Gentile4

Among the position players, I'm keeping only Mountcastle and Mullins. Maybe Hays. Mancini and Santander are a bit more problematic, especially if you think the team can compete within the next three years.Trey will be 32 and AS 29 in year 3, and both should still be productive.

I don't see any down side to this reasoning. Cumberland's going to be 26 in a month, and we're really just looking to see if he can be Rutschman's backup down the road. I've never seen a catcher as bad with the glove as Severino, and while I'd love to trade him, I'm not sure what the market would be. I'd take anything.

Of course it does. It means he's caught the equivalent of 31 professional games and has yet to display the dominant hitting you'd like to see out of the overall #1 pick.

That's true, but Mountcastle was 22 in AAA while AR is 23 in AA. Like I said, walks are not a small thing, especially for a team whose OBA is bad, but I'd like to see Adley really get into a groove hitting before we throw him to the wolves.

Can I just point out that Rutschman has caught all of 280 innings in the minors and is a career .258 hitter. Yes, he does walk a lot, and that's not a small thing, but he's yet to really put together any dominant hitting streaks. At 22, Mountcastle hit 35 doubles and 25 HR's at AAA. Let's see AR do something similar.

If we take out his season at Frederick, his numbers are very ordinary. I can't see him ever being more than a 4th or even 5th OF (do 5th outfielders even exist anymore?), so as Aristotelian says, he needs to show he can do that job.

There's no reason to promote him to the big leagues now. I'd rather he develop a working relationship w/pitchers like DL Hall and Grayson Rodriguez and bring them all up together. I can't imagine those two pitchers are going to need much more time in the minors.

Exactly. He's 25.

I too have had enough of Matt Harvey as a starter, but what I don't understand is demoting Kremer and leaving Lowther in Norfolk. Yes, I know the argument is that they need to log innings. As my grandmother used to say: "Innings is innings." Okay, she didn't actually say that. They're both 25; if not now, when? If their fragile egos can't survive a bit of a struggle in the low pressure situation that is the Orioles' season, then maybe they'll never be ready to pitch in the majors.

Not to hijack the thread, but can we now add Matt Harvey to this list.

Great assessment by OP. I want to like Sisco and have defended the O's hanging onto him, but his lack of production is getting difficult to accept. As Bahama noted, it may be time to figure out which of the four organizational catchers (Wynns and Cumberland) can do the best job helping the young pitchers figure things out. Severino at least occasional resembles a major league hitter.

Was Elias even born in 1976? ? For a team like the O's, trading with the Yankees, or the Red Sox, makes perfect sense. Those teams are going to add roster pieces with or without the O's. If we can get better at the same time, then it makes sense to trade with them. BTW, I'm not advocating trading Mullins. And don't forget the 17 player trade the O's pulled off with the Yanks in the early 50s. Those days are gone.

Ordinarily I'd say that we could just slide Hays into the CF spot, but he's MIA as often as not. The defense is so bad as it is, do we really want to trade arguably our best defender? If the thought is that the team could be competitive in three years, Mullins will be 29 and theoretically still productive. Tough call; I guess we see what they offer.

I've noticed this as well and really don't understand what's going on. The poor bunting bothers me more than the base running blunders though obviously both are important.

Agree 100%. I'm a fan of the 3 batter minimum rule to improve the game's pace, but if the league addressed the revolving door policy as you note, teams would rethink how they handle pitchers.

I can't tell if you're serious. Why would any team trade its 19 year old 1st round pick, especially for the three players named?

Yet he leads all of baseball in throwing out base stealers.

Agree, but unless/until Rutschman starts lighting it up at Bowie, we're stuck w/Sisco and Severino. And from what I've seen, the infield defense is just as bad as the catching.

They've had Bannon playing 2B as well as 3B. He's 25 and couldn't possibly be worse than what they've been trotting out to play 2B each day. Agree when Jones is healthy he should be here as well. I also think they need to play Sisco more. Instead of 6/1 maybe 5/2 or even 4/3 with Severino who is also clearly not the answer. I think we all agree we're talking about a backup catcher here since the job will be Rutschman's soon.

When I saw the ball go off the bat of that last hitter, my heart sunk momentarily.

I guess I look at that situation differently than you. I think it would look bad if he pitched to the 8th hitter with a career .107 hitting pitcher on deck.

Even if he had immediately tagged up, I think he gets easily thrown out at home. It seems to me that going half way is the only sensible thing to do. That said, I have the benefit of instant replay; the runner doesn't.

I didn't see it either. Was he bunting against the shift?

If the O's are willing to trade 26 yr old Santander, then I assume they're also willing to part with 29 yr old Mancini. What kind of timeline are we talking about here when it comes to competing for a playoff spot? Three years?

While I'm certainly not advocating heavily investing in any 28 year old, the O's are planning to throw several young starting pitchers out there, and it behooves management to put as good a team as makes financial and developmental sense behind them. Adhering to the Ravens' "right player-right price" motto, Franco would clearly improve the team, and as long as they don't overpay, it makes sense. Rio Ruiz is not the future. Franco at least has a semi-enviable track record.