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Will Brob be brought back?


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Will the O's bring back Brob?  

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  1. 1. Will the O's bring back Brob?

    • Yes
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    • No
      44


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Also, let's keep in mind Duquette/Buck saw Betemit and Reimold as viable options for platooning DH. And then Pearce, Valencia, Dickerson, Urrutia, and Roberts.

So uhh... how did those guys all work out, other than a small sample of Valencia? We can't be too sure of ourselves when it comes to who will be DHing next year based on OPS.

You can't be sure of anything. You can only assess risk and probabilities. Planning for Roberts to DH next year would be a pretty piss poor management decision.

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I think the O's are going to save money where they can in order to pay for the core and some upgrades. Flaherty is already a superior defender and showed some power, so unless they still are in search of a DH by Spring Training, I don't see them paying the million or 2 it would take to keep Roberts.

That said, you could do much worse than Roberts at DH.

Sorry I don't see someone coming off a 704 OPS (albeit with a fine approach with RISP) as a viable option as the everyday DH.
Who said everyday? You could platoon him with Valencia. Better as a LH hitter anyway. Also, that OPS includes a period of time during which he was knocking off considerable rust. Turned it up quite a bit to end the year.

Like I said:

1. I don't believe he'll be back.

2. You could do worse.

3. But you could also do better.

Surey you could do worse. You could sign Yuni Betancourt to DH. You could bring Melvin Mora out of retirement. You could DH Alexi Casilla.

But among reasonable options planning on getting Brian Roberts more than a small handful of ABs at DH in 2014 is among the worst things you could do. Literally you could find a more productive DH among minor league free agents, Rule 5 draftees, and the end-of-spring waiver wire. Any number of players the Orioles acquired last spring and never/barely even called up (i.e. Russ Canzler, Travis Ishikawa, Jason Pridie) would likely be cheaper and at least as productive as platoon DHs than Brian Roberts.

For the cost Roberts likely requires (several $million) it would be almost inept to not find someone who could put up a .750ish OPS with no defensive requirements and the platoon advantage.

This argument is akin to making your interim manager the permanent manager because he happened to have been standing five feet away when the old guy was fired. Out of the 132 possible candidates the top guy was really standing in your clubhouse all along? Really!?

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I think the O's are going to save money where they can in order to pay for the core and some upgrades. Flaherty is already a superior defender and showed some power, so unless they still are in search of a DH by Spring Training, I don't see them paying the million or 2 it would take to keep Roberts.

That said, you could do much worse than Roberts at DH.

Flaherty's BA was lower than Roberts, his OPS was lower, his OBP was lower, RBI production was a lot lower, HR's were slightly above, and his D was a little above Roberts. We already know what Roberts can do. He is an all around solid option at 2B and i believe he will only continue to play better the longer he is back playing at a normal pace. Why put all your hope in Flaherty, who is very unproven and has shown he is NOT a major league starting caliber player? Buck gave him plently of time to establish himself as the everyday 2B and he failed miserably. What happens if they don't sign Roberts or another free agent 2B and start Flaherty, and he plays like he did at the beginning of last year? (This is figuring that Schoop wont be ready to come up and take over). Are we comfortable with the possibility of a guy hitting .200 and an OBP of .280 manning 2B? It's VERY possible that happens.

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Flaherty's BA was lower than Roberts, his OPS was lower, his OBP was lower, RBI production was a lot lower, HR's were slightly above, and his D was a little above Roberts. We already know what Roberts can do. He is an all around solid option at 2B and i believe he will only continue to play better the longer he is back playing at a normal pace. Why put all your hope in Flaherty, who is very unproven and has shown he is NOT a major league starting caliber player? Buck gave him plently of time to establish himself as the everyday 2B and he failed miserably. What happens if they don't sign Roberts or another free agent 2B and start Flaherty, and he plays like he did at the beginning of last year? (This is figuring that Schoop wont be ready to come up and take over). Are we comfortable with the possibility of a guy hitting .200 and an OBP of .280 manning 2B? It's VERY possible that happens.

I don't know how anyone could look at Brian Roberts' body of work over the last four years or so and truthfully say "He is an all around solid option at 2B and i believe he will only continue to play better the longer he is back playing at a normal pace." He's going to be 36 and has had a laundry list of health problems. I think it's fairly amazing he played as well as he did, and it would be even more amazing if he was both healthy and good for a majority of 2014.

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Flaherty's BA was lower than Roberts, his OPS was lower, his OBP was lower, RBI production was a lot lower, HR's were slightly above, and his D was a little above Roberts. We already know what Roberts can do. He is an all around solid option at 2B and i believe he will only continue to play better the longer he is back playing at a normal pace. Why put all your hope in Flaherty, who is very unproven and has shown he is NOT a major league starting caliber player? Buck gave him plently of time to establish himself as the everyday 2B and he failed miserably. What happens if they don't sign Roberts or another free agent 2B and start Flaherty, and he plays like he did at the beginning of last year? (This is figuring that Schoop wont be ready to come up and take over). Are we comfortable with the possibility of a guy hitting .200 and an OBP of .280 manning 2B? It's VERY possible that happens.

Dan-O is about the biggest Roberts fan on the board.

Flaherty has options. Roberts doesn't. If Roberts stinks we're stuck with him. If Flaherty stinks we can/will have a couple layers (including Schoop and a veteran AAA guy most likley) available to fill in. In the end there wasn't a great deal of difference between the two this year and may not be next year. Roberts may be a safer bet to provide mediocre production while Flaherty has more upside potential and downside risk. Rather take the risk and have the flexibility with Flaherty and company than Roberts.

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Flaherty has options. Roberts doesn't. If Roberts stinks we're stuck with him.

Well... maybe. I know Roberts' special relationship with management and fans complicates things. But there's nothing stopping them from having Flaherty on the roster and several backup plans in Norfolk, and if Roberts OPSes .550 for six weeks you just release him. Or Buck and Dan talk him into retiring gracefully. Or he just has a recurrence of his concussion symptoms from hustling on the basepaths for the good of the team a bit too aggressively...

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Dan-O is about the biggest Roberts fan on the board.

Flaherty has options. Roberts doesn't. If Roberts stinks we're stuck with him. If Flaherty stinks we can/will have a couple layers (including Schoop and a veteran AAA guy most likley) available to fill in. In the end there wasn't a great deal of difference between the two this year and may not be next year. Roberts may be a safer bet to provide mediocre production while Flaherty has more upside potential and downside risk. Rather take the risk and have the flexibility with Flaherty and company than Roberts.

I don't know what about Roberts game was so bad this year that ppl think next year he could stink. It's more likely to me that Flaherty will stink next year beings he is 28 yrs old and still hasn't matured into an everyday player. If Roberts is healthy next year, i don't see why he would play any worse than he did this year, perhaps slightly better. I do agree that it would be dumb to pay him to be our LH DH tho. I know ppl are going to disagree with me all day, but it seems fairly unrisky to pay Roberts $1 mill to come back and give us decent to good 2B production. Flaherty can spell him at 2B some and also provide days off for JJ and Davis.

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Well... maybe. I know Roberts' special relationship with management and fans complicates things. But there's nothing stopping them from having Flaherty on the roster and several backup plans in Norfolk, and if Roberts OPSes .550 for six weeks you just release him. Or Buck and Dan talk him into retiring gracefully. Or he just has a recurrence of his concussion symptoms from hustling on the basepaths for the good of the team a bit too aggressively...

It would be nice to think that, but my take is they'd give Roberts a pretty long leash (probably too long) to do what he wants. In any event, the likley upside is mediocrity (and I was actually impressed and surprised by what Roberts was able to do this year).

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I don't know what about Roberts game was so bad this year that ppl think next year he could stink. It's more likely to me that Flaherty will stink next year beings he is 28 yrs old and still hasn't matured into an everyday player. If Roberts is healthy next year, i don't see why he would play any worse than he did this year, perhaps slightly better. I do agree that it would be dumb to pay him to be our LH DH tho. I know ppl are going to disagree with me all day, but it seems fairly unrisky to pay Roberts $1 mill to come back and give us decent to good 2B production. Flaherty can spell him at 2B some and also provide days off for JJ and Davis.

The 80 games he missed? The fact that players' skill start degrading at some age well before 36? The fact that a lot of his 2013 value was due to a completely unsustainable stretch of hitting with RISP?

I would also be very surprised if Roberts took a million to play for the O's.

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I don't know what about Roberts game was so bad this year that ppl think next year he could stink. It's more likely to me that Flaherty will stink next year beings he is 28 yrs old and still hasn't matured into an everyday player. If Roberts is healthy next year, i don't see why he would play any worse than he did this year, perhaps slightly better. I do agree that it would be dumb to pay him to be our LH DH tho. I know ppl are going to disagree with me all day, but it seems fairly unrisky to pay Roberts $1 mill to come back and give us decent to good 2B production. Flaherty can spell him at 2B some and also provide days off for JJ and Davis.

Yeah, this boils down to risk tolerance I think. You'd be happy with a better chance at mediocrity with Roberts, I'd be willing to take more risk with Flaherty and the fallback options (Schoop/AAA vet etc.).

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The 80 games he missed? The fact that players' skill start degrading at some age well before 36? The fact that a lot of his 2013 value was due to a completely unsustainable stretch of hitting with RISP?

I would also be very surprised if Roberts took a million to play for the O's.

I wouldn't be surprised really. He actually just said in an interview that it wouldn't be about the money at all. His first choice is to play in Balt. and continue his career here, that money isn't an issue. So lets quit on Roberts who was one of the only players down the stretch with great RISP numbers. Makes sense to me

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