This is A Mess (Mega RANT Thread)

[Dipper9]

At the end of the day we should not be relying on our catcher coming off of TJ surgery to carry a big load. We moved Chris Davis to the OF for Chris Parmelee not Anthony Rizzo.

Davis was moved to the outfield because 1) they know he is not coming back next year so why not see if we have a suitable replacement for first currently on the team, and 2) none of the 80 guys we have run out to the outfield this year have claimed the full time job.

So throwing Davis in right keeps his bat in the lineup while also allowing the team to get a look at what we have.

[mdbdotcom]

This is Duquette's mess.

I'm looking forward to another one just like it in October.

[eddie83]

Davis was moved to the outfield because 1) they know he is not coming back next year so why not see if we have a suitable replacement for first currently on the team, and 2) none of the 80 guys we have run out to the outfield this year have claimed the full time job.

So throwing Davis in right keeps his bat in the lineup while also allowing the team to get a look at what we have.

And who is the guy who brought the 80 outfielders in?

Lord help us if they are trying to replace Davis with Parmelee next year. If they are going to go this route with the cheap pitching staff we have then that is criminal.

I like DD and did not rip his offseason. The facts though are outside of Roe what moves did he make that worked?

Didn't trade Norris

Young, DeAza back

Kept Matusz

Has a roster with limited flexibility

Once agian this is all Monday Morning QB after the fact at it's finest. If we are going to give him credit for past moves then we have to look at this past year as well.

[eddie83]

This is Duquette's mess.

I'm looking forward to another one just like it in October.

Still plenty of time for that to happen. I am not writing the season off by any means.

[SteveO]

Markakis is contract we should all be glad never came to fruition. Cruz on the other hand IMO was a miscalculation. I believe his production would have been decent enough for at least 3yrs and his value to this team, this year would have warranted taking a chance on having to carry that 4th year. That said I think there were valid reasons to not sign him, its not like it was a slam dunk, the dude has some history and there was some risk.

Not moving Norris this offseason was and remains my biggest gripe. I think you could have gotten something half decent in return for him and made room for KG to be the 5th starter behind Ubaldo, Tillman, Chen and Miggy. Instead we kept him, have been jerking KG around and now his value (Norris) is less than a jar of pine tar. If you believe KG is a future TOR the way your talking him up as an organization then you put him in your rotation and let him learn. You don't put him in your pen.

I get the idea of pitching depth, I just think you could have moved Norris and still brought in a vet to protect you if you were not 100% confident guys like Wright and Wilson could give you what you need in terms of SP depth. Honestly I think the whole handling of KG has been clumsy at best. .

[El Gordo]

At the end of the day we should not be relying on our catcher coming off of TJ surgery to carry a big load. We moved Chris Davis to the OF for Chris Parmelee not Anthony Rizzo.

Markakis Parmelee not much of a difference there. I think you are overreacting to a 10 day slump, which happens a lot in baseball, no matter who the GM is.

[Aristotelian]

The one decision I put on DD is the failure to trade Bud. This is not hindsight being 20/20. A bunch of us on the board were calling for it. Coming off a career year, he had real value. We had Gausman plus Wright and Wilson ready to take the spot. Would have cleared $9M to spend on other things while maybe even getting something back for Bud. Now, nobody predicted that Bud would be this bad, but many of us predicted regression and wanted him gone while he had peak value. DD did not make the move and the team is paying for it.

[eddie83]

Markakis Parmelee not much of a difference there. I think you are overreacting to a 10 day slump, which happens a lot in baseball, no matter who the GM is.

Maybe I am overreacting but having Markakis getting on base in front of our big hitters and playing steady defense is exactly what this team needed. It is July and we are still searching for answers in the OF. Complementary pieces on a contending team are huge.

[SteveO]

Markakis Parmelee not much of a difference there. I think you are overreacting to a 10 day slump, which happens a lot in baseball, no matter who the GM is.

Yea lot of that going on right now.

Nothing that winning 10 out 13 wont fix lol.

I was not in love with the offseason DD orchestrated or how it went down. I don't think for a minute that man as intelligent as DD though was "distracted" or decided to dog it. DD is not a perfect GM, he is a very good one. As such he will make mistakes, my guess is that if you sat down with him, shared a few shots of whatever and loosened him up, he would tell you that he should have brought back Cruz. He gets a whole lot more right than wrong IMO so I think the man is getting a raw deal from many posters based on some of the comments. Nobody is perfect.

[mdbdotcom]

I blame Dan Duquette for those big orange batting gloves Adam Jones wears.

[CA-ORIOLE]

The one decision I put on DD is the failure to trade Bud. This is not hindsight being 20/20. A bunch of us on the board were calling for it. Coming off a career year, he had real value. We had Gausman plus Wright and Wilson ready to take the spot. Would have cleared $9M to spend on other things while maybe even getting something back for Bud. Now, nobody predicted that Bud would be this bad, but many of us predicted regression and wanted him gone while he had peak value. DD did not make the move and the team is paying for it.

I believe they did try to trade Bud. How do you know he had any value at an 8.8 mil contract? It's not like a GMs don't look beyond wins and losses these days. Look what the value for Jim Johnson was coming off 2 50+ save seasons. GM's aren't stupid.

[Bahama O's Fan]

I don't think trading Bud was the answer in the offseason. We had Tillman, Chen and Miggy we could count on. Ubaldo was assumed to be horrible, leaving two holes without Bud. Even if KG had locked down one of them (We have no idea if he could have), who was going to be trusted to the other one? No one was ready to see Wright or Wilson starting the year in the majors and no one wanted to trust Ubaldo.

[SteveO]

I believe they did try to trade Bud. How do you know he had any value at an 8.8 mil contract? It's not like a GMs don't look beyond wins and losses these days. Look what the value for Jim Johnson was coming off 2 50+ save seasons. GM's aren't stupid.

At the end of the day the team we had last year at the end of the season was by far the class of the division.

So far the team we have seen this season is pretty much what its record is. There is no team that appears to be the class of the division, Orioles included. To go from clearly the best team of the division to just another team trying to grind out a division title, tells me that our offseason was not that great and our GM had some missteps. None of that means he sucks, was distracted or should be raked over the coals, but it is a bummer and feels like a wasted opportunity. Certainly there is time to right the ship and address some issues the team has but I also fear that in doing so we will have to further deplete a depleted farm system.

[Can_of_corn]

I don't think trading Bud was the answer in the offseason. We had Tillman' date=' Chen and Miggy we could count on. Ubaldo was assumed to be horrible, leaving two holes without Bud. Even if KG had locked down one of them ([b']We have no idea if he could have[/b]), who was going to be trusted to the other one? No one was ready to see Wright or Wilson starting the year in the majors and no one wanted to trust Ubaldo.

He looked pretty equivalent to Bud and the others last season. Don't see why you couldn't project him as part of the rotation.

[mrbig1]

Remember we were a step away from the World Series. You would think this would the time to pull the trigger on a trade or sign a FA or two. We lost three very good players and got little to nothing in return. I don't blame DD. We all knows who signs the checks.