Jump to content

Per Rosenthal: Balfour (FINALLY) to Orioles...


xian4

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 1.5k
  • Created
  • Last Reply

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Is it time to take the Rage to Baltimore? <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23ItMightBe&src=hash">#ItMightBe</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23BalfourRAGE&src=hash">#BalfourRAGE</a></p>— Grant Balfour (@GrantBalfour50) <a href="

">December 17, 2013</a></blockquote>

<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Link to comment
Share on other sites

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Is it time to take the Rage to Baltimore? <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23ItMightBe&src=hash">#ItMightBe</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23BalfourRAGE&src=hash">#BalfourRAGE</a></p>— Grant Balfour (@GrantBalfour50) <a href="
">December 17, 2013</a></blockquote>

<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

That's a parody account.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Right. Johnson blew 9 saves and the O's finished 6 games out of the wild card. So if he would have blown 7 less saves and converted 57 of 59 save opportunities the O's would have been in the playoffs. Last time I checked it is a team sport. The O's win as a team and they lose as a team. They had lots of holes.

This is what you say in a team sport when one person is the glaring issue. The numbers quoted above don't even count all the games they may have lost from bad mojo the blown saves cause.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Define: a lot of money. Weeks hasn't been a capable, everyday MLer since his rookie season. PTBNL? Who cares? You're applauding the acquisition of more organizational filler? Webb is a perfectly OK get.

The O's continue to have huge question marks at LF, DH, 2B, and in the starting rotation. They've already spent more than JJ was due to make without addressing any of those holes, most of which show up in the box score every single day. A "proven closer," if available/financially feasible, should have been the very last thing on their rather long list of needs.

Is this sarcastic? If not, wow.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Either way, I'm not unhappy I don't have to root for him. I'm optimistic we'll add an equivalent or superior option. Hopefully one that rhymes with Shmoobaldo Shmimenez.

Holy double negative, Batman! :) Took me a second to sort this one out.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think Jim Johnson is a better pitcher than Balfour, but they're at least similar in value. What the Orioles did with this move was save some money (about $2.5M) this season by taking on more risk (a longer-term deal for a reliever at age 35). Also, they added Weeks as part of the bargain. I don't really love the move, mostly because I prefer Johnson-style low-K, low-BB to Balfour, but it's not bad or anything. If Balfour gets old all of a sudden and can't K as many guys, this will look truly awful because he'll be blowing games via the BB for two seasons. But that seems pretty unlikely.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Has anybody mentioned yet that this signing means the Orioles and Athletics have swapped closers this season?

The bigger question is why Billy Beane did not resign him for a similar deal instead of paying $10m to have JJ for one year. He must be planning to blow the A's up after next season.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The bigger question is why Billy Beane did not resign him for a similar deal instead of paying $10m to have JJ for one year. He must be planning to blow the A's up after next season.

"We don't even have a stadium lease after next season."

Billy Beane.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, now we can claim to have shored up the gaping hole in our BP spending most of the money we saved on dumping Johnson and his salary and people will once again take us seriously.

Meh....

I think there was legitimate concern that the O's were headed in the direction they previously stayed in for 14 consecutive seasons. Now, they've finally done something other than acquiring a flock of AAAA players, so hopefully it's a sign of better things to come.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.




  • Posts

    • Thanks for the detailed explanation of all of the issues.  Sounds like a mess.
    • Yeah the amenities are pretty outdated at the yard and they seem to do nothing year over year to improve them. The touchscreens have been banged on to death to the point they barely function, so you can't accurately fill out your order at the kiosks, and they don't have a way for the people behind the counter to ring you up at many of the food places. The sound is low to non-existent in certain sections of the club level, like around 218. Seems like there should be speakers that reach there but they might have been damaged by rain, etc. and they are too lazy to fix them. If you go to a game that's even slightly busy, you will wait forever to get into the bathroom, and the sink will be an absolute mess with no soap or paper towels. It's even worse on the club level where they have one sink that's right by the door. Nearby businesses don't care, either. The Hilton parking garage reeks of decay, pot and human waste. They don't turn on the air circulation fans, even if cars are waiting for an hour and a half to exit from P3, filling up the air with carbon monoxide. They only let you enter the stadium with one 20 oz bottle of water. It's so expensive to buy a drink or water in the stadium, but with all the salty food, 20 oz of water isn't enough, especially on a hot day. Vegetarian food options are poor to none, other than things like chips, fries, hot pretzels and the occasional pizza. Vida Taco is better, but at an inconvenient location for many seats. The doors on the club level are not accessible. They're anti-accessible. Big, heavy doors you have to go through to get to/from the escalators, and big, heavy doors to get to your seats, none of them automatic (or even with the option to be automatic with a button press). Makes it hard to carry food out to your seats even if not handicapped. The furniture in the lounges on the club level seem designed to allow as few people as possible to sit down. Not great when we have so many rain delays during the season. Should put more, smaller chairs in and allow more of the club level ticket holders to have a seat while waiting for thunderstorms to pass. They keep a lot of the entrance/exit gates closed except for playoff/sellout games, which means people have to slowly "mooooo" all the way down Eutaw St to get to parking. They are too cheap to staff all the gates, so they make people exit by the warehouse, even though it would be a lot more convenient for many fans to open all the gates. Taking Light Rail would be super convenient, except that if there's at least 20k fans in attendance, it's common to have to wait 90-120 minutes to be able to board a non-full train heading toward Glen Burnie. A few trains might come by, but they are already full, or fill up fast when folks walk up to the Convention Center stop to pre-empt the folks trying to board at Camden Station. None of the garages in the area are set up to require pre-payment on entry (reservation, or give them your card / digital payment at the entrance till). If they were, emptying out the garage would be very quick, as they wouldn't need to ticket anyone on the way out: if you can't get in without paying, you can always just leave without having to stop and scan your phone or put a ticket in the machine. They shut down the Sports Legends Museum at Camden Station in 2015 because the Maryland Stadium Authority was too greedy. That place was a fun distraction if you were in the area when a game wasn't about to start, like if you show up super early on Opening Day or a playoff day. Superbook's restaurant on Eutaw is a huge downgrade from Dempsey's in terms of menu and service quality. Dempsey's used to be well-staffed, you could reserve a table online, and they had all kinds of great selection for every diet. Superbook seems like just another bar serving the same swill that the rest of the park serves, with extremely minimal and low-quality food. For that matter, most of the food at the stadium is very low quality these days. A lot of things we used to love are made to a lower standard now if they are served at all. These are gripes about the stadium and the area that haven't changed my entire adult life. Going to an O's game requires one to tolerate many small inconveniences and several major inconveniences, any number of which could easily be fixed by the relevant authorities if they gave a damn about the people who pay to come see the team play. You would think a mid-market team would be able to afford to invest in the fan experience. You would think the city and partnering organizations like garages, the Stadium Authority and MTA would at least try to do their part to make the experience enjoyable and free of kinks. You would think they would put some thought into handling the "growing pains" of the fanbase due to recent renewed interest after the dark years. Instead, all we get is the same indifference and the same annoyances year in and year out. The whole area is overdue for a revamp. Not sure if $600 mil will get it done, but at least it's a start. Hopefully they can start to patch up some of the many holes in the fan experience. If you're not going to invest in Burnes, at least make it so paying customers have an easier, more enjoyable time getting to/from the stadium and having some food while we're there.
    • Elias has only been in rebuild mode with the O's so there's not much to speculate on there.  Houston, where he spent his formative years, doesn't seem to like to be on the hook for more than a couple of big long-term contracts at any given time.  I can see that as being Elias' choice as well, albeit with a lower overall cost - Houston runs a big payroll.  But it's all guesswork.  I really don't know. If Elias takes the 2025 payroll to $150 million it will creep up to $200 million or so by 2028 just from keeping the core together.  That's where I start to wonder about sustainability due to market size, economic forces, etc., etc., etc... If it were up to me, I would add a couple of free agents this offseason even if the contracts were longer than ideal and be conservative about extensions elsewhere until the prospects establish themselves a little better.  I think there's a competitive opportunity that the team is already into that's worth exploiting. I think ownership is very happy to have Elias on board and they're not inclined to force him to do anything.  I also think Rubenstein's demonstrated business prowess is great enough to assume that he has had plenty enough time to come to a mutual understanding with Elias as to goals.
    • We need a RH O’hearn…in addition to Westburg. At least 3 batters that will push up the pitch count and cause damage in the top 5 of the lineup.
    • Boy,  that Jackson Merrill is a good young player that is playing his best ball down the season stretch and in the playoffs.   He's only 21.  I guess some young guys are able to play up to the pressure.   Who could have guessed that?
    • I’m aware.   You are arguing something im Not.
    • What agreement? The agreement you are talking about happened as a result of the move.  The MASN agreement would not have existed if Angelos had gone to court to block the move.
  • Popular Contributors

×
×
  • Create New...