MW QO Acceptance: For or Against the QO?

[weams]

If Wieters arm is not in any harm, he'll catch 120 games minimum. Bank on it.

Even if it is tender occasionally, bank on it.

[Es4M11]

Even if it is tender occasionally, bank on it.

Most definitely! PA isn't going to pay a guy 16 mil to be a semi-part time player.

[weams]

Most definitely! PA isn't going to pay a guy 16 mil to be a semi-part time player.

Or even a DH. He pays 8 million for that.

[Es4M11]

Or even a DH. He pays 8 million for that.

Ignoring the fact Matt has no value as a DH to begin with. As a DH at 16 million?

[Tony-OH]

I'm happy the 27 people are not running the Orioles front office. lol

The people who said they are for it before and against it afterwards make sense because you didn't think he would take the QO. That's a valid opinion. For those of you that are for this move after he accepted, well, thank God you have a day job. If you think signing Wieters for $16 million when we have Joseph and name your back up for about $14 million less really don't understand the Orioles payroll limitations. If they were paid the same I'm probably picking Wieters due to his offensive abilities, but he's not $15 million better than Caleb. That money could have been used for an Alex Gordon or a starter, but now we will be out one less potential impact player for a guy who may only be marginally, and potential not better than our current in house options.

[DrungoHazewood]

For Wieters to be a plus, he needs to sigfnicantly outperform what can be expect of a platoon of what Joseph/Clevenger would have produced. I think the evidence shows that a platoon could be expected to produce 1-2 WAR. Wieters can reasonably, IMO, be excpected to produce 1-2 WAR. His last healthy season he produced a .6 WAR. His defense has slipped. Let's forget that we won 96 games with mostly Joseph behind the plate in 2014. We didn't need Wieters, certainly not at 15.8M.

Except that I don't think it would have been a platoon with Clevenger. Even with the instability in the Orioles' catching the last two seasons Clevenger caught 230 innings for the Orioles, or 25, 26 games. Clevenger was a 3rd catcher who would primarily DH or play first, as was his role last year (30 games played, 9 as a catcher). I have to think Joseph's backup would have been someone not in the organization.

[Stotle]

SSS, n=2, correlation doesn't equal causation and all that, but Joseph's bat has totally disappeared the last two Septembers with his moderate workload.

Yes. I know people in multiple organizations that do not believe Joseph is a full-time catcher, and chuckled a bit when I suggested there were Orioles fans who viewed him as a potential above-average regular. Doesn't mean those chuckle-heads are right, of course.

[Stotle]

He's never had a 5 or 6 win season. His last really good year was 2012 with a 3.5 WAR. His last healthy season was a .6. There is no logical reason to expect more than a 2 WAR season from him. 3 is possible but very unlikely. His defense accounted for a significant portiion of his WAR and that seems to have slipped over the last 3 years. We still don't know what his arm will be like this year.

I think he was just responding to the post that said Weters could hit .300/30/100 and still hurt the team.

Drungo is correct. I wasn't projecting out Wieters, I was responding to a claim made by another poster.

[DrungoHazewood]

For those of you that are for this move after he accepted, well, thank God you have a day job. If you think signing Wieters for $16 million when we have Joseph and name your back up for about $14 million less really don't understand the Orioles payroll limitations. If they were paid the same I'm probably picking Wieters due to his offensive abilities, but he's not $15 million better than Caleb. That money could have been used for an Alex Gordon or a starter, but now we will be out one less potential impact player for a guy who may only be marginally, and potential not better than our current in house options.

I was for the QO because I believe that was an acceptable level of risk, and that there was a very good chance of the outcome being a better Oriole farm system. The outcome doesn't change that, even though I'm not happy that the team now has to pay Wieters $16M.

[Stotle]

I'm happy the 27 people are not running the Orioles front office. lol

The people who said the for it before and against it afterwards make sense because you didn't think he would take the QO. That's a valid opinion. For those of you that are for this move after he accepted, well, thank God you have a day job. If you think signing Wieters for $16 million when we have Joseph and name your back up for about $14 million less really don't understand the Orioles payroll limitations. If they were paid the same I'm probably picking Wieters due to his offensive abilities, but he's not $15 million better than Caleb. That money could have been used for an Alex Gordon or a starter, but now we will be out one less potential impact player for a guy who may only be marginally, and potential not better than our current in house options.

That analysis doesn't make much sense. Why is $16 MM for Wieters demonstrably worse than $13 MM for Ubaldo or $12 MM for Hardy? The outcome is fine; it just requires Duquette to make the appropriate moves within the allotted payroll to get to a satisfactory 25-man come March. Maybe that means he has to trade some combination of Britton/Matusz/Tillman/Ubaldo/Hardy? But acting like the singular act of having Wieters on the roster for a year at $16 MM crushes the teams chances is pretty rudimentary.

[Es4M11]

Yes. I know people in multiple organizations that do not believe Joseph is a full-time catcher, and chuckled a bit when I suggested there were Orioles fans who viewed him as a potential above-average regular. Doesn't mean those chuckle-heads are right, of course.

All we needed was a Nick Hundley type. Somebody who could catch 50ish games and be a competent second option behind Joseph. Could have gotten a guy like Salty and paid next to nothing for the position. Now the team has 16 mil wrapped up in the position with the (potentially) better asset riding pine.

[Frobby]

If Wieters arm is not in any harm, he'll catch 120 games minimum. Bank on it.

I don't think Buck will push Wieters that hard, given the quality of his backup. I think he'll start Wieters at C in about 110 games. And I'm hoping that level of use will keep Wieters fresh and maximize his offense. Buck really rode him hard in 2011-13, because his backups (principally Tatum and Teagarden) couldn't hit a lick. Joseph is a much better alternative.

[turtlebowl]

I have read so much talk about Weiters excepting the QO has really hurt the O's. To me the only way this hurts is if he completely sucks next season. Sure it may mean that DD needs to be a little more creative with a limited budget but that's his job and had to know it was a possibility when the QO was offered.

Even hitting 250 with 12 hr's at the trade deadline means that he is a very tradeable commodity. I have to believe that in a trade scenario the O's will get back a player with more likelihood of helping the major league team than what you would get from drafting and trying to develop a player. Also you still have that marginal hope that Weiters has a breakout type season. Who knows maybe he keeps this team in the playoff hunt or we parlay a hot bat into 2 or 3 major league ready prospects.

Just don't get all the gloom and doom over this. It actually could really pay off in the long run. I'm hoping Weiters mashes next year!!

[weams]

That analysis doesn't make much sense. Why is $16 MM for Wieters demonstrably worse than $13 MM for Ubaldo or $12 MM for Hardy? The outcome is fine; it just requires Duquette to make the appropriate moves within the allotted payroll to get to a satisfactory 25-man come March. Maybe that means he has to trade some combination of Britton/Matusz/Tillman/Ubaldo/Hardy? But acting like the singular act of having Wieters on the roster for a year at $16 MM crushes the teams chances is pretty rudimentary.

Ubaldo appears to be worth 13 million. Maybe a lot more based on some of the weird deals we have seen so far. Hardy got hurt.

[weams]

All we needed was a Nick Hundley type. Somebody who could catch 50ish games and be a competent second option behind Joseph. Could have gotten a guy like Salty and paid next to nothing for the position. Now the team has 16 mil wrapped up in the position with the (potentially) better asset riding pine.

Hundley type costs about 3 million.