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And still no mionor league free agents.


bigbird

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Aren't there some junior level employees who wouldn't get anywhere near trade negotiations for major league stars but could be empowered to go out and sign fillers for the minor league rosters? :confused:

Well, Andy hired his nephew, Lee IV, as a special assistant. I believe he has experience in player development and minor league operations.

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Millar should be traded and Josh Phelps signed.

Payton should be dumped for a bullpen arm

We need a starting LF and CF

We need a starting pitcher unless you pencil Olsen in to start the year.

We need to upgrade the bench. As it stands now it's Quizino, Fahey, Bynum and Moore.

We have no players in the minors we can count on at the major league level in case of injury.

We have Penn who will use up his last option in 2008 and most likely has no spot on this team.

There is a ton of small moves to do. We need to do them the same time we're working on something larger.

All meaningless when compared to the importance of the Bedard, Roberts, and Tejada trades.

We certainly should do some things to fill holes for next year, but winning next year is not a priority. I'd look to find depth so that we don't have to rush any prospects, but other than that, it doesn't really make a difference who is on our bench, who we get to fill those holes, and what minor league depth we have.

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No there aren't. The only reason they got House, Dubois, Knott, and a few other quality players last year was that they reacted quickly, had things set up early in the off-season, and sealed the deals. This year we're in mid-December and most, if not all, of the House-type players have long since gone elsewhere.

I'd be surprised if Norfolk's and Bowie's rosters didn't look like it was 2004 all over again (hello Alejandro Freire and Luis Lopez!), barring some trades that add AA or AAA level talents.

I'm speaking more of guys to be filler in the minor leagues, not guys we expect to be useful in Baltimore next season.
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All meaningless when compared to the importance of the Bedard, Roberts, and Tejada trades.

We certainly should do some things to fill holes for next year, but winning next year is not a priority. I'd look to find depth so that we don't have to rush any prospects, but other than that, it doesn't really make a difference who is on our bench, who we get to fill those holes, and what minor league depth we have.

Personally I think this priority excuse is flimsy, at best. The Orioles bring in hundreds of $millions in revenues every year. There's no excuse at all for not addressing all of their priorities all the time. You could have an unpaid intern scour Baseball America all summer to set up minor league free agent targets in time for the end of the season.

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Personally I think this priority excuse is flimsy, at best. The Orioles bring in hundreds of $millions in revenues every year. There's no excuse at all for not addressing all of their priorities all the time. You could have an unpaid intern scour Baseball America all summer to set up minor league free agent targets in time for the end of the season.
I'm not trying to justify them not signing minor league FAs or being lazy, I'm just pointing out that it really isn't that big of a deal.
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I'm speaking more of guys to be filler in the minor leagues, not guys we expect to be useful in Baltimore next season.

Isn't there a lot of overlap there? Jason Dubois spent all of 2007 in Norfolk batting in the middle of the order, but had things broken differently he could have had 250 at bats in Baltimore.

And if you don't put any effort into finding filler you'll surely end up with crap. The Orioles should have at least had someone making sure we get the AA utility guy with the .700 OPS instead of someone with a .580.

It's not monumentally important, but like I said before - a half-billion dollar corporation with its act together would at least assign a kid right out of college or an intern to cover the research on this.

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All meaningless when compared to the importance of the Bedard, Roberts, and Tejada trades.

We certainly should do some things to fill holes for next year, but winning next year is not a priority. I'd look to find depth so that we don't have to rush any prospects, but other than that, it doesn't really make a difference who is on our bench, who we get to fill those holes, and what minor league depth we have.

All very important if you can't find the right deals for Tejada, Bedard, and Roberts.

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Personally I think this priority excuse is flimsy, at best. The Orioles bring in hundreds of $millions in revenues every year. There's no excuse at all for not addressing all of their priorities all the time. You could have an unpaid intern scour Baseball America all summer to set up minor league free agent targets in time for the end of the season.

For that matter all MacPhail (and I say hom because I'm not sure who's working with him) has to do is stay up and extra hour, read the info on this board which will give him some clue. It's not hard to walk, chew gum and fart at the samt time.

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All very important if you can't find the right deals for Tejada, Bedard, and Roberts.
Why are they important? Its not like we have a chance at competing next year even if we can't move those guys.

I'm not trying to argue against these moves, just putting some perspective on how important they are for us. The team that does the absolute best job with minor league FAs probably wins a handful of games more each year than the team that does the worst. Thats not gonna make a difference for us. Small moves and having sufficient depth are much more important to teams that have something to play for.

It'd be great to see the FO out there making smart signings like they did last season, but in the end it doesn't really improve the state of the franchise in any tangible way.

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Isn't there a lot of overlap there? Jason Dubois spent all of 2007 in Norfolk batting in the middle of the order, but had things broken differently he could have had 250 at bats in Baltimore.

And if you don't put any effort into finding filler you'll surely end up with crap. The Orioles should have at least had someone making sure we get the AA utility guy with the .700 OPS instead of someone with a .580.

It's not monumentally important, but like I said before - a half-billion dollar corporation with its act together would at least assign a kid right out of college or an intern to cover the research on this.

How do we know that this hasn't been or isn't being done to some extent? the absence of a flurry of moves doesn't mean that NOTHING is being done on this front. Again, as I said earlier, I realize and understand why so many are skeptical and expect the worse out of our management, but AM has a great track record of building whole franchises. We need to exhibit some patience and trust in his plan.

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I don't really care about filling out the minor leagues, but MacPhail should have somebody beneath him in charge of this. He's right to be focusing on the big trades, but you're right that there should be somebody in charge of finding some filler for the minor league teams.

Makes me wonder what Flanagan is doing...? We don't hear his name, or see his face, pop up anywhere.

I'm not at the pulling out my hair stage on the O's apparently inactivity. I can accept (so far) that MacPhail is playing it cautious because he knows he has limited resources (tradable players), and as a result, will only get one shot at doing the rebuild right.

As for filling the MiL rosters....well, I thought the FO did a pretty good job last year, but obviously they didn't like all the pieces. Maybe they are just being more selective this time around.

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Why are they important? Its not like we have a chance at competing next year even if we can't move those guys.

I'm not trying to argue against these moves, just putting some perspective on how important they are for us. The team that does the absolute best job with minor league FAs probably wins a handful of games more each year than the team that does the worst. Thats not gonna make a difference for us. Small moves and having sufficient depth are much more important to teams that have something to play for.

It'd be great to see the FO out there making smart signings like they did last season, but in the end it doesn't really improve the state of the franchise in any tangible way.

Signing Guthrie wasn't important??

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Millar should be traded and Josh Phelps signed.

Payton should be dumped for a bullpen arm

We need a starting LF and CF

We need a starting pitcher unless you pencil Olsen in to start the year.

We need to upgrade the bench. As it stands now it's Quizino, Fahey, Bynum and Moore.

We have no players in the minors we can count on at the major league level in case of injury.

We have Penn who will use up his last option in 2008 and most likely has no spot on this team.

There is a ton of small moves to do. We need to do them the same time we're working on something larger.

I agree with all of these by far. Curious if these are on the books or not. Like I said, the stuff I mentioned is all most of us talk about here, or have some knowledge of. The others, we're not sure how they're going. Needless to say, if most of these don't occur, I'm going to be pretty mad come ST.

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Right...At this point, to assume big trades are going to be made is a mistake.

We should be looking to do a lot of other things.

I think frustration/expectation are over-riding common sense for many fans. But I don't see the lack of a major trade at the winter meeting as a negative. Obviously MacPhail put out a a lot of feelers, but didn't like what he heard in return. However, to assume that means no major trades will be made between now and ST is grossly unjustified.

As for the FO looking to do other things....how do you know they aren't? Just because MacPhail's inner thoughts aren't splashed all over the newpaper, or expounded by the OH insiders, doesn't mean nothing is happening.

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I wonder what Lee MacPhail's role is since he was hired? I'm sure that between Lee, John Stockstill, Dave Stockstill, and the pro scouts, we have plenty of front office personnel to handle procuring minor league free agents. I seriously doubt Andy is insisting on doing this all himself. He has been in this business for too long to ignore the importance of minor league free agents.

Bigbird---is your contact, or former contact, telling you that these things are not getting done? I'm just trying to understand where you are coming from. I can't tell if you know this as being factual, or if you are just basing it on not seeing a list or announcement of minor league free agents being signed.

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