The O's "Bombs Away" offense

[Shoeless Joe]

So what is your point? Should we just go the entire winter without discussing what the team should do on offense?

My point is....this team needs to first start with fixing it achilles heel and that is pitching. The offense is good enough to help us win, but when they are 4 runs down every night because the pitching is mediocre it's tough to be a winner under those circumstances.

[Enjoy Terror]

I don't think Reimold is a gigantic question mark. He isn't any more or less streaky than Jones is. I attribute Reimold's struggles last year to injury.

[thundercleetz]

Sign Fielder up for 50 home runs!

[MrOrange82]

I don't think Reimold is a gigantic question mark. He isn't any more or less streaky than Jones is. I attribute Reimold's struggles last year to injury.

He's played a grand total of 230 major league games. More than half of those games have yielded mediocre-to-poor results.

So...either the sample size is too small to make a judgment (i.e., question mark), or his performance has been too erratic to make a judgment (i.e., question mark).

You're right about one thing, though...he's been consistently worse than Jones for the last two years.

[Frobby]

It would be marginally better with a healthy Scott. IF Scott is re-signed. But then again, despite the fact that Vlad's performance last year was incredibly underwhelming, he hit .290 with 13 HR and 63 RBI. And his OPS was a hair above league average. So...he's gone. That production does need to be replaced. Can Reimold do it? Maybe, but he's a gigantic question mark. Does Antonelli represent an upgrade over Andino? I say "not likely," but whatever. You and I agree that pitching/defense will define the Orioles' success/failure next season...I just think it's a tad ridiculous to talk about how much the offense can improve when it's basically reverted to an arguably slightly-worse-off position than the one it occupied at the beginning of last season.

Here is a way to look at this -- leaving Scott out of this for a moment, we are replacing Vlad, Lee, Pie, Tatum, Fox, Izturis and Florimon. Everyone else remains with the organization. Collectively, those seven players accrued 1335 PA and had a wOBA of .296. The remaining players (again, leaving Scott out of it) had a wOBA of .328 in 4585 PA. It really shouldn't be that hard to find a collection of players who can give you a wOBA better than the .296 that the 7 departed players produced, especially when you figure in that a fair number of those PA will go to Reimold (career .342 wOBA) and Davis (career .322 wOBA). Heck, even Chavez (.305 career wOBA) and Teagarden (.306) will be improvements over the guys they replaced (Pie .244 wOBA and Tatum .219 wOBA last year).

Again, no guarantees, but the prognosis for the offense is decent, IMO.

[Frobby]

My point is....this team needs to first start with fixing it achilles heel and that is pitching. The offense is good enough to help us win, but when they are 4 runs down every night because the pitching is mediocre it's tough to be a winner under those circumstances.

And my point is -- everybody knows this, including me. But that isn't a reason not to discuss the offense on a message board, is it?

[Lucky Jim]

You are one of the most knowledgeable and funniest posters on this board. El Nina? Hilarious. But I have to take some issue with the way you and others under value "confidence" as an important variable in player performance.

One of the arguments many sabremetricians make about people using terms like belief and confidence is that it's hard to measure. But you have to agree that statisticians, particularly those engaged in econometric research or sociological research, place a lot of value on a subjects self reporting or "anecdotal evidence".

Athletes, across sports, invariably speak of the effect things like confidence and belief have had on their performance. In golf, for example, players are trained to think positively about impending shots to help them execute the fundamentals better. Golfers talk about the value of this all of the time.

"Soft' information is not as sexy as the hard information we get from things like OBP, OPS, WAR etc but it is nonetheless valuable and relevant IMO.

No question confidence matters. The problem is that there's no evidence that it can be controlled or promoted, or that there's any way to identify its presence on a kind of micro-scale. Most major league players are "confident" to some extent (though certainly we've seen our share of shell-shocked young pitchers and tentative young position players). When you purchase athletic success, you are, too some extent, purchasing "broad" confidence. But the idea that a team of discrete personalities can somehow be molded into "confident" world beaters one year is (i) impossible to predict; and (ii) seemingly impossible to control. Makes for a great story, but it's nothing to bank on and certainly not something (in its extreme) worth pursuing.

You try to purchase the best talent available, you take character into account, and you do your damnedest to make sure your young players are prepared and aren't over-matched when they arrive. The rest is, well, luck.

[Shoeless Joe]

And my point is -- everybody knows this, including me. But that isn't a reason not to discuss the offense on a message board, is it?

I am not sure I ever said to you or anyone on this board that we shouldn't discuss any topic. If you like to put things in people's mouths, you should be a politician. All I mentioned was you cannot have a winning team without good pitching. If that bothers you so much, then don't reply.

[Sports Guy]

So, we need to hire Tony Robbins or, better yet,

.

[33rdst]

No question confidence matters. The problem is that there's no evidence that it can be controlled or promoted, or that there's any way to identify its presence on a kind of micro-scale. Most major league players are "confident" to some extent (though certainly we've seen our share of shell-shocked young pitchers and tentative young position players). When you purchase athletic success, you are, too some extent, purchasing "broad" confidence. But the idea that a team of discrete personalities can somehow be molded into "confident" world beaters one year is (i) impossible to predict; and (ii) seemingly impossible to control. Makes for a great story, but it's nothing to bank on and certainly not something (in its extreme) worth pursuing.

You try to purchase the best talent available, you take character into account, and you do your damnedest to make sure your young players are prepared and aren't over-matched when they arrive. The rest is, well, luck.

I'm not completely sure I understand what you mean by this but I'll take a shot. Isn't it sufficient evidence that a player reports that he is playing with more confidence. There are numerous examples in other sports, tennis, golf, etc where players report how positively there performance has been effected by a sports psychologist. State of mind is an important variable in athletes performance. They tell us this all of the time.

With regard to a team's performance, I certainly agree that whether they will play confident or not is difficult to predict. But we do have an idea of the elements that exist in winning teams. You mentioned one character. Wouldn't be important to try to identify the variables that would create this kind of synergy.

[SilentJames]

As for my "it can't get worse comment"

sarcasm doesn't play well on the internet.

This is a discussion of the offense, we all know the key is pitching.

The thing that I find interesting is that the idea that we need a big MOO bat is not necessarily true. We had some pretty impressive power last year considering our lack of a Fielder or A-Gon type bat. And that was including all the horrible seasons from Nick, Lee, Vlad and Roberts.

The potential is there for a truly top-5 offensive team.

But we need pitching.

[weams]

I'm not completely sure I understand what you mean by this but I'll take a shot. Isn't it sufficient evidence that a player reports that he is playing with more confidence. There are numerous examples in other sports, tennis, golf, etc where players report how positively there performance has been effected by a sports psychologist. State of mind is an important variable in athletes performance. They tell us this all of the time.

With regard to a team's performance, I certainly agree that whether they will play confident or not is difficult to predict. But we do have an idea of the elements that exist in winning teams. You mentioned one character. Wouldn't be important to try to identify the variables that would create this kind of synergy.

I will take the player with more skill than the player who is confident in his skills ten times out of ten.

[DrungoHazewood]

You are one of the most knowledgeable and funniest posters on this board. El Nina? Hilarious. But I have to take some issue with the way you and others under value "confidence" as an important variable in player performance.

One of the arguments many sabremetricians make about people using terms like belief and confidence is that it's hard to measure. But you have to agree that statisticians, particularly those engaged in econometric research or sociological research, place a lot of value on a subjects self reporting or "anecdotal evidence".

Athletes, across sports, invariably speak of the effect things like confidence and belief have had on their performance. In golf, for example, players are trained to think positively about impending shots to help them execute the fundamentals better. Golfers talk about the value of this all of the time.

"Soft' information is not as sexy as the hard information we get from things like OBP, OPS, WAR etc but it is nonetheless valuable and relevant IMO.

I won't ever argue that the soft information isn't important, but it's like Lucky Jim has responded: it's not quantifiable, it's not reliable, and it often ends up being what Bill James calls a "BS dump." In other words, its importance often is directly proportional to the lack of hard evidence available to support a position. For example, in the Luis Hernandez debates of a few years ago we were beaten over the head with soft information about his hard work and character and defensive prowess and ability to do the "little things" as a way to try to prove that his beyond anemic bat wasn't a big deal.

I'm sure character and chemistry and confidence all play roles. But nobody knows just how or how much or even how to acquire or refine such things, so I'll continue to be very skeptical about statements like wildcard's insisting that ephemeral, almost undefinable things are more important than stuff like health or skill or past performance.

[Frobby]

I won't ever argue that the soft information isn't important, but it's like Lucky Jim has responded: it's not quantifiable, it's not reliable, and it often ends up being what Bill James calls a "BS dump." In other words, its importance often is directly proportional to the lack of hard evidence available to support a position. For example, in the Luis Hernandez debates of a few years ago we were beaten over the head with soft information about his hard work and character and defensive prowess and ability to do the "little things" as a way to try to prove that his beyond anemic bat wasn't a big deal.

To be fair, I can only think of two posters who were pressing that point, both of whom were later banned from the site!

I do believe in chemistry and "the little things," but they only help you if enough "big things" are in place. As relevant here, I certainly believe that pitching and defense have a somewhat symbiotic relationship. If the defense is good, pitchers work faster and aren't as prone to nibbling. If a pitcher works faster and challenges hitters a bit more, the defense tends to be on its toes more. There's a reason why "work fast" was one of Ray Miller's three keys to successful pitching (along with "throw strikes" and "change speeds"). It helps the defense.

[33rdst]

I won't ever argue that the soft information isn't important, but it's like Lucky Jim has responded: it's not quantifiable, it's not reliable, and it often ends up being what Bill James calls a "BS dump." In other words, its importance often is directly proportional to the lack of hard evidence available to support a position. For example, in the Luis Hernandez debates of a few years ago we were beaten over the head with soft information about his hard work and character and defensive prowess and ability to do the "little things" as a way to try to prove that his beyond anemic bat wasn't a big deal.

I'm sure character and chemistry and confidence all play roles. But nobody knows just how or how much or even how to acquire or refine such things, so I'll continue to be very skeptical about statements like wildcard's insisting that ephemeral, almost undefinable things are more important than stuff like health or skill or past performance.

Here's my point It's more then obvious that Bill James and others have established the importance of statistical analysis in projecting performance on the baseball diamond. However, because something can not be quantified doesn't render it superfluous. What happened to the Diamond Backs last year? What happened to the Red Sox? All of the data screamed that the Red Sox were going to win it all and the Diamond Banks were going to finish out of the running. Some of our sabremetric friends on the Hangout would explain what happened in Boston and Arizona as simple luck. Well I would suggest that there was a lot more operating in both club houses that contributed to their success or failure. Variables that weren't quantifiable but nonetheless essential to the end results. These are the things that I believe make baseball a great game. The things that are immeasurable.