Adam Jones: ""This is the last six games with our brothers..."

[jtschrei]

Love AJ. Love the quote. Love his attitude. I'll tip one back as well for this mini-end of an era... really, we're talking about the Deputy, O'Day, Chen, and Wieters.

[Frobby]

Is there a point here somewhere??

Is 50 wins your criteria for being terrible

Mine is a little higher like 70 wins

and with a team of Jones, Machado, Schoop, Gausman, Britton

and Davis, Chen, and O'day the 2015 O's are only going to win 76-77 games

So without them we will be very lucky to win 70 in 2016

Depends who gets signed in the offseason, and other factors, most importantly, what we get out of our four returning starting pitchers next year. I could see some scenarios where we are horrible, and other scenarios where we contend. But Duquette has his work cut out for him, for sure. You can't replace all the guys you mentioned with a bunch of iffy guys.

[DrungoHazewood]

Juan Bell

Brian Holton

Ken Howell

Ken Howell brought back Phil Bradley, who had a nice 2-win season for the Why Not? team before disappearing into the ether much like the ball he lost in the fog one night in early June. Also, I was in attendance at Brian Holton bullpen committee night where Frank ran out of starters and had to stick somebody out there for the first. I guess it would be fun reprising that.

[DrungoHazewood]

There are NO INDICATIONS that ownership was open to the idea of raising payroll by 13 million on top of the increase they already had.

Folks "The owner is wealthy" is not a valid argument.

All MLB owners are wealthy, all of them have budgets.

Why do you like losing so much?!?!

[TonySoprano]

Davis also recognizes he may not be back

"I'm trying not to reminisce too much just yet. I definitely want to enjoy these last few games and take everything in being around these guys and playing in front of our fans. I try not to look too far ahead. If I did that, it would be a lot harder the last few days and that might take some of the joy away."

Davis said for now he wants to embrace the final few days of this season, not knowing if his days as an Oriole are numbered.

"I think it is trying to enjoy being around these guys. We know we have several guys that could go to other teams, with uncertain futures here. We are trying to enjoy these last few days together. This is a special group of guys," Davis said. "It has been the four years I've been here. Every clubhouse group we've had has been extremely close, like a family. So it's going to be tough when the last day comes."

source - Steve Melewski

[Can_of_corn]

Why do you like losing so much?!?!

I like high draft picks.

[24fps]

It is quite clear that the core of the team was upset about the two guys that left and are very sad anticipating the group that will leave this year. No matter how you slice it, it isn't a good thing when critical members of the team are spending so much energy focusing on how things are ending.

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No, it isn't a good thing. That being said, IMO the energy would have been much better spent, especially after the AS break, making a more compelling case that the existing team chemistry is so special that heroic measures to preserve it were warranted. I burned a lot of digital ink this season responding to the unrelenting negativity around here and I recall that you did the same. As the season draws to a close, the standings say to me that some of that negativity (certainly not all) was deserved. Maybe a few fresh faces and a vigorous punch of the reset button won't be such a bad thing.

[osfan83]

Is there a point here somewhere??

Is 50 wins your criteria for being terrible

Mine is a little higher like 70 wins

and with a team of Jones, Machado, Schoop, Gausman, Britton

and Davis, Chen, and O'day the 2015 O's are only going to win 76-77 games

So without them we will be very lucky to win 70 in 2016

You are only looking at the lost players and not at the replacements...yes I know we don't know who they are yet, but I believe payroll in 2016 will be in the same neighborhood as 2015....so there will be additions.

This team has a good core of players, much better than 2000-2010. And players don't perform the same every year. 2015 team, allowed to come back with the same players could win 85-88 games in 2016, the talent was there.

Next year this team will have the talent to make the post season.....the question is will they perform at their talent potential, or under-perform?

[osfan83]

It is quite clear that the core of the team was upset about the two guys that left and are very sad anticipating the group that will leave this year. No matter how you slice it, it isn't a good thing when critical members of the team are spending so much energy focusing on how things are ending.

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Why didn't the Mets tank realizing that Cespedes may be leaving next year?

[MrOrange82]

I like high draft picks.

They're put to (much?) better uses by (most?) other teams.

At least I can put my season ticket money into a car this winter with few regrets. It's shaping up to be an ugly year for Baltimore sports.

[Nevermore]

Personal money? If so that would be nice, but hardly expected. Most here work off the reasonable assumption that budgets are meaningful and determined from a business standpoint.

I didn't mean that Angelos would take this out of his personal pocket money. Angelos, like most MLB owners, has businesses other than baseball. Yes, there is a budget. But the budget is a lot higher than some people on OH are assuming that it is.

[Nevermore]

It is quite clear that the core of the team was upset about the two guys that left and are very sad anticipating the group that will leave this year. No matter how you slice it, it isn't a good thing when critical members of the team are spending so much energy focusing on how things are ending.

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Speaking of budgets, there will be lost revenue from fans deciding not to return because they believe that management is letting fan favored FAs leave the team. And speaking further of budgets, with bringing back the two guys that are mentioned (we know who they are), there would have been a lot of gained revenue from post season money and progressing further into the playoffs. Who knows, perhaps into the WS.

[FlipTheBird]

Pardon me if this link was posted before, I didn't see anything like this already on the board.

SOURCE: http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/orioles/bs-sp-orioles-main-0930-20150929-story.html

This article is from the Sun yesterday, and it's pretty melancholy to say the least. This quote from Adam hit me pretty hard:

There's definitely a feeling of an ending of an era. A short-term era of winning where the contention window ended pretty fast. I plan on watching the last games with a beer held high for the great memories of 2012 - 2014. Although I do feel they could have done much more to maintain contention, I'll never forget my experiences at OPACY playing the Yankees in the ALDS. One of the greatest experiences of my entire life.

I also like the Zack Britton was just as excited about the potential of contending as the fans.

There will always be a lot of unfulfilled dreams of what would have happened if the Orioles had went all in. We could be in a three-way tie for the AL East with Toronto and the Yankees. That would have been glorious.

As I said before, here's to brighter days...

MSK

It absolutely is the end of an era.

That doesn't necessarily mean it's the end of success, or the end of the Orioles' window. It's just the end of THIS particular group's window. Next year is a new group, which will have every opportunity to make its own window.

Though we all have our suspicions, we don't know precisely what the future holds. But by Opening Day 2016, this roster will probably have just a small handful of guys that were around for the majority of the 2012-2014 magic. Jones, Machado, Hardy, Tillman, Britton. Everyone else is a question mark.

It'll be tough to let this team go. Was a great ride, and they came oh-so-close to putting it all together. They were a heckuva lot of fun to watch, and it'll be hard to replicate that success, that chemistry, right away, if at all.

So, yeah, I agree. I'll crack a beer Sunday, or whenever the regular season ends (what with the weather), and salute what's been a fantastic ride. Because it's over, and it'll never quite be the same. Doesn't mean it can't be as good, but it's absolutely going to be very different.

[DrungoHazewood]

It absolutely is the end of an era.

That doesn't necessarily mean it's the end of success, or the end of the Orioles' window. It's just the end of THIS particular group's window. Next year is a new group, which will have every opportunity to make its own window.

Though we all have our suspicions, we don't know precisely what the future holds. But by Opening Day 2016, this roster will probably have just a small handful of guys that were around for the majority of the 2012-2014 magic. Jones, Machado, Hardy, Tillman, Britton. Everyone else is a question mark.

It'll be tough to let this team go. Was a great ride, and they came oh-so-close to putting it all together. They were a heckuva lot of fun to watch, and it'll be hard to replicate that success, that chemistry, right away, if at all.

So, yeah, I agree. I'll crack a beer Sunday, or whenever the regular season ends (what with the weather), and salute what's been a fantastic ride. Because it's over, and it'll never quite be the same. Doesn't mean it can't be as good, but it's absolutely going to be very different.

That's a good post. Too many people think that the only way to go is down. Change equals inevitable decline. But often staying the course is worse. You can make bad investments to keep the band together. If you just go out and resign all of your guys because you love your team you end up with a bunch of highly paid free agents in their decline phases, pushing the mid-range talent off the roster to make the budget work. And you can end up as the Phillies. Pretty much every Phils fan would like a bunch of wins instead of seeing Howard and Utley and Ruiz go down the toilet together.

[El Gordo]

That's a good post. Too many people think that the only way to go is down. Change equals inevitable decline. But often staying the course is worse. You can make bad investments to keep the band together. If you just go out and resign all of your guys because you love your team you end up with a bunch of highly paid free agents in their decline phases, pushing the mid-range talent off the roster to make the budget work. And you can end up as the Phillies. Pretty much every Phils fan would like a bunch of wins instead of seeing Howard and Utley and Ruiz go down the toilet together.

Speaking of Howard maybe we'll trade for him to be a LH DH?:laughlol: