Justify keeping Bedard or Roberts

[Runs2the1Show]

The Orioles will not trade Bedard to the Yankees in a million years, and it's a bad idea to hold onto a pitcher with somewhat of an injury history after he had an insanely good season. Not only that the Orioles just switched pitching coaches. Whose to say Kranitz can do for Bedard what Mazzone did?

I think it's a really stupid risk. If they are going to trade Bedard and or Roberts, do it now, and don't risk injury or decline. This Tejada trade worked out OK for us, but if we would have traded him a year ago we probably could have netted a ton more.

I just have trouble swallowing the fact that no team has offered a package good enough to net Bedard. In a league where Carlos Silva got a 48 million dollar contract. Where last season Gil Meche, a type B free agent last season, gets 55 million and the Royals have to give up a draft pick. I obviously can't know for sure, and I don't have all the facts, but I have trouble believing that no team has offered a great package for Bedard.

The Tejada trade could be one of the greatest trades in history if he ends up going to jail. Five players for one who might not even play? Dumping over 10 million in salary? Talk about a lobsided trade. Thats an example of a team getting desperate, which is what we would see more of at the deadline. Yes, Bedard faces injury problems like any other pitcher who eats cereal and pitches with an arm. But as long as he is not hurt at the time it comes to trade him, his value will still be higher than it is now.

Who knows if there is a great deal being made right now. I strongly doubt it based on how long the wait has been. If MacPhail has held out this long, it means he is not getting a deal the fancies him. He knows that Bedard's value will skyrocket at the deadline when some team is 4 games back with a chance to get to the playoffs. As for Roberts, it probably is better to trade him now because i dont see his value getting any higher, regardless of how good of a season he has. Bedard is a totally different story though. He could be the dfference of about 6-7 wins for any team.

[Dr. FLK]

What difference does it make if Bedard goes the the Yankees or Sox? The deal made for him should be for the best propects availible, not just to keep him out of the AL East.

While it would be great if he was traded to the NL so we would never have to face him, we need to find the best value for him, even if it is the MYF or the laundry items.

It doesn't make a difference to me. But, I'd be willing to bet that PA and AM don't want Bedard traded in the division.

[Delduck]

MR that was a truly well thought out post as pretty much all your posts are. I hope everyone reads it and has an open mind when they do.

[66-70-83-??]

I don't think AM is a loser. It was a sarcastic response to Migrant Redbird for suggesting Oriole fans who'd like Roberts & Bedard traded (for the right price) are losers.

I'm not sure you even read my post. You obviously didn't read the post I was responding to. My post is a lot more than us being bad for 10 years. It's about money and well run organizations and the combination of the two.

I'll say this. I was going to respond to Migrant Redbird's long and rambling post, but I'll try to kill two birds with one stone since you two have a lot in common. You both have a similar arrogance. You both love to generalize and put everyone in the same box. An OH where 90% of the posters are boobs who are reactionary jerks with no intellect whatsoever. Your generalizations and constant putdowns (especially in your case) are so annoying because, as I said, you try to lump people together to fit your agenda. You can't stand the fact that many people wanted to rebuild and that's exactly what AM is trying to do. If he does do it, it doesn't mean that we're right or that it will work, but it kills you just the same. You can't even admit that if Bedard & Roberts are traded, that it is a rebuild. I've tried not responding to your longwinded posts since you came back from your hiatus but I finally caved in. You have the uncanny ability to annoy even the most even tempered posters here. Face it. You're just an annoying person who feels he is above the common folk. And of course, it's clear that you see the common folk here on the Hangout as a bunch of fools.

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to RZNJ again.

As usual, you hit the nail on the head.

Some people are here not to discuss baseball, but to "win" debates and forward agendas. The posts here just serve as their launching pads.

[HarryReasonable]

It doesn't make a difference to me. But, I'd be willing to bet that PA and AM don't want Bedard traded in the division.

I've said this before and I think it bears repeating - I think we trade Bedard for the best return we can get, no matter what division a team is in. The one thing we have absolutely no control over is what team Bedard ends up with 2 years from now. If he wants to be in Boston or New YOrk anyway, he's going to end up there through free agency. If he doesn't like Boston or New York and really wants to play elsewhere, that's where he'll end up in 2 years. For the most part, if he continues to dominate, he will play wherever he wants. So I say trade him within the division if it gets us the best return and let the Blue Jays, Sox and Yankees bid against each other to get him. Bottom line is - if he ultimately wants to be in AL East, he'll be there in 2 years anyway and we can't do anything about it. Just my opinion.

[DrungoHazewood]

Waiting involves as much risk as trading him now. Someone suggested that by the deadline Bedard would be worth Kennedy and Hughes. Well... what if Kennedy and Hughes are both in the Yankee rotation and both pitching as well as Bedard? Not only would the Yanks not need him, they'd never trade him for those two in a million years. That scenario isn't out of the question.

You also risk an injury to Bedard. If he blows out his elbow in April your return has changed from two impact prospects, maybe more, to zero. Rebuilding takes a big step backwards.

Plus, the longer you wait the less value Bedard has. Trade him now and a team gets two guaranteed years at below market rates. Wait until the deadline and that's down to 1 1/2. Wait until next offseason and that's one. That's why most deadline deals are disappointments for sellers - nobody wants to mortgage the farm for a three-month rental, no matter how good the rental is.

[TinCup]

I agree with that, I just disagree with you completely about the liklihood of either signing. I would say that Bedard has about a 1% chance of signing and Roberts has about a 10% chance.

With this in mind and understanding the reasonable assumption that the longer you wait until the day they become free agents, the less you will get back (who would give up much for someone they may lose in FA)....you need to trade them to get more younger talented players who can help to fill various holes, and allow us to keep them under our control cheaply for a longer period of time.

[Migrant Redbird]

As for you Migrant Redbird. You don't know much about the O's organization but yet you have the arrogance to give the fans here on the Hangout your expert advice on, guess what, THE ORIOLES.

I'm arrogant, huh? Sure! I posted that "This is my perception..." and "My perception might not be accurate..." and I gave an example using 9/11 how people tend to get their minds locked in a box and closed to the possibility of any ideas beyond their preconceived opinions. Then I explained why the trade of Bedard and Roberts for prospects might not turn the O's into winners; why the O's need to take advantage of the leverage they have on Bedard to get him to sign a 3-4 year "bargain" contract; and how difficult it can be to develop pitchers of Bedard's level -- as illustrated by the approximately 15 years it's been between Mussina and Bedard.

What happens? I get post after post telling me that I'm the one with a closed mind; that this is such a disfunctional organization that "blowing it up" is the only possible way to ever compete; and that my opinion is worthless because the AL East is so different.

Guess what? I don't need to be an expert on the O's organization. I'm confident that most of you know more about the O's than I do, but I'm equally confident that the O's front office knows more about them than practically everyone of you. That doesn't keep most of you from vehemently insisting that you know exactly what the O's need to do to compete and that MacPhail and Angelos are idiots because they aren't doing exactly what you lay out.

Give me a break! [Expletive of frustration deleted.]

No, I don't know exactly what it will take to make winners out of the O's. At some point, you must accept that Angelos is the owner and he's hired some fairly knowledgeable people to run the organization and that MacPhail might, just possibly, know what he's doing and has a strategy to reach the promised land. I simply point out that blowing the team up isn't necessarily the only way to develop a winner and I get excuse after whining excuse how I don't know anything and blowing it up is the only solution.

[Rant about Cardinals comparisons being invalid deleted.]

... You actually think your provacative (your arrogance lets you think this) posts are going to change people's minds?

Actually, I thought that exposing you to a little common sense might open your minds to some new ideas, but I was obviously wrong. The Blow it Up crowd is so locked into their vision of the only possible solution that all they can do is to continue throwing out reason after reason why their solution is the only one.

I have not pretended that I know The True Path or that trading Bedard might not be a good deal if the Mets or some other team decided to give you all their best prospects for him. I'm skeptical, but there have been a few situations where that has been a good plan. When it does work out, it's quite often as much luck as design, but it still convinces folks like you that it validates their premise that it's the only solution for the O's.

Yes, I've been a little sharp with people -- for a couple of reasons. One is that you need something which can break you out of this mindset that there is only one way to go. The second is a growing sense of frustration at just how closed minded some people can be.

Allow me one more reference back to 9/11. In hindsight, the people who were supposed to be planning and implementing our national defense against terrorism appear to have been incredibly stupid. It now seems so obvious, especially after Tom Clancy was so kind as to write them a blueprint in 1994 by publishing Debt of Honor. It wouldn't have taken too much for someone in the organizations planning our defenses to read Debt of Honor and say, "Oh crap, that would be easy! We better do something to make sure it won't happen." But they didn't. They weren't stupid or lazy or incompetent; they were very diligently working very hard to make sure that terrorists didn't smuggle a bomb on board in luggage to create another Lockerbie; they were putting up barriers around public buildings to prevent another Oklahoma City; they were setting up safeguards around public water supplies and the air handling systems for the Mall of America. Their efforts undoubtedly saved thousands or even millions of lives.

But they didn't think about securing the cockpit door -- something that El Al had done years ago. They didn't think about revising the training of air crews who were told to cooperate with hijackers so that negotiators might be able to get the hostages released unharmed. They didn't do any number of things -- many of them simple and cheap -- which would have made 9/11 difficult or impossible to occur. And they didn't do these things because their minds were closed to the possibility, so closed that when Tom Clancy drew them a picture, they couldn't recognize it!

And that's what I see among the Blow it Up crowd. Minds which are closed to the possibility of alternate solutions. Minds that, when confronted with possible alternatives, simply pour out more excuses why nothing but blowing it up can work.

Have it your way. There are none so blind as those who refuse to see. The Cardinals have more than enough problems for me to consider; I don't need to waste any more time with people incapable of listening.

Keep your 2 by 4 and give yourself a whack in the head. You need it. What's really funny is your hatred for Tony LaRussa.

You have no idea how I feel about La Russa. I don't hate him. I actually recognize personality flaws in him which I believe that I share, such as difficulties with interpersonal verbal communications.

I'm not totally incapable of communicating verbally, but I recognize that I'm more skilled at written communications; I can get by and do my job -- well -- and Tony can get by too. He does some aspects of his job very well, perhaps as well as any manager in the history of the game, but his problems with communicating to his players are beginning to force the Cardinals to move players for reasons which have nothing to do with their ability to play the game. And that's why I believe that Tony needs to go.

A few months ago, I was on the West Coast, providing some software developers with the benefit of my 20 years in the Army and over 30 years in my particular specialty, to help them understand how the software they were developing was likely to be used by soldiers. At the end of the meeting, one of the lady programmers was kind enough to thank me and tacked on an unusual comment: "I wish that you could leave your brain behind when you return to the East Coast, so that we could continue to pick it!"

So, I am confident that, even with my deficient verbal communications skills, I am still capable of getting the job done; I'm equally confident that La Russa can manage the Cardinals despite his communications deficiencies. However, I'm thoroughly convinced that a manager more proficient at communicating with his players -- e.g. Joe Torre or Jim Leyland -- would do a better job of developing our young players and allow us to retain useful veterans like Scott Rolen and Jim Edmonds to coach the youngsters on how to play the game.

We have a surly young superstar right now in Albert Pujols who devotes a great deal of his time and money to helping children with Downs Syndrome (his stepson has it) and children in the Dominican Republic. He's probably on his way to the Dominican right now with a team of eye specialists to treat children there with no access otherwise to such specialized care. Yet Pujols was so surly when signing autographs last weekend that he spoiled the experience for many of the kids getting autographs and they've switched their allegiances to more personable players. A few years ago, Larry Walker was signing autographs and Pujols was supposed to take the next shift. One of the people keeping things running asked Walker if he could remain a little longer because Pujols had told them he wasn't going to be signing. (No idea why.) Oh yes he will, Walker said, and went into the back to have a few choice words with Albert. Sure enough, Albert was out there signing autographs pretty soon, not necessarily very happy about it, but it only illustrates how important veterans like Walker are to guide the young players along.

Scott Rolen was good at that too. Once, after Pujols had hit a home run and flipped his bat, Scott told him back in the dugout, "Albert, you're better than that." From what I know, Albert hasn't flipped his bat after a home run since.

And it's things like that which La Russa is taking away from this team. He has a long history of problems with his players, from Ozzie Smith to Ron Gant to Brian Jordan to Jose Jimenez to Pat Hentgen to Eli Marrero to Ray King to Jason Marquis to Julian Tavarez to Steve Kline to Sidney Ponson to Brendan Ryan to Scott Rolen to Anthony Reyes. Now Tony has gratuitously disparaged Adam Kennedy and Scott Spiezio to the media, over winter warmup participation issues which should have been handled directly with the players involved. For all of Tony's good qualities, it's obvious to me and to many other Cardinals fans that his tendency to fracture the relationship between himself and his players is a disadvantage to the team.

You don't know what your talking about regarding the O's but yet you feel you need to share your wisdom. Thanks, but no thanks.

I notice that not all your fellow O's fans share your opinion and I take satisfaction that some of them do have sufficiently open minds to consider what I'm saying, even if they don't completely agree with me. I'll stop wasting my time trying to get through to the rest of you. It's not worth it.

The best thing about banging one's head against the wall is that it feels so much better after one stops.

[RShack]

You can't stand the fact that many people wanted to rebuild and that's exactly what AM is trying to do. If he does do it, it doesn't mean that we're right or that it will work, but it kills you just the same. You can't even admit that if Bedard & Roberts are traded, that it is a rebuild.

Huh? This is not even close to the truth. I think AM is exactly right to see what he can get, and I think he's exactly right to either trade them or not, based entirely on whether the return suits him. I also trust that he is focused on all that rebuilding implies, and not just trades. When it comes to the work of rebuilding, the trades just don't matter all that much compared to the other aspects of it.

Posts filled with a bunch of phony "us-vs-them" fabrication are what I mean by reactionary BS. And, no, I certainly do not believe that 90% of OH posters believe in this kind of junk. To the contrary, I routinely see *lots* of posters who are way smarter than that. They often get drowned out by others who accuse them of *wanting* more years of losing just because they don't subscribe to overly-simple supposedly-magic fixes. Claiming that the reactionary portion is 90% does a disservice to the OH in general. There are lots of intelligent and informed discussions around here. Reactionary "us-vs-them" posts are a distraction from them.

[RShack]

Blow it up is synonomis with rebuilding, wouldn't you agree.

Nope, not at all.

[RShack]

I would submit to you then, that you're idea of "blow it up" is not the same as the people you continually accuse of being reactionary, simple, close minded, or whatever else. Ask any reasonable person on this site what the difference is between rebuilding and blow it up. I'll bet that you are either the only one or two who thinks there's a significant difference, but that's what makes you, you.

Thank you for Yet Another Dose of reactionary "us-vs-them" pseudo-logic. You wouldn't be trying to characterize the opinions of all-but-a-few OH posters to suit your agenda, now would you? Doing that would be lumping OH-people together into bogus predefined categories. I thought you were supposedly against that kind of thing. So how come you keep doing it?

When you plan to renovate your house, you don't talk about blowing it up. Nor do you begin with the idea that the "Big Most Important Step That Matters Most And Must Be Done Immediately" is destroying the very best things about the house. Well, maybe some folks would, but I wouldn't.

[DrungoHazewood]

Do we have to let this evolve into yet another Webster's Dictionary slap-fight? We know that many of us think "blow it up" and "rebuild" are synonymous for each other, and that some others (most notably rshack) thinks blow it up is defined as something like "turn the team into the 2003 Tigers."

Can't we just accept that and return to a debate about baseball? Why do we care what individuals call the different paths towards making the Orioles better?

[Sports Guy]

I would submit to you then, that you're idea of "blow it up" is not the same as the people you continually accuse of being reactionary, simple, close minded, or whatever else. Ask any reasonable person on this site what the difference is between rebuilding and blow it up. I'll bet that you are either the only one or two who thinks there's a significant difference, but that's what makes you, you.

Save your breath...This is the same stupid argument that he tried to have before.

Pretty much the entire site agreed that we should trade the guys like Tejada, Millar, Payton, Huff, Mora, etc.......

The real differences came on BRob and Bedard...That was always obvious.

Trading those guys means you are blowing this team up.

By dealing those guys, you are basically saying that you are going to have at least 4 new(starting) position players this year and several new pitchers.

Changing roughly half of your starting lineup(and really, maybe way more than half if guys like Millar, Ramon and Mora are dealt, which AM wants to do) and getting rid of your 3 marquee names is without question, blowing it up. Anyone doubting that is crazy.

Just let Rshack argue with himself about it.....Its not worth your time...It hasn't even been 24 hours and I already am much happier being on this board with that guy on ignore.

[Migrant Redbird]

Much too much information. You're obviously too smart for the rest of us. You should have left your ample brain on the West Coast just like the lady asked. Now, I await RShacks equally longwinded and volumnous rebuttal.

Thanks for confirming virtually everything I said.

[RShack]

Do we have to let this evolve into yet another Webster's Dictionary slap-fight? We know that many of us think "blow it up" and "rebuild" are synonymous for each other, and that some others (most notably rshack) thinks blow it up is defined as something like "turn the team into the 2003 Tigers."

Can't we just accept that and return to a debate about baseball? Why do we care what individuals call the different paths towards making the Orioles better?

More "us-vs-them". What's with you guys, everything has to be a gang fight? Just because not everybody agrees with you, that's no reason to start making it a matter of high school cliques about what "most of us" think while using non-arguments to diss those who don't buy it.

Look, the claim that "blow it up" is just another word (or three) that mean the same thing as "rebuild" is ludicrous. If all people meant by it was "rebuild" then we wouldn't have had "blow it up" being such an anger-thumping slogan. If you'd just stop and think for a sec, you'd (prolly) admit that they are *not* synonyms. "Blow it up" was a rallying slogan for those who favored giving up on the current group of good players on the roster, trading them for "prospects" who may or may not turn out, and biting the bullet for a couple years of more-or-less intentional losing so that the O's could be good later, after the prospects (maybe) turned out to be good ML guys.

You know that's true, so why all the gang-tackles and word games? Rebuilding is something that can be done without trading a team's good players, but that's certainly not what "blow it up" means. Rather, "blow it up" is a slogan for those posters who wish to diss anybody who thinks that maybe the idea of keeping some good players might be one possible path to rebuilding the franchise.