Last-minute attempt by O's to sign ace holding up trade

[Sports Guy]

To be fair, even if we trade Bedard and Roberts, we'll still have to hope that the young pitching comes through, the Yankees and Red Sox plane crashes, we stay healthy, all of our young position guys develop and we sign Tex and a top of the rotation pitcher. None of the guys we're talking about are sure things and lots of other things, besides these trades, would have to go right for us to develop a competitive team. And, if we re-sign Bedard (which I don't personally want), we would be able to skip the "sign a top of the rotation pitcher" as we'll already have done that.

If you make a slew of trades, as we should be, you deepen the organization.

You fill more holes and cause more competition.

With that depth, it allows you to make other moves as well.

The idea is to give you the best chance, long term, to compete.

Look at what every team in the league is doing, outside of Toronto.

They are all in line to contend right now, are setting themselves up long term or both, as in the case with teams like, you guessed it, Boston and NY.

The Orioles are stuck in the middle and in the case, being in the middle means you are at the bottom.

The plan of holding onto these guys, hoping for the best with the young players you have and adding FAs has failed for years now. Its not going to work....It is destined to fail.

We have way too many needs and issues.

[Sports Guy]

SG, could you see a strategy of re-signing Bedard and Roberts, using some of our surplus of young pitchers to trade for a young SS, signing Patterson to a one-year deal, and throwing a boatload of money at Tex next year. We'd have Wieters and Reimold ready in '09 and Moore in position to take over at 3rd until Snyder or Rowell is ready.

Using this strategy, we'd still be in a position to compete in '10 with

1B Tex

2B Roberts

SS Hu/Lillibridge/Nelson (whoever we target for trade)

3B Rowell

C Wieters

LF Scott

CF Reimold

RF Markakis

SP Bedard, Guthrie/Liz, Loewen, Penn/Arrieta, Patton/Olson

The only real difference at this point is that we have Reimold in CF instead of Jones, a probable down grade for the O's, but Bedard leading off the rotation.

It's not obvious that Jones in CF in 2010 is better than Bedard in the rotation.

Again, you are relying on everything to turn out well. That's just a bad idea.

[allstar1579]

Again, you are relying on everything to turn out well. That's just a bad idea.

Too many eggs in one basket makes for a pretty big omelet at the end of the day. You have to plan for worst-case instead of depending on best case.

[PoorMike]

SG, could you see a strategy of re-signing Bedard and Roberts, using some of our surplus of young pitchers to trade for a young SS, signing Patterson to a one-year deal, and throwing a boatload of money at Tex next year. We'd have Wieters and Reimold ready in '09 and Moore in position to take over at 3rd until Snyder or Rowell is ready.

Using this strategy, we'd still be in a position to compete in '10 with

1B Tex

2B Roberts

SS Hu/Lillibridge/Nelson (whoever we target for trade)

3B Rowell

C Wieters

LF Scott

CF Reimold

RF Markakis

SP Bedard, Guthrie/Liz, Loewen, Penn/Arrieta, Patton/Olson

The only real difference at this point is that we have Reimold in CF instead of Jones, a probable down grade for the O's, but Bedard leading off the rotation.

It's not obvious that Jones in CF in 2010 is better than Bedard in the rotation.

That's how the organization has been run in the past. You can't have one guy in A or AA and say, "that's our X for the future". You need a boatload of guys throughout the minors in the hope that a handful of them actually become good major leaguers. We are starting with a handful and hoping that ALL of them become good. That's not realistic.

In general, your scenario is gambling on alot of things breaking correctly for us.....I just don't want to play that game anymore.

[BaltimoreTerp]

To be fair, even if we trade Bedard and Roberts, we'll still have to hope that the young pitching comes through, the Yankees and Red Sox plane crashes, we stay healthy, all of our young position guys develop and we sign Tex and a top of the rotation pitcher. None of the guys we're talking about are sure things and lots of other things, besides these trades, would have to go right for us to develop a competitive team. And, if we re-sign Bedard (which I don't personally want), we would be able to skip the "sign a top of the rotation pitcher" as we'll already have done that.

One thing you are forgetting is that we are going to get from 7 to 9 players for those two. Most very highly rated prospects.

Even if only five become decent major-leaguers, and one or two become stars, would you rather have the value from those five (at no money), or Bedard and Roberts (at BIG money)?

It's easy to replace a nobody making nothing. It's a lot harder to replace a big ego with a big contract.

[allstar1579]

If we stay how we are, sign extensions and all, we are more than a 1B, away from competing. We would either need one of the existing pitchers, or an outside pitcher that can step up and be a legitimate #2. By #2 I mean a guy that would be a #1 on half the teams in baseball (because they lack an ACE and we have one), and a guy that is just a notch below Bedard, not 3 or 4 notches below.

Then, we need a CF thats good offensively and defensively. A power hitting LF. Need to give Moore a shot at 3B and if he isn't the answer get one of the young guys developed there, either Rowell (could also be the LF) or Snyder (will hit for more avg., think Youkilis). A SS would be nice, and we have to find one outside the organization. And then we need to get healthy in the bullpen, and find a guy like Sherrill with success as a set up guy that can step in and close, either giving the 2 young kids development time and then they take it, or going outside for a guy. Ray will need a year after the surgery (2010) before you can expect him to be back to normal.

[davearm]

I think thats a simplistically grim outlook.

Its very easy to envision a scenario where signing Bedard is better, and possibly even far better, than trading him. Theres a very realistic chance none of the prospects ever become anything better than average MLBers, if that. Its just the risk you run with prospects. Of course theres also risk the other way with dumping a ton of money into Bedard.

The only other trade that is really going to improve the team is Roberts. Since its inarguable that extending Bedard could be better than trading him, I really don't think the lynchpin of the next 3-5 years of this franchise is whether we have Brian Roberts or Sean Gallagher. I'd still definitely trade him, but if you keep Bedard, keeping Roberts is understandeable as well, as your new competition timeframe becomes 2009, not 2010 and beyond.

It does neccesitate a ton of spending next offseason, because obviously the team isn't competing as currently arranged.

I still think trading these guys is the right move, but you can't say it definitely will cripple the team over the next 3-5 years. What will determine that is how well our current young players develop and how smartly we spend our other money. Do they prospects all flop, or become solid regulars on the cheap? Do we sign good players to smart deals, or keep announcing the Jay Payton's and Danys Baez-type deals?

Mackus I can kind of see where you're coming from, but you don't seem to be giving proper consideration to just how far away from contention this O's team is.

This core O's roster has won 74, 70, and 69 games the last three years.

To make the playoffs out of the ALE required 95, 95, and 94 wins the last three years.

So as a ballpark, you're looking at needing about a 25 win improvement to sniff the postseason.

From that 69-win roster, you've lost about 8 or so wins at SS.

You're leaking a few wins across 3B, 1B, C, and DH, as Mora, Millar, Hernandez, and Huff age.

You've gained maybe 3 or 4 wins in LF by adding Scott.

CF is a mess, but I'll call going from Patterson to Redman a net loss of a win or two.

I'll add a win for Markakis in RF.

Roberts I'll say is neutral at 2B.

And I'll say the bench is neutral also.

So collectively in the lineup, you're looking at a net loss of around 8 wins.

Now in the rotation, I'd expect a little regression from Bedard. I just don't think the big spike in his K/9 is sustainable, especially after how consistently he has been in in the 8 range prior to '07. Call it one win down.

Same with Guthrie. A little regression, another one win lost.

Cabrera probably can't get any worse. Let's say he makes up those two wins lost by the first two.

Next you're making some ground up with Loewen. Call it a 4 win gain over the revolving door of last year.

You've probably got a rookie in the last spot. I'll call that neutral, relative to what Trachsel gave in this slot last year.

I won't go man by man through the pen, but the only real add I see is Sarfate. His impact probably neutralizes the age-related decline expected from Walker and Bradford. Overall I'll call the bullpen neutral.

So overall you've gained 4 wins in the pitching staff.

The grand total is a ballclub that's 4 wins worse than last year, which somewhat unsurprisingly, is basically just the difference between Tejada and Scott.

Now your deficit for the postseason is almost 30 wins.

Frankly I don't see any reasonable path to making that up that doesn't involve exchanging Bedard's ~8 win contribution for a handful of guys that collectively might only be worth a handful of wins this year, but could blossom into a combined 20 wins a few years down the road.

Same with Roberts. You gotta try doubling those 8 wins into 16, because Roberts himself will never get you that many.

Now if things go right, you've turned 16 wins into 36, and you can realistically try to buy the last 10 on the free agent market. Trying to buy 30wins on the FA market is exceedingly infeasible.

Obviously rebuilding this way is not guaranteed to work, but it's got much better odds of success than sticking with a badly broken status quo.

[NCRaven]

One thing you are forgetting is that we are going to get from 7 to 9 players for those two. Most very highly rated prospects.

Even if only five become decent major-leaguers, and one or two become stars, would you rather have the value from those five (at no money), or Bedard and Roberts (at BIG money)?

It's easy to replace a nobody making nothing. It's a lot harder to replace a big ego with a big contract.

Just want to point out that in my post, I made a point of saying that I personally disagree with keeping Bedard and Roberts. But, I don't think it's a slam dunk that trading them makes us better in the long term. Both plans require young players to develop. Reimold and Wieters are already pretty close as are a number of young pitchers with other high ceiling pitchers further down in the pipeline. And, since Jones is the only position player coming back in the Bedard trade, that trade does nothing to improve our positional depth in the minors. We still are counting on Reimold, Wieters, Rowell, Snyder, Kolodny... to develop. That won't change with the trade of Bedard.

My only point is that I can see an argument for not trading them, though I personally believe we should.

[Fan4Life]

Mackus I can kind of see where you're coming from, but you don't seem to be giving proper consideration to just how far away from contention this O's team is....

Obviously rebuilding this way is not guaranteed to work, but it's got much better odds of success than sticking with a badly broken status quo.

IMO, the majority of the wins you need to makeup will come from pitching, SP and Bullpen. Can someone calculate for me what our record would have been last season with a 4.50 bullpen ERA?

[Sports Guy]

Mackus I can kind of see where you're coming from, but you don't seem to be giving proper consideration to just how far away from contention this O's team is.

This core O's roster has won 74, 70, and 69 games the last three years.

To make the playoffs out of the ALE required 95, 95, and 94 wins the last three years.

So as a ballpark, you're looking at needing about a 25 win improvement to sniff the postseason.

From that 69-win roster, you've lost about 8 or so wins at SS.

You're leaking a few wins across 3B, 1B, C, and DH, as Mora, Millar, Hernandez, and Huff age.

You've gained maybe 3 or 4 wins in LF by adding Scott.

CF is a mess, but I'll call going from Patterson to Redman a net loss of a win or two.

I'll add a win for Markakis in RF.

Roberts I'll say is neutral at 2B.

And I'll say the bench is neutral also.

So collectively in the lineup, you're looking at a net loss of around 8 wins.

Now in the rotation, I'd expect a little regression from Bedard. I just don't think the big spike in his K/9 is sustainable, especially after how consistently he has been in in the 8 range prior to '07. Call it one win down.

Same with Guthrie. A little regression, another one win lost.

Cabrera probably can't get any worse. Let's say he makes up those two wins lost by the first two.

Next you're making some ground up with Loewen. Call it a 4 win gain over the revolving door of last year.

You've probably got a rookie in the last spot. I'll call that neutral, relative to what Trachsel gave in this slot last year.

I won't go man by man through the pen, but the only real add I see is Sarfate. His impact probably neutralizes the age-related decline expected from Walker and Bradford. Overall I'll call the bullpen neutral.

So overall you've gained 4 wins in the pitching staff.

The grand total is a ballclub that's 4 wins worse than last year, which somewhat unsurprisingly, is basically just the difference between Tejada and Scott.

Now your deficit for the postseason is almost 30 wins.

Frankly I don't see any reasonable path to making that up that doesn't involve exchanging Bedard's ~8 win contribution for a handful of guys that collectively might only be worth a handful of wins this year, but could blossom into a combined 20 wins a few years down the road.

Same with Roberts. You gotta try doubling those 8 wins into 16, because Roberts himself will never get you that many.

Now if things go right, you've turned 16 wins into 36, and you can realistically try to buy the last 10 on the free agent market. Trying to buy 30wins on the FA market is exceedingly infeasible.

Obviously rebuilding this way is not guaranteed to work, but it's got much better odds of success than sticking with a badly broken status quo.

Very well said Dave....I agree that i think people overlook the other teams, both in the league and in our division.

We are talking about a 25 game improvement and then, after that, remaining a consistent winner. Not likely.

[Sports Guy]

You wrote "relying on 30 somethings to win" like that was something to be used to discredit his argument. It isn't. Most of the teams that make the play-offs and win the Series are not young teams. Look at Boston's roster from last year. They have some youth, but they also have a lot of "thirty somethings". Our age distribution isn't our problem. Our talent is our problem.

Now, the argument can be made (and successfully IMO) that our talent will only get better if we trade our "veteran" players to get younger players with less of a resume now, but more long term talent. However, the problem isn't that Bedard and Roberts will be 30+ when we can realistically compete and so we shouldn't count on them to contribute. The problem is that we can't count on enough other players to contribute, regardless of their age.

I know that you think a lot of people here have a blind spot re: lots of different things and you're correct in many cases, but you definitely have a blind spot where the term prospect and the age 30 are concerned IMHO.

Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, players do decline in their 30s...Relying on players in their 30s isn't a smart way to go.

Yes, you can still do some things with those guys and yes, you should probably have a few on your team...No one has ever disputed that.

[Sports Guy]

Well, then you can't say "relying on players in their 30s" derisively then. Virtually every single successful team over the past decade has had major parts of their success due to players in their 30s (and 40s in many cases). Nobody is saying that players don't decline IN GENERAL in their 30s. All of us know that. It isn't a tough thing to grasp. The point is that no team makes it via guys on the way up or at their peak age of 27/28. No team.

But for a rebuilding team, we need to have as many young guys as we can.

I am all for signing Tex next year. He is going to be older.

[Herbie]

Mackus I can kind of see where you're coming from, but you don't seem to be giving proper consideration to just how far away from contention this O's team is.

This core O's roster has won 74, 70, and 69 games the last three years.

To make the playoffs out of the ALE required 95, 95, and 94 wins the last three years.

So as a ballpark, you're looking at needing about a 25 win improvement to sniff the postseason.

From that 69-win roster, you've lost about 8 or so wins at SS.

You're leaking a few wins across 3B, 1B, C, and DH, as Mora, Millar, Hernandez, and Huff age.

You've gained maybe 3 or 4 wins in LF by adding Scott.

CF is a mess, but I'll call going from Patterson to Redman a net loss of a win or two.

I'll add a win for Markakis in RF.

Roberts I'll say is neutral at 2B.

And I'll say the bench is neutral also.

So collectively in the lineup, you're looking at a net loss of around 8 wins.

Now in the rotation, I'd expect a little regression from Bedard. I just don't think the big spike in his K/9 is sustainable, especially after how consistently he has been in in the 8 range prior to '07. Call it one win down.

Same with Guthrie. A little regression, another one win lost.

Cabrera probably can't get any worse. Let's say he makes up those two wins lost by the first two.

Next you're making some ground up with Loewen. Call it a 4 win gain over the revolving door of last year.

You've probably got a rookie in the last spot. I'll call that neutral, relative to what Trachsel gave in this slot last year.

I won't go man by man through the pen, but the only real add I see is Sarfate. His impact probably neutralizes the age-related decline expected from Walker and Bradford. Overall I'll call the bullpen neutral.

So overall you've gained 4 wins in the pitching staff.

The grand total is a ballclub that's 4 wins worse than last year, which somewhat unsurprisingly, is basically just the difference between Tejada and Scott.

Now your deficit for the postseason is almost 30 wins.

Frankly I don't see any reasonable path to making that up that doesn't involve exchanging Bedard's ~8 win contribution for a handful of guys that collectively might only be worth a handful of wins this year, but could blossom into a combined 20 wins a few years down the road.

Same with Roberts. You gotta try doubling those 8 wins into 16, because Roberts himself will never get you that many.

Now if things go right, you've turned 16 wins into 36, and you can realistically try to buy the last 10 on the free agent market. Trying to buy 30wins on the FA market is exceedingly infeasible.

Obviously rebuilding this way is not guaranteed to work, but it's got much better odds of success than sticking with a badly broken status quo.

Fantastic analysis. This highlights the biggest problem the O's have had in their decision making under the last regimes - a basic misunderstanding of how their talent stacks up relative to the competition. They go out and spend money on certainty - Aubrey Huff, Kris Benson - presumably because they feel they are close enough to compete. They aren't and haven't been in a long time. I hope McPhail realizes this and is willing to take a few risks. A slew of prospects for Bedard is a gamble but one the O's almost have to take.

[olehippi]

Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, players do decline in their 30s...Relying on players in their 30s isn't a smart way to go.

Yes, you can still do some things with those guys and yes, you should probably have a few on your team...No one has ever disputed that.

I'm sure everyone could compile a list of players who remained productive offensively well into their 30's....it's the defensive skills that seem to start failing first. The result is a bunch of DH type players. This is exactly the O's problem now, except we have a bunch of 30's guys who only had limited offensive and defensive skills when they were younger, so I'd expect the dropoff curve with age would be pretty rapid.

[Dipper9]

Just speculating here, but with the sudden rumor over the past few days that the Cubs are willing to give up Pie and Gallagher for Roberts, could the holdup be that the O's now don't think they need Jones as well? Maybe they are content with Pie in CF and Scott in left, and thus are looking elsewhere to see what they can get for Bedard? It's possible. If they do the two Seattle and Cubs deals and the players are who have been rumored, we would have 4 starting outfielders, as it is well known that the O's are high on Scott. So maybe they are now looking to go back to the Dodgers or Angels or somebody? Thoughts?