Orioles "Appear to be the Leading team of interest" to Get Samardzija

[Rene88]

Would EdRod and Wright get it done? Is he worth them?

No way it gets it done and yes it is definitely worth both:)

[Guest]

I bet a lot of people here 4 years ago wouldn't trade. Matusz , Arrieta , Britton , Hobgood how did that work out?

[Can_of_corn]

I bet a lot of people here 4 years ago wouldn't trade. Matusz , Arrieta , Britton , Hobgood how did that work out?

Go ahead and find ANYONE (other then his uncle) that wasn't willing to trade Hobgood.

[Enjoy Terror]

That would be terrifying if the guy in charge of running the baseball side of the organization has no faith in the ability of the organization to develop top five overall draft talents. Yikes!

No; terrifying is MacPhail and FlanaQuette not figuring that out earlier.

[Sanfran327]

Put me in the camp that's not overly impressed with Gausman. I just don't think he is going to be a TOR pitcher in the AL. Don't see it. And the fact that he's mostly a two pitch pitcher bothers me. Gausman, ERod, and Wright with some filler is fine with me.

[Rene88]

I bet a lot of people here 4 years ago wouldn't trade. Matusz , Arrieta , Britton , Hobgood how did that work out?

Most people wouldn't have drafted Hobgood so I doubt that is true, but I see your point.

Stotle is a sharp guy and I value his opinion deeply. I trust his analysis. To me, Gausman seems like a closer. His balls are too straight and I see no improvement there. Having said that, I didn't see any improvement in Tillman and then all of the sudden...

Who knows, LOL.

[VeveJones007]

I wouldn't do this trade. But if they did, they should give up Bundy instead of Gausman in order to maximize their chances in 2014 by moving Gausman to the pen. That would really be going all-in and is the logical 2nd move.

[Stotle]

No; terrifying is MacPhail and FlanaQuette not figuring that out earlier.

Sounds like an argument for firing Duquette and the dev staff, rather than for trading for Samardzija.

[Rene88]

I wouldn't do this trade. But if they did, they should give up Bundy instead of Gausman in order to maximize their chances in 2014 by moving Gausman to the pen. That would really be going all-in and is the logical 2nd move.

What trade wouldn't you do? There is no proposed trade mentioned?

Agree 100% on Gausman.

[El Gordo]

I just want to reiterate this: from 2012-2013 Samardzija had an ERA+ of 97. He had an ERA+ of 91 in 2013.

Do you really want to give up the farm for someone who has been below average pitching in the NL Central?

In that time frame he had 36 QS in 60 GS and was 6.4 IP/GS. We rarely loose when we get a QS.

[Rene88]

No way would I be happy to lose Gausman and Bundy. Its just too much to give up. Harvey too.Its just way too much.

I don't think the article is saying we are trading Gausman AND Bundy AND Harvey?

[Enjoy Terror]

Sounds like an argument for firing Duquette and the dev staff, rather than for trading for Samardzija.

The devs; sure. Being the new president and identifying that your new club hasn't developed a decent starter in the last ten years other than Erik Bedard and rerouting your approach to building the team is not a bad thing as far as I can tell. As long as there is a plan I guess.

[scOtt]

Oh heck yeah, please do this so the Blue Jays do not.

I'm giving up Ed Rod in like a millisecond. I don't buy one bit of his league average lefty game. Get 'er done!!

I don't know enough about Samardzija or trades, but I don't like this reasoning at all. Speaks of desperation and Albert Belle. Not knocking the Belle deal but even the two great years we got out of him didn't make us a winning team. Doing something to keep a player from another team is a bad idea.

[Rene88]

I don't know enough about Samardzija or trades, but I don't like this reasoning at all. Speaks of desperation and Albert Belle. Not knocking the Belle deal but even the two great years we got out of him didn't make us a winning team. Doing something to keep a player from another team is a bad idea.

Or maybe we are just trying to drive up the price on other teams....

[Jonesy10]

Trading two of our top four pitching prospects for Samardzija would be an awful move.

Here's the thing--if Tillman and Ubaldo were pitching to their ability level, we'd consider our starting rotation to be a strength, because Norris/Chen/Gonzo have all pitched about as well as you could expect this year. If we trade for Samardzija, he would presumably bump Gonzo, who has been a pretty effective starter for us since 2012, including this season. Is upgrading from Gonzo to Samardzija for 1.5 seasons worth giving up Kevin Gausman, let alone Gausman plus (say) Ed Rod?

Trading for Samardzija barely moves the needle on our postseason chances, in my view. If we trade for him, we're still going to have Tillman and Ubaldo in the rotation, and our team's playoff chances are still going to mostly depend on whether Tillman and Ubaldo can get it together and pitch like the frontline starters they are supposed to be.

This. Gonzo has a better ERA than Tillman since the start of last season, I believe. He's been a very good pitcher for the O's since 2012 and comes to pitch in big games. He had a rough April but his ERA in May is 3.51. Replacing him with Samardzija may end up not being an upgrade at all in the ERA department. Samardzija will throw more innings but that's not worth 2 top pitching prospects. If they're going to replace Gonzo, then it should be a Lee/Shields type pitcher. A true ace.

The bottom line, IMO, is that we don't need more SP's if our 2 best pitchers pitch like our 2 best pitchers. I'm looking at you Tillman and Jimenez. If they don't turn it around, and even if they do, replacing Samardzija with Gonzo just isn't that big of an upgrade.

Just my 2 cents.