle room to get the bonus to $2m. If we go really under-slot and save the full $2.2m in the math above, it'll also get us wiggle room to potentially get the next pick around $2m bonus as well. 4.107 - $2m ($571k) - over slot by $1.43m Total over slot needs = $3.83m. $2.2m under slot saving + $825k allowed overage = $3.025m gap. Or $805k needed under slot from later picks in rounds 5-10. Which is tight because those rounds combined have a total slot value of $1.5m.

Sounds like the Red Sox and Fabian lost their gambles. I bet Fabian won't get a $3m deal this year. And maybe not $1.86m 40 slot money either. I imagine the Red Sox were somewhere between those two numbers though. Fabian may break even money-wise except he gets his money a year later of devalued currency and inflated costs.