Gotta get help at the black hole at 2nd base

[FlipTheBird]

Considering if he was a normal prospect he would have been playing in A- or A+ when he was in AA and AAA. His stats are rather remarkable, IMO. He could repeat AAA for 5 years before he becomes league average.

Which is all well and good, but playing better than your age at a level or two doesn't make you MLB ready.

[Jonesy10]

Considering if he was a normal prospect he would have been playing in A- or A+ when he was in AA and AAA. His stats are rather remarkable, IMO. He could repeat AAA for 5 years before he becomes league average.

That's true but he probably shouldn't have started in the bigs this season and definitely shouldn't be here with his offensive performance so far. He obviously has a lot of potential though. I don't think it's unreasonable to have pretty similar WAR's as Hardy. A pretty good bat for his position but an outstanding glove is where most of his value comes from. It just really seems like he needs to go down and work on his hitting. He was pretty bad in AAA last season. It's not like he has nothing left to prove.

As for you comparing him to the recent performances of Davis, Cruz, and Pearce, it seems a little silly. Every player will go through tough stretches. Pearce and Cruz have been our 2 best hitters this season. Comparing them with Schoop isn't fair. Davis has struggled all year but is still MUCH better than Schoop offensively. Comparing a bad month to Schoop having a bad month isn't right when Schoop hasn't had a single good month the season (and 3 awful months) and hasn't come close to contributing as much offense as the other 3 players. Second base is by far the biggest black hole on the team. Joseph struggled in his first month but has an OPS near .700 the last 2 months. His defense is also much better. Unlike Schoop, Caleb adjusted and has been a decent hitter the last 2 months. That's what's worrisome about Schoop. He has continuously gotten worse ehen he should be constantly improving.

[mark_beckens]

Which is all well and good, but playing better than your age at a level or two doesn't make you MLB ready.

I've said it before, he should have started the season at AAA. However, with Manny being hurt he was rushed. He's held his own. His numbers aren't as good as anyone would want. But we don't have any in house alternatives that will be a significant improvement offensively and defensively to warrant sitting him or sending him down!

I posted this earlier.

[mark_beckens]

That's true but he probably shouldn't have started in the bigs this season and definitely shouldn't be here with his offensive performance so far. He obviously has a lot of potential though. I don't think it's unreasonable to have pretty similar WAR's as Hardy. A pretty good bat for his position but an outstanding glove is where most of his value comes from. It just really seems like he needs to go down and work on his hitting. He was pretty bad in AAA last season. It's not like he has nothing left to prove.

I'm not denying that, actually I said it earlier in this thread

I've said it before, he should have started the season at AAA. However, with Manny being hurt he was rushed. He's held his own. His numbers aren't as good as anyone would want. But we don't have any in house alternatives that will be a significant improvement offensively and defensively to warrant sitting him or sending him down!

As for you comparing him to the recent performances of Davis, Cruz, and Pearce, it seems a little silly. Every player will go through tough stretches. Pearce and Cruz have been our 2 best hitters this season. Comparing them with Schoop isn't fair. Davis has struggled all year but is still MUCH better than Schoop offensively. Comparing a bad month to Schoop having a bad month isn't right when Schoop hasn't had a single good month the season (and 3 awful months) and hasn't come close to contributing as much offense as the other 3 players. Second base is by far the biggest black hole on the team. Joseph struggled in his first month but has an OPS near .700 the last 2 months. His defense is also much better. Unlike Schoop, Caleb adjusted and has been a decent hitter the last 2 months. That's what's worrisome about Schoop. He has continuously gotten worse ehen he should be constantly improving.

You need to read this thread from the start. Roy Firestone mentioned Cruz, Pearce and Davis, I posted their split stats to compare with Schoop and confirm what he said. They have been almost as bad as he has and they are not a 22 year old rookie 2nd basemen. They bat #4, 5 and 6 in our lineup. If they can struggle similar to what Schoop is, perhaps you all should be more lenient with him?

[El Gordo]

The Fielding Bible has Brian Roberts worth 32 RC and 3 RS. Schoop at 20 RC and 8 RS. Roberts would be an upgrade in spite of his lesser defense.

[Can_of_corn]

The Fielding Bible has Brian Roberts worth 32 RC and 3 RS. Schoop at 20 RC and 8 RS. Roberts would be an upgrade in spite of his lesser defense.

If both players continued at the same pace. Which given that we are talking about 7 runs, is far from a sure thing.

[El Gordo]

If both players continued at the same pace. Which given that we are talking about 7 runs, is far from a sure thing.

This is not to argue for Roberts, it's just to demonstrate how poor Schoop is with the bat. He hasn't even been as good as Roberts. By comparison the great Omar Infante has been worth 38 RC and 2 RS and Prado 43 RC and 3 RS. Pedroia in a down year is 52 RC 12 RS and Cano is 68 RC -3 RS.

[Ori-Al]

We would have won last evening with a little offense from second base.

Actually, all we needed that final at-bat was a walk. Schoop, who like too many of our other hitters rarely walks, struck out on ball three up and away. If he takes that pitch to bring the count to 3-2, putting added pressure on the pitcher, being that the bases were loaded, who knows what happens The pitcher might still have gotten him out, or he might have thrown a more hittable pitch that Schoop is able to turn into a hit, or he might've thrown a pitch far enough out of the strike zone that even Schoop takes it for ball four to drive in the game-winning run (would've been revenge for the third game in their Park in which the eventual winning run scored on a bases-loaded walk.) Unfortunately, a non-strike was able to secure the final out of the inning, which made the Angels and their fans happy that the game didn't end right there as a 1-0 Orioles win.

A problem I see with Jonathan's offense is that he doesn't seem to show signs of improving as the season goes on. He's hit some home runs, which are always welcome, but his overall batting average and on-base percentage are terrible. If the rest of the team was hitting, the team could still score a lot of runs in spite of lousy hitting from the eight and nine spots in the order, but the rest of the team isn't hitting well. When they don't hit home runs, they rarely win, because they struggle to score without the home run ball. All these close games put a lot of pressure on the pitchers, who would appreciate an occasional blowout, as would us fans.

[Can_of_corn]

Schoop is all good when the rest of the lineup is doing what we expect them to do. When they aren't, and it's a 0-0 game with the bases loaded and 2 outs and Schoop goes down swinging, it makes me want to bash my head into a brick wall.

Bottom line, Schoop is a problem, but the majority of the lineup struggling is a much bigger problem.

Then you pinch hit for him and bring in Flaherty.

If the situation warrants it.

[OrioleMagic79]

Roberts is far from a lock to provide that offense.

And does Roberts make the plays that help keep the Angels off the board for 12 innings? Off the top of my head, there was the play off Pearce's glove, his throws from right field on grounders into the shift, the double plays he turned. Does B-Rob make all (or any?) of those plays?

All that said ? I'm not happy with Schoop's production at the plate. But I definitely wouldn't replace him with Roberts. And because our overall defense dramatically improves our pitching staff, I don't want to get weaker defense at any position ? unless it's supplanted with dramatic offensive increases.

Exactly.

What actually bothers me more than Schoop not being ready is that Davis' numbers (albeit better) are actually in the same ballpark. Schoop actually has more hits than Davis in fewer at bats...it is a complex thing to compare, but the one thing is clear...Schoop is much closer to what we expected from 2B (which wasn't all that much) than Davis is to what we expected from 1B...

Davis walks a lot more, which is good. He has scored more runs too, which is also good. That being said, if Schoop didn't keep getting time taken away from him by Flaherty, who isn't any better and has zero upside IMO, he might have the 52 more plate appearances to match up Davis's stats. Could Schoop have scored 11 more runs in 50+ more plate appearances? Maybe not all 11, but close...he also would have had more at bats to develop. Schoop also didn't have Cruz on fire batting right behind him to be driven in more often, and therefore score more runs. Schoop is putting the ball in play though, because Davis has 124 K's compared with Schoop's 75 K's...which means that Davis, with all of those extra plate appearances, has pretty much struck out every single time.

Let me say that one more time. In 52 more plate appearances, Davis has 49 more K's than Schoop. That includes Davis having 47 walks on the season, compared with Schoop's 8 walks...

I might be able to argue that Schoop is having a roughly equivalent offensive season to Davis in many ways this year...and that isn't an endorsement of Schoop, it is a MAJOR issue with Davis and how badly he is hurting this team.

[El Gordo]

Schoop is all good when the rest of the lineup is doing what we expect them to do. When they aren't, and it's a 0-0 game with the bases loaded and 2 outs and Schoop goes down swinging, it makes me want to bash my head into a brick wall.

Bottom line, Schoop is a problem, but the majority of the lineup struggling is a much bigger problem.

I think we have to accept that we won't get much out of catcher. That said I have more confidence in a Caleb or Hundley AB than I do with a Schoop AB. The rest of the offense may be struggling but they have given evidence in the past of being able to hit at the ML level, even Flaherty. I have yet to see that evidence from Schoop.

[Ori-Al]

He's pulling his head. If you watch him swing you'll see his head/eyes will be looking down the LF line at the end of his swing. He's also pulling off on everything. As soon as he starts trying to hit the ball up the middle/opposite field this will be corrected.

Isn't that something the hitting coach should be working on? Davis has has had the same problem this season. For all I know, he is working with them, and they're not listening. Whatever, Nelson has had a lousy two months, and Davis has had a lousy four months. Pearce has had a bad couple of weeks.

Just a note-In 1983, even with the Three Stooges (Dempsey, Dauer, Cruz), the Orioles ranked fourth in the league in runs scored, while the pitching staff ranked number one in earned run average.

[Jonesy10]

I think we have to accept that we won't get much out of catcher. That said I have more confidence in a Caleb or Hundley AB than I do with a Schoop AB. The rest of the offense may be struggling but they have given evidence in the past of being able to hit at the ML level, even Flaherty. I have yet to see that evidence from Schoop.

Caleb has had a near .700 OPS and ~90 wRC+ the last 2 months. He has been pretty good lately considering he's also playing GG caliber defense.

b is the problem.

[LookitsPuck]

Batting average is one of the most over-rated stats in baseball. The difference between hitting .250 and .300 over 500 ab's is 25 hits. The MLB season is 26 weeks, so that's 1 hit per week.

Do you know what the MLB average is for OPS? I'll save you. .705

He was 5-6 years younger then the competition at AA and AAA.

I've said it before, he should have started the season at AAA. However, with Manny being hurt he was rushed. He's held his own. His numbers aren't as good as anyone would want. But we don't have any in house alternatives that will be a significant improvement offensively and defensively to warrant sitting him or sending him down!

Batting average is not overrated when talking about prospects in the minors. When he has zippy batting average followed by a poor OBP and little to no power at AA and AAA...tell me, what value does he bring offensively? That's the issue here. He's young. He needs to develop. He's regressing up here.

[BradyBunch]

We would have won last evening with a little offense from second base.

You mean like Schoop putting down the SF and Markakis screwing the pooch and then Manny screwing the pooch as well.

We lost last night cause everybody crapped the bed.