dzorange
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Just want to clarify what Girardi said about Mountcastle, to break up any confusion on what he said or by what I meant he said. Not trying to derail the topic off of Cowser, just want to clarify.
After the commentary team talked about how the Orioles are aggressive at the plate and don't walk, Girardi said:
"Talking about the young hitters with the Orioles, the fourth highest in chase rate. But Mountcastle isn't one of those guys. He's in the top, uh, lowest 8th percent of chase. But we just got him to chase that good cutter."
Take that however you want.
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Just now, Frobby said:
If by best, he means worst.
Yes, I just wrote that poorly.
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1 hour ago, Frobby said:
Cowser has cooled off. Mountcastle actually has been very steady.
On the Yankees broadcast, Girardi mentioned that Mounty has the best chase rate on the O's so far this season.
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People are really overanalyzing the promotion of a player that may be on the team for a week. Clearly sending Holliday down wasn't plan A, and neither is bringing up McKenna.
If Kjerstad gets sent down when Hays comes back then we have a problem. My main takeaways from this are that Hays is coming back shortly and Kjerstad is going to get Holliday's opportunity in the lineup. Perhaps he runs with it.
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1 hour ago, DirtyBird said:
I assume they will both settle in as .900 OPS hitters
That would be really nice and would offset your OPS projections for Mullins and Santander, which I would guess is around .590 and .610, respectively.
So between the four of them, we'd average four league average hitters.
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7 hours ago, Frobby said:
Colton Cowser (.373/.411/.784) and Jordan Westburg (.333/.392/.692) are both on a tremendous roll right now, but where do you see them settling in?
Cowser was a .298/.420/.489 hitter as a minor leaguer, including .280/.399/.498 in AAA. His cumulative major league numbers are .232/.338/.438.
Westburg was a .278/.371/.506 hitter as a minor leaguer, including .283/.366/.533 in AAA. His cumulative major league numbers are .279/.332/.464.
My best guess is that Cowser settles in around .285/.375/.485, while Westburg is something like .275/.350/.485. And honestly, that would be pretty amazing.
It would be amazing and I think those lines are reasonable.
Even if just one of these two guys pan out with those lines, it would be such a shot to the organization.
It's important to hit on the elite prospects like Adley, Holliday and Grayson. But the Orioles hitting on any of the other prospects is really what takes the organization to great heights. Gunnar's development being an example of that.
Hitting on both Cowser AND Westburg in 2024 means that this team is even more solidified as a legit World Series contender for this season. Those slash lines would put both Cowser and Westburg over a 4 WAR over a full 2024 season.
If this happens, what does the batting order turn into over the summer?
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11 minutes ago, Frobby said:
I’d take the under, and I probably would have said that the day he got called up. ZiPS had him at 2.7 before the season began, and now has him at 2.2 the rest of the way (he’s at -0.2 now, so the updated full season projection would be 2.0). And I’d be perfectly fine with a 2 WAR season from a 20-year old rookie. Witt had a 2.4 rookie year at 21, and look at him now.
Witt also did that hitting mostly 2nd and 3rd in the lineup. Holliday won't have as many opportunities to accumulate stats hitting 9th.
Although Holliday could certainly make up a lot of WAR defensively. But my point being that hitting 9th will give him less opportunities.
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Just now, Sports Guy said:
For those voting under, would you have voted under had I asked this question the day they brought him up?
Most likely. But him starting with an fWAR of -0.2 through 18 games of the season and needing a 3.1 fWAR through the next 144 games is the bigger factor for me,
I for sure would have voted the under if the fWAR was set at 3.1 the day he was called up.
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5 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:
I tend to disagree with is perspective being as relevant now. Traditionally attendance was influenced/dependent upon the opponent draw. Our fans wanting to see “the better teams” and the bigger fan bases visiting the Yard.
However, I believe that times have changed. Because we have so many homegrown stars and such an excellent team, the O’s are much more of a draw themselves since the days of Cal Ripken.
The Oakland series will be well attended. Early this week I purchased tix to next Sunday’s game and there were very few sections that had 4 tix available. And this is for the lowly Athletics.Maybe, but the other aspect I was considering is how fans travel. Baltimore won't get fans traveling from Los Angeles, Kansas City, Milwaukee, Minneapolis or Oakland.
But they will from the likes of Philly, New York, Boston, Toronto, etc, especially as the O's continue to win and the weather gets nicer.
But if the O's can draw 25,000+ locally for an April weekend series against the A's, then I would expect some huge attendance numbers the rest of the season.
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If we're going to wait a bit on any Henderson, Holliday, or Rutschman extension... I'd like to see Rubenstein make extending Kevin Brown a priority. If for no other reason than to show that this organization will be run differently than the previous regime, and good employees will be rewarded.
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Baltimore has had some tough draws this year. Angels, Royals, Brewers and Twins. I can't imagine these teams draw in general, and especially in Baltimore. Might as well get them out of the way early in the season.
Oakland next weekend won't help, but the Yankees should draw some great early season Monday through Thursday crowds. Then I expect the crowds to increase considerably.
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A 3+ fWAR the rest of the way seems mighty aggressive. His defense has rated very well on Fangraphs so far as well. It's not going to continue at that rate.
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25 minutes ago, OsFanSinceThe80s said:
I don't if Cedric will ever match his 2021 season again, but he has an .860 OPS this first month of the season with some great center field defense to match.
Offensively he won’t. But it wouldn’t shock me if he exceeds what he did defensively in 2021.
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Mullins is an absolute luxury in the bottom half of the order and defensively in CF on a team where the young prospects get all of the attention.
Good to see him showing off the power to start the season.
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43 minutes ago, glenn__davis said:Thanks a lot Rubenstein!
Maybe this is a cryptic sign that he's signed Henderson to a long term deal???
Gotta save money somewhere.-
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10 minutes ago, dzorange said:
Orioles going with a suns out guns out lineup with Albert Suarez pitching today.
Just checked the weather. Looks like no sun today but the guns will hopefully still play.
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1 hour ago, Roy Firestone said:
Let me be clear.I never said the young man is anything close to a bust.Its only been about a week. But his strikeout rate(more than half his at bats) is concerning right now. I believe he WILL figure it out and play well. But between facing top major league pitching, and playing a new position, this 20 year old has a lot on his plate.And then theres the scrutiny and expectation. I don't think the Orioles ever had a prospect with this kind of intense expectation.He'll be fine. But it may take a while.
The expectations are even higher because the O's are coming off of a 100+ win season.
Rutschman struggled for the first month or two (clearly not like Holliday has), but the O's had no expectation of winning going into his promotion. He was also hitting in the top six spots in the order.
Holliday is hitting last regularly and is 20 years old.
I guess my only point here is that the expectations of the organization have grown. Adley and Holliday were both one ones and the #1 prospect in baseball.
When Adley got called up, the Orioles started winning. While Holliday has been up, the Orioles are continuing to win. As long as the O's stay competitive, keep throwing Holliday out there in the 9 spot. At minimum he's getting reps defensively at second and hasn't been hurting the team there.
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Orioles going with a suns out guns out lineup with Albert Suarez pitching today.
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Dude is a 74 year old billionaire and we're trying to dissect his "cryptic" tweets??
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12 minutes ago, btdart20 said:
It's just a quibble over an imperative 'need'. Would a higher walk rate help him? All things being equal, absolutely. But what if there's a trade off? Maybe less aggressive swings lead to lower EV and less SLG?
That's sort of what happened last year. Gunnar got off to his slow start with a .189 AVG but had 17 BB in April. He then really hit well the rest of the year as he walked considerably less - a 7.3% clip.
That's part of the reason why I expect (and why I say needs) his walk rates to increase. He was a 12% walk rate kind of guy in the minors and in 132 PAs in 2022. He was an 18% walk rate guy last April. Clearly that's part of his DNA. What we saw in 2023 was a guy still developing at the plate. He was 22 years old.
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13 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:
What is your cutoff for "elite"? Gunnar is at 6.2 rWAR/per 162. That's higher than Riley, Seager, Witt, and Julio.
The other poster brought up those other names.
But Gunnar ranked 20th in oWAR in 2023 with Baseball Reference and 21st in Offense with Fangraphs in 2023. If we're just going off of every player's 2023 season, then Gunnar didn't make my elite cutoff.
I'm surprised that of anything in my original reply, saying that Gunnar needs to improve his walk rate is what's creating a debate. Of the top 30 players in fWAR in 2023, the only ones who had a lower OBP were Witt and Robert Jr.
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26 minutes ago, btdart20 said:
Need? Tatis, Riley, Seager, Witt, Julio... all Gunnar adjacent or worse BB%. Nice to have to make him "more elite", sure.
All of these guys with the exception of Witt, who is in the same boat as Gunnar, have batting averages considerably higher than Gunnar.
Gunnar is not yet an elite player, based on his 826 career plate appearances. Not saying that he won't be going forward starting as soon as today, but his OBP needs to improve.
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Of the Orioles starters, the only one with a truly poor walk rate this year is Santander (3.1%). He's generally an 8.5% walk rate kind of guy.
Cowser, Westburg and Mullins are all at about 7%, but all three have been hot to start the year. They should be swinging.
Henderson's walk rate is right about where it was last year, but for him to become elite it'll need to eventually improve. But 8.3% isn't horrible.
Mountcastle (10.3%) and O'Hearn (11.1%) are actually up considerably. O'Hearn's isn't sustainable, but Mountcastle's may not drop too far.
The two biggest reasons why the O's walk rates are down? Rutschman (down 6%) and zero walks out of Holliday, who will be the every day 2B. Once he starts to figure things out, and Adley trends back to his normal walk rates, I don't think this will be much of a concern. Santander will improve as well.So basically, are we worried about Adley, Jackson and 'Tony 'Taters? I am not.
Thursday afternoon May 2: Battle for First Place with MFYs
in Game Threads
Posted
I can’t wait to see this ump’s scorecard foe the game when it comes out.