Ohfan67

SSS and all that but it's exciting to see Hays have some immediate success.

Congrats on first hit.

It's complicated: https://www.playoffmagic.com/mlb/ If I understand that table correctly, it looks like the Twins magic number against the O's is 14; any combination of Twins wins and O's losses would eliminate the O's. All of the teams ahead of the O's have magic numbers versus the O's. p.s. The way everybody is playing, the second AL wild card team is going to back up into the playoffs. Unless some teams catch fire, then the O's might not be mathematically eliminated until there's five or even fewer games left in the season (technically 4.5 right now). If the Orioles aren't going to make it, then I would rather they be eliminated sooner than later. Maybe then Buck would play the rookies.

Running for your life.

I think someone has reported that the Orioles are going to shut Harvey down and give him a "regular" off season. Maybe Roch even reported a Buck quote regarding this?

Yes, he does.

Whatever. If you read my comments to other posters I admitted I misspoke and fully explained what I meant. I did not mean to send you and others down the parse every word to death route.

Again, I was referring to the comment that the Orioles had ""finally" developed an ace in waiting." Not downplaying Harvey's hype. Poor choice of words by me in my initial post.

p.s. And I would definitely say being taken #4 overall is a component of "hype", expectations, or perceived potential.

Baseball America #68. Gausman was Baseball America #20 at one point. Again, not ragging on Harvey, just making a point that the Orioles have had other highly ranked starting pitching prospects.

Didn't mean to be a negative nelly...but it comes very naturally. I sure hope Harvey blossoms into an ace for the Orioles. I just was pointing out that the Orioles have had very promising starting pitchers in the minors even in recent years. Bundy was Baseball America's number 2 prospect at one point, for example. Doesn't get much more promising than that.

I'm not trying to dump on Harvey and I hear you, but Gausman was Baseball Americas #20 prospect at one point. Harvey has not reached that level. Maybe "hype" was the wrong word. My point was that Harvey's potential to be an "ace" is certainly no more and probably less than Bundy and Gausman had early in their minor league career. I was referencing BW55's "finally" comment.

I don't mean to rain too hard on your parade, but Harvey is much less of a hyped prospect than Bundy and even Gausman were. He's also pitched less than 25 innings in the last three years. I am extremely happy that he is happy and his rehab assignments are going well, but the amount of hype based on overpowering a few short season minor leaguers seems a bit over the top.Harvey is no more of an ace in waiting than Bundy, Gausman, and even others were early in their minor league careers.

That sounds like a pretty good plan. I think if Harvey looks really, really, really good in spring training then they may jump him straight to Bowie. But something like your plan is more likely in my pretty ignorant opinion. The innings will be tricky. The poor guy has only pitched 135 or so pro innings and most of those were years ago. I think they will push the envelope a little with him...they will want to get some return on their investment.

Edit: Posted in the wrong thread!

Thanks!

I live about two hours away from there and kick myself every summer for not going. It's just so dang hot! And I don't want to drive back home after a night game and don't want to get a hotel room just to see a game. I sound like Goldilocks. We do have a local collegiate league team so that's my live baseball for hot summer evenings.

Excellent acquisition by DD.

Man, this thread makes me wonder what the board would have done with Cal Ripken. "Bench the loser!" "Cut him!" "He doesn't deserve to be an all star!" "Silver slugger, my butt! His OPS was only .718!" "HOFamer! What???!!!"

By the way, Bryce Harper OPS less than .650 two months last season. It happens.

Yes. Machado had a sOPS+ of 114 in the second half last year and he was incredibly hot in August (143 sOPS+). But folks are not going to let data get in the way of doom and gloom. Some posters seem to think Machado is not a future HOF type player and are trying to turn that into "he stinks".

Not a good hitter? Look at his stats. He has been an excellent hitter at a very young age. Come on. But yes, some fans jumped the gun and were already planning his coronation in Cooperstown and O's fans quickly overlook or excuse his past behaviors that would drive them crazy if he was a Yankee, Red Sox or Blue Jay. I'm not defending the idea that he walks on water, but the idea that he is not a good hitter is unsupportable. He's having a bad year and he's definitely not the second coming of Mike Schmidt, but he's been incredibly important to the Orioles. Even in his bad year he has OPS .829 in June. He's looked much better this month although he seems to run very hot or cold.

I know you get carried away with your negativity, but this is just totally idiotic. Manny has played three full seasons at 3B in the majors and ranked 3rd and 5th in OPS in two of those. p.s. I do, however, agree that it is unlikely that Manny will be dealt this year. If the O's deal him, then it will be before the deadline next summer. His value is down now and the O's are going to hang onto him until the last possible moment regardless of his performance/trade value IMO.

One of my friends is a life-long, die-hard Dodgers fan. He frets worse than any O's fan I've ever met. We're all the same.