The only reason this team will not make the playoffs...

[OFFNY]

2/5ths of the rotation has been a dumpster fire all year. First it was Norris and Tillman. Then when that situation was resolved or fixed, Chen and Gonzo hopped in to keep the flames going. Every so often they hop out and Jimenez or Gausmen hops in.

Seems that we can't string together a weeks worth of decent starts in a row. The two times that it happened the team went on great win streaks. Otherwise they are stuck playing at or below 500 because the starters when not good, are just awful.

Talk about Cruz and Nick all you want. Bottom line is this team is getting 2 horrible starts every trip through the rotation and you can not make the playoffs that way.

Thank you.

As Roy Firestone once said:

http://forum.orioleshangout.com/forums/showthread.php/141339-It-all-begins-with-decent-starting-pitching

When you get AT LEAST decent starting pitching (and particularly if you have an excellent defense to compliment that starting pitching, as do the Orioles), then you've got a pretty good shot to win. It's almost like the foundation of a house.

When you don't, you more often than not won't.

[Babypowder]

Then why bother with the nitpicking snark?

I just hear and read them referred to as the best defensive team too much over the last few years when in fact they are not and haven't been in any recent season. I'm well aware it is nitpicky.

[DrungoHazewood]

I just hear and read them referred to as the best defensive team too much over the last few years when in fact they are not and haven't been in any recent season. I'm well aware it is nitpicky.

But Thorne said they were! Wait... what's that? He was talking about fielding percentage? Oh... well... then. Of all my pet peeves, this is one of the most pet peeviest. It's like judging drivers solely by who has been in the fewest accidents. Or giving the 100m dash title to whomever has the fewest false starts.

[Babypowder]

But Thorne said they were! Wait... what's that? He was talking about fielding percentage? Oh... well... then. Of all my pet peeves, this is one of the most pet peeviest. It's like judging drivers solely by who has been in the fewest accidents. Or giving the 100m dash title to whomever has the fewest false starts.

Exactly, this is the same reason I feel the need to correct every time someone refers to them that way.

[wildcard]

Tillman' outing was such a buzzkill. We had Walker on the ropes after allowing 2 runs and making him throw 33 pitches. A quick inning there and we may just come back out and pummel Walker into submission. Instead, it takes Tillman like 25 pitches and 20 minutes to record the third out of the inning, and we're down 4-2.

Line drive off the throwing arm never helps.

[El Gordo]

Exactly, this is the same reason I feel the need to correct every time someone refers to them that way.

[Nite]

I wouldn't have minded if they did trade Norris this past off-season. However from a team building for a championship standpoint, why would you? Jimenez and Guasmen were HUGE and I mean HUGE question marks going into the year. You couldn't rely on them going into the year. So I understand the reason for keeping the depth. Bottom line is the SP failed this year and that's why unless they as a unit turn it around like yesterday this team will not make the playoffs.

As far as having more offense. The team struggled to score runs for a two week period earlier this year. Guess who also was having a horrible go at it at the exact same time? Cruz. So you can't say that having him would have helped at all since he himself was ineffective at the only time this year the O's needed him.

As far as the lower 1 run winning percentage. Part of that was losses like last night. SP goes 2 innings, and then come late in the game when the bullpen is taxed the winning run for them scores. Or we are down so much early just to comeback and fall 1 run short. If the SP was just decent you would see a different 1 run win percentage.

Then someone mentioned the almost $25 mil in dead money this year. My opinion is at least it's just this year. ALL of that comes off the books the second the season ends. I support not bringing back Cruz and Markakis (I wanted to keep Miller even at 9 per) as long as you are able to resign Davis, Oday, and at this point Parra. If you take the remaining free agents plus the dead money you can resign these guys at market value and add a quality SP to replace Chen without increasing payroll at all. You lose Weiters but at this point who cares? Joseph looks like he can provide the same level of offense or slightly below with about the same defense for pennies on the dollar.

GMs have to have a 3-5 year plan. Managers have a season to season plan. I see the plan DD had going into this year. You have 10 free agents that total about 50mil in current salary. So rely on the good SP you had going in, get a bunch of OF and hope 2 have at least average years. Instead the rotation has been bad and all the players you brought in have had career lows. BTW the odds of one having a career year is higher then ALL of them having their worst years ever at the same time. Was just bad luck in a transition year when you get $50+ million to reload your team. Now if they do NOTHING this off-season and don't start with a $125-135 mil payroll next year, that's when you can question not bringing back Cruz or Markakis to really go for it all this year.

[gmelson26]

Four career seasons...

That's what it took last year for the Orioles to get to where they got. I don't understand how anyone looked at what they were doing this year and thought they could compete. Tillman, who was saw was very out of shape during the off season, never got it going. Norris is gone after putting up 2 wins, he contributed 14 last year. Chen and Gonzalez always wane in August. Frequently they rebound but we are seeing that now as well.

Just think how bad they'd be if we had an average defense.

[Ori-Al]

Just think how bad they'd be if we had an average defense.

And how much better they'd be if they were a few games over .500 in one and two run games. Don't even need incredible numbers like 2012.

[LookitsPuck]

Yes, there's no way to spin it. In the context of contending teams, our starting pitching stinks.

And our offense stinks. When you're starting Paredes (< 200 avg, < 500 OPS since ASB), David Lough, and Ryan Flaherty...you're going to be in deep crap.