Report: Morosi says a source links us with Hamilton and Ross

[CA-ORIOLE]

Does Reimold even have options left? I think the O's are going to give Reimold every chance if he's healthy. Atleast until he's back on the DL again.

He has no options left.

[El Gordo]

That's a good point, but I think Hamilton will be very good for 3-4 years. Teams like the Dodgers and Jay's have shown, no contract is untradeable. I think that takes away a little of the risk now too. Even if the O's had to eat a little, to get a good player or two back. I just think the theory that signing Hamilton will hinder us from keeping guys like Wieters, is short sighted. Mostly, because I think the odds of keeping Wieters are slim, even without signing Hamilton. It's like a game of chicken. We won't know until it actually happens. By then, it's too late to avoid the crash.

I think you can be pretty sure of 10-12 WAR over the next 3 years with Hamilton, based on his track record. After that, not likely IMO. You'd be lucky to get 18 WAR in production over 6 years, IMO. But you would essentially be paying for 25-30 WAR.

[OrioleMagic79]

You believe that Hamilton is 100% guaranteed to get us to 95 wins consistently? Even in the 7th year of a $175 million contract when he's 38 years old? The question goes both ways here.

Do we want unrestrained spending to win right now or do we want to moderate our spending and win both now and in the future?

No, I didn't say that...but it was for dramatic effect anyway...not intended to be literal.

And to be clear, though I didn't say it before, I think 7 years at any amount is silly, but I didn't address it because to me that is not a real offer that anyone would consider making to him...JH's agent will be throwing huge numbers around because that's what agents do, as well as he knows there has been a lot of speculation that JH won't get what a player of his production would normally because of OTF issues. It's an attempt to set the numbers WAY HIGH so that normal numbers for a player like this seem reasonable and he might actually get them if the plan distracts the media and teams from focusing TOO much on his issues...

That said, all I want is the Orioles to be willing to pay what other teams are willing to pay so that we can be considered by JH and his camp...I would even be willing to pay slightly more than some others to get him...but that's because I know 7 / $175 is not real, nor does anyone believe it to be...

The bolded quote is where the golden goose lays its eggs...if you can find the answer to that then you need to become a GM of a MLB team. (I'll politely ignore the biased angle at which it was written from since a third option could be win right now AND later with signing Hamilton, but who said "unrestrained spending"? I want JH, I am not advocating making huge contracts a regular habit...)

[Dark Helmet]

So it sounds like you're in the "spend whatever it takes" camp - or is there a max you're not willing to exceed?

I thought there were no "imaginary sides"? Atleast that's what I was told when I made a similar comment, directed to towards someone with an opposing view.

[Dark Helmet]

I think you can be pretty sure of 10-12 WAR over the next 3 years with Hamilton, based on his track record. After that, not likely IMO. You'd be lucky to get 18 WAR in production over 6 years, IMO. But you would essentially be paying for 25-30 WAR.

So would you agree, that if Hamilton did give us 10-12 WAR over the first 3 years, he would still have a trade market? If it doesn't work out with Hamilton the first 3 years, most likely it won't work at all. So, would giving Hamilton a 6 year deal, assuming you could offload his contract after 3 years, be a worthy outlook to take?

[OrioleMagic79]

So it sounds like you're in the "spend whatever it takes" camp - or is there a max you're not willing to exceed?

I am closer to this camp, but when 7 / $175 is thrown out there, that is just stupid...I won't pretend to know what the financial difference on the O's organization will be if we do 4/100, 5/100, 5/125, 5 with op for 6/130, 3/90, etc. I mean, who the heck knows?

So I guess spending whatever it takes to me seems less risky because we have no idea what will happen with this roster 3 years from now? What if Jones ruins his knee playing basketball in Nov 2013, Wieters stops progressing and starts regressing at 30 yrs old, while Manny demands a trade after 2014 season and Bundy blows out his arm in Sept 2015 in a way that he's never the same? Hamilton might help us through that and to remain contenders...without him we could be a 68-ish win team again...

Again, this is all just to illustrate a point...there is just as much risk in inaction as there is in action...in 1998 I don't believe anyone saw 14 losing seasons ahead, especially after being awesome in 1996/7 (which was done by acquiring guys like Alomar by the way)...once Mikey left for NYC, things were in a tailspin and signings like Belle and Tejada were bad choices...but that is because we didn't have a good foundation...

I like our odds with JH only because he is an addition to a solid foundation of young stars...if he makes it hard to resign a couple of them in 4 to 5 years, who cares? You know what that means? It means we have too many good players...that's a good thing...and once or twice we can trade a few of them away to unload big contracts and garner more young talent because we will have that luxury...there are plenty of examples of this being done by teams that reload and don't need to rebuild...in my opinion, now is our time to do something big to help secure and continue this success...

So far the kindling and twigs are really doing a great job making a big flame, but if we don't add a log to that fire soon, it will burn out just as fast as it lit up...

[Brendan25]

For the record, if we sign Hamilton, and he is worth about $20M in 2014, then in two years we will have 84M locked up in 5 players. Adam Jones, Nick Markakis, JJ Hardy, Wei-Yin Chen, and Josh Hamilton.

84M + Wieters + Davis + Jim Johnson + Pedro Strop + Darren O'Day + Machado

Plus a possible Hammel extension

Plus whoever our 2B is

Plus Gonzalez & Tillman

Plus Britton who will be arb eligible

Plus Tommy Hunter

That has the potential to be a fairly large payroll.

Especially if Wieters signs an extension before then.

[Mr Snuffleupagus]

I thought there were no "imaginary sides"? Atleast that's what I was told when I made a similar comment, directed to towards someone with an opposing view.

You just can't resist can you? You told me to stop replying to you. You told be to go cyberbully someone else. If that's really what you want, I suggest you stop antagonizing me.

[Brendan25]

I am closer to this camp, but when 7 / $175 is thrown out there, that is just stupid...I won't pretend to know what the financial difference on the O's organization will be if we do 4/100, 5/100, 5/125, 5 with op for 6/130, 3/90, etc. I mean, who the heck knows?

So I guess spending whatever it takes to me seems less risky because we have no idea what will happen with this roster 3 years from now? What if Jones ruins his knee playing basketball in Nov 2013, Wieters stops progressing and starts regressing at 30 yrs old, while Manny demands a trade after 2014 season and Bundy blows out his arm in Sept 2015 in a way that he's never the same? Hamilton might help us through that and to remain contenders...without him we could be a 68-ish win team again...

Again, this is all just to illustrate a point...there is just as much risk in inaction as there is in action...in 1998 I don't believe anyone saw 14 losing seasons ahead, especially after being awesome in 1996/7 (which was done by acquiring guys like Alomar by the way)...once Mikey left for NYC, things were in a tailspin and signings like Belle and Tejada were bad choices...but that is because we didn't have a good foundation...

I like our odds with JH only because he is an addition to a solid foundation of young stars...if he makes it hard to resign a couple of them in 4 to 5 years, who cares? You know what that means? It means we have too many good players...that's a good thing...and once or twice we can trade a few of them away to unload big contracts and garner more young talent because we will have that luxury...there are plenty of examples of this being done by teams that reload and don't need to rebuild...in my opinion, now is our time to do something big to help secure and continue this success...

So far the kindling and twigs are really doing a great job making a big flame, but if we don't add a log to that fire soon, it will burn out just as fast as it lit up...

Or Hamilton could become awful, we could become stuck with an AWFUL contract (Carl Crawford) and have to trade away one of our best players with that contract just to get it off the books so we can move forward with our franchise.

Just saying, there are other scenarios to this.

[Dark Helmet]

No, I didn't say that...but it was for dramatic effect anyway...not intended to be literal.

And to be clear, though I didn't say it before, I think 7 years at any amount is silly, but I didn't address it because to me that is not a real offer that anyone would consider making to him...JH's agent will be throwing huge numbers around because that's what agents do, as well as he knows there has been a lot of speculation that JH won't get what a player of his production would normally because of OTF issues. It's an attempt to set the numbers WAY HIGH so that normal numbers for a player like this seem reasonable and he might actually get them if the plan distracts the media and teams from focusing TOO much on his issues...

That said, all I want is the Orioles to be willing to pay what other teams are willing to pay so that we can be considered by JH and his camp...I would even be willing to pay slightly more than some others to get him...but that's because I know 7 / $175 is not real, nor does anyone believe it to be...

The bolded quote is where the golden goose lays its eggs...if you can find the answer to that then you need to become a GM of a MLB team. (I'll politely ignore the biased angle at which it was written from since a third option could be win right now AND later with signing Hamilton, but who said "unrestrained spending"? I want JH, I am not advocating making huge contracts a regular habit...)

Agreed. All I want is for the O's to make a sincere run at Hamilton. Not just a token offer. I want the O's to make the decision by Hamilton a tough one, by atleast being in the same ballpark as other offers. No one is saying write Josh Hamilton a blank check (Yet thats what most with an opposing opinion is trying to imply). We ALL want the O's to win, we just all don't have the same opinion on the best route to take. There's no guarantee that spending more will guarantee winning. Just like, minimal spending doesn't automatically guarantee sustatined success for years. There's no "right" or "wrong" view to have on here. Because we're just fans, we're not the ones that are um, actually making the decisions.

[Dark Helmet]

Or Hamilton could become awful, we could become stuck with an AWFUL contract (Carl Crawford) and have to trade away one of our best players with that contract just to get it off the books so we can move forward with our franchise.Just saying, there are other scenarios to this.

There's also the scenerio the Marlins just took. Unload all of your bad contract's, and get some decent prospects back in return.

[Brendan25]

There's also the scenerio the Marlins just took. Unload all of your bad contract's, and get some decent prospects back in return.

Is that really what we want to do? We sign a bunch of awful contracts (Reyes & Buehrle), we finish .500 or worse, and we need to trade them away with our ace just to get those contracts off our books. These are contracts they JUST did last year. And they regret them already.

[lovetoaster]

There's also the scenerio the Marlins just took. Unload all of your bad contract's, and get some decent prospects back in return.

I don't think anyone in their right mind thinks that is a good way to run a baseball team. The Marlins of the last decade should never be cited as an example of good baseball business.

[Can_of_corn]

I don't think anyone in their right mind thinks that is a good way to run a baseball team. The Marlins of the last decade should never be cited as an example of good baseball business.

Unless the topic is maximizing profits in a small market.

[OrioleMagic79]

Here's my best illustration of how I see it...

The Orioles in the early to mid 2000's tried to start a fire with only this:

+

The result was we couldn't get anything started because our solution was signing one big free agent and giving him no support (ala Tejada and Belle signings)

The next option is not spending big, but continuing to find talent like we have, grow it in our system, find guys other teams gave up on and hope they revitalize their career at the right time, and this is a good start, it got us here, but not finding an elite veteran or two leaves us looking for scraps all the time and has a very high risk of our nice flame burning out before we can find enough guys like this to keep it going...

So here is my analogy with this "moderate spending" approach:

+

There are a few teams that use this approach, they show up once in awhile, don't actually win the WS but make a big splash, and then fall back down and try again...few years later, they come back, don't win the WS but make some noise, just to die back down again...

Now that we have a team that is a really good foundation with a very young average age and lots of talent and potential (the kindling), we need an established superstar (a log or two) to keep it going...

Doesn't this look like a more reliable solution?

+ +

If the logs are wet, we can get rid of them (via trade for legit prospects, or even salary dump trades) and keep the kindling going until one of them becomes a real log on their own and decides to not leave for FA or go out and get another log...but we do have to keep the kindling going...

does that illustrate my stance? you don't have to agree with it, and if you don't, we won't be able to convince each other anyway, but just so you understand where I'm coming from...