Regretting Not Signing Andrew Miller?

[CA-ORIOLE]

I was in favor of signing Andrew Miller in the off season and he left for NY while DD was dreaming about Toronto. What a stellar shut down reliever almost Rivera like. We had him and decided to let him go after trading for him and not bid on him. I'm a season ticket holder and during the off season everybody I talked to was upset about Miller leaving. Very few comments about Cruz and Nick. If we had Miller our record would not be 3-4 right now. Buck is doing his best in his postgame interviews but Matusz should have faced Drew with the bases loaded tonight. Not Hunter! Buck thinks they would have pinch hit Headey if he would have brought him in to the game. Maybe....maybe not. .

Almost surely I would think.

Another tough loss. The pen has got to get better

True. We are wasting some decent offense.

[Crazysilver03]

It wasn't mathematically feasible to keep Cruz. He cost too much. Miller cost too much. Winning doesn't matter if it costs money.

MSK

Glad you finally understand that point.

[24fps]

It wasn't mathematically feasible to keep Cruz. He cost too much. Miller cost too much. Winning doesn't matter if it costs money.

MSK

This is complete nonsense as everyone except you seems to understand. Utterly baseless.

[AlbionHero]

And I'm not advocating signing Davis and Weiters, I'm just saying the Yankees were cash starved and still managed to sign Miller. We can't afford big time free agents, I get that, but we could have afforded Miller to give us the best bullpen in the game once again

Miller WAS a big time free agent. I believe thats the most money a non closer reliever has ever gotten. If you're a team that has a 150+ million dollar payroll maybe you can afford to spend that much money on a set up guy, but we're just a mid market who is already incredibly strapped for cash. In a perfect world it would have been nice to sign him but there was never any way it would have happened in reality. We're not a Yankees, Dodgers, Red Sox, etc. Those are the kinds of teams that can afford to pay a set up man that kind of money.

[brianod]

Miller WAS a big time free agent. I believe thats the most money a non closer reliever has ever gotten. If you're a team that has a 150+ million dollar payroll maybe you can afford to spend that much money on a set up guy, but we're just a mid market who is already incredibly strapped for cash. In a perfect world it would have been nice to sign him but there was never any way it would have happened in reality. We're not a Yankees, Dodgers, Red Sox, etc. Those are the kinds of teams that can afford to pay a set up man that kind of money.

Wrong, Pujols was a big time free agent. Miller cost 40 million for 4 years. We should be able to afford that

[Guest birdsallday]

I do wish we signed Andrew Miller. He's very good.

[section18]

When I created this post the other Miller post was not up yet. I got interrupted twice while writing it and thought it would post much earlier than it did. Did not intend to duplicate posts or be similar. I left out one thing. Watching Miller even for a short time last season made him my favorite Oriole player almost overnight. Why? He got the job done. I actually felt almost depressed after he signed with NY. I really would like to know whose decision it was not to pursue signing him. I can't imagine Buck would not have wanted him back. I know Buck is a big O'Day and Hunter guy and Miller made both of them look bad after he arrived. O'Day and Miller seemed to give up way too many HR's. I don't recall seeing Miller give up any. End of my Miller fan club comments. If I owned this team and sat in my suite watching him last year I would have insisted DD sign him. Dump Hunter and Matusz to help pay his salary. That's what I would have done. We all know the salaries have gotten totally out of hand.

[AlbionHero]

Wrong, Pujols was a big time free agent. Miller cost 40 million for 4 years. We should be able to afford that

We can afford it, sure. But only if its for a high impact player, not a pitcher who will throw 60 innings. Do you really want to handicap the franchises spending in future years just so we have an 8th inning guy? You can easily find relievers almost as good for only a couple million dollars instead of getting into a bidding war with the Yankees and Dodgers of the world.

[25 Nuggets]

To answer your question, I am expecting Miller to close many games against the Orioles, as well as against other teams, because if Betances doesn't improve, he'll be full time closer. I expect a 40 save season out of him.

[brianod]

We can afford it, sure. But only if its for a high impact player, not a pitcher who will throw 60 innings. Do you really want to handicap the franchises spending in future years just so we have an 8th inning guy? You can easily find relievers almost as good for only a couple million dollars instead of getting into a bidding war with the Yankees and Dodgers of the world.

Absolutely I do. I have zero faith in this franchise's desire to spend money. I keep hearing we can't afford this, we can't afford that and I keep seeing no signings. We could be 5-2 had we had Miller in the pen. Matusz cost us a game and Hunter cost us a game. We could have cut both of them to make up half of Miller's salary

[24fps]

Wrong, Pujols was a big time free agent. Miller cost 40 million for 4 years. We should be able to afford that

How does that work in the real world? That's more than any pitcher on the team except for Ubaldo - so far a very regrettable contract. For a set-up guy no less.

Miller is a great pitcher. Looking for value in the bullpen is a great strategy, one that's worked for the Orioles in the recent past. It's a bit early to start beating ourselves up.

[AlbionHero]

Absolutely I do. I have zero faith in this franchise's desire to spend money. I keep hearing we can't afford this, we can't afford that and I keep seeing no signings. We could be 5-2 had we had Miller in the pen. Matusz cost us a game and Hunter cost us a game. We could have cut both of them to make up half of Miller's salary

For the first part about how you say we aren't spending money... We had an incredibly high amount of arbitration increases this year, and we still have the highest payroll in franchise history even after letting those 3 guys go. Winning ends up costing you a lot of money. For a market like ours, which is average at best (given that we're part of the competitive balance draft pick group), we're already spending more than our market would normally allow in payroll by being 11th in the league.

And for your second point... You don't really know that. We could have easily won tonight by putting in Matusz instead of having Hunter in there... that was a blunder on Bucks part, not because we didn't sign Miller. And saying we would have won if Miller was on the team everytime we lose is just a slippery slope and being way too reactionary.

[Ruzious]

So every time Hunter or O'Day messes up, we're going to get one of these stupid threads?

[kelsey59]

Of course not. Paying almost 40 million for a relief pitcher is not a luxury a franchise like ours can afford.

That is what it comes down to. The Orioles well never be the Yankees in spending, they are a small market team.

[AlbionHero]

Realistically, we probably would have had to non tender De Aza and wouldn't have been able to sign Cabrera or traded for Snider to be able to fit Miller under our self imposed salary cap this year. I don't think that a 60 IP relief pitcher is worth 2 solid starters and an important bench player myself. And thats only for this year... we'd have to make concessions over the other 3 years o the contract to be able to afford him, too.