The O's Weakness

[weams]

Luck. It was luck. So their weakness in that series was luck.

[Redskins Rick]

The staff as a whole relies on pitching to contact and has average stuff at best. If they're off even a little, they're very hittable. See Norris, Chen when he's not hitting his spots, Gonzalez, most of the guys in the pen.

You could be talking about most any MLB team.

[ArtVanDelay]

We lead all of baseball in runs scores and are tied for the lead with runs allowed and your answer is hitting?

So far the biggest weakness has been bad pitching coupled with inconsistent defense. I think both will stabilize and we'll have a middle tier pitching staff along with an upper tier offense. It may be enough to get us to the offseason or it may not.

Hopefully it gets us to the offseason about a month or so later than most other teams.

[waroriole]

No great strength. No glaring weakness. The weakness is that we have no great strength.

Exactly this.

[Reboulet'sStache]

Average pitching. We don't really have many, if any, guys with dominate stuff. You're going to be able to put the ball in play. If our defense is performing like it can, that might not hurt us as much as it might another team. If it isn't, things can get ugly.

[Uli2001]

So far, it's pretty cut and dried.

The weakness is pitching, last in MLB in ERA, worse even than Boston's.

The strength is hitting, first in MLB in runs, second in OPS.

[Reboulet'sStache]

You could be talking about most any MLB team.

Not really. We tend to be in the bottom group in terms of K/9.

[Bahama O's Fan]

Are we talking in terms of what we have seen or what we expect to see?

[Aristotelian]

Bullpen was a major strength last year, even before we got Miller. We had several guys get off to a rough start at the same time this year, and Garcia is throwing off our overall numbers. I think the bullpen will stabilize, especially with Gausman in the mix.

My big worry is the lack of a dominant #1 starter. I just have a hard time seeing us win a short series with the guys we have. They are excellent "bend, don't break" pitchers, but that is not good enough in a short series when runs are at a premium and the other team has good pitchers too.

[UpstateNYfan]

Right now it's pitching and defense. I can at least 2 games which were likely winnable with the O's normal defense compounded by the numerous BB's that have been very costly. 9-10 could easily have been 11-8. The BP worries me most. I look at relief pitchers a bit like running backs in the NFL, 3 quality years and diminishing returns. Guys hang on, move to other teams, but they were not starters for a reason, they are limited.

[weams]

Are we talking in terms of what we have seen or what we expect to see?

The Royals did not have better pitching. Short series is all luck.

[Redskins Rick]

The Royals did not have better pitching. Short series is all luck.

I know what you mean, but not sure luck is the right word, there is skill involved.

Luck implies that they didn't do anything right to "win" on their own accord.

[OFFNY]

o

Up until now, I believe that the Orioles' biggest weakness has been sup-par pitching and sub-par defense.

That's the bad news.

The good news is that those are two areas that are usually a strength for the Orioles (especially the defense), and that if the Orioles right the ship at some point during the marathon 162-game season (as many expect them to do), we will likely stop seeing stretches of 9-10 records over 19-game stretches of baseball, and start seeing 11-8, 12-7, and 13-6 records over 19-game stretches of baseball

[Oriole1940]

IMO it is not having 1 or 2 innings eaters, good innings eaters, not mop up men in what is already a blowout. Our pen would look a lot better, esp. in the dog days of summer if our starters, even 1 or 2, would give us 7+/- GOOD innings every so often. If that were the case, by the ASB we would have zeroed in on one set of pen guys, that barring injury, could be counted on to do a reasonably good job. As it is, we manage by the most recent crisis, and while we have the best manager to do that, it is not really what championship ball teams do. Giver the pen a break and get at least 1 guy that can pitch 7 +/- innings many starts. It used to be commonplace. Now a days it seems to have disappeared, for what ever reason.

[Palmoripken]

Offensively- speed. This is something that has improved since last year with De Aza and Cabrera on the team but it's still there. I think we're more better at clutch hitting than some give us credit for. I also think patience has improved too though a month under Coolbaugh is perhaps too early to tell.

Defensively- I guess it's not having a true no.1 type starter which kind of goes with what Oriole1940 says above about inning eaters.

All in all I think we got a solid squad that can and will compete.