So We Finished Dead Last.

[LookitsPuck]

1 hour ago, ORIOLE33 said:

Oh come on. Yes, the pitching was horrible, but this team was in last place for ONE day all season. The very last day.

Where was the pride and heart these last few weeks?

We knew the starting pitching had the potential to be awful at the start of this season.

We knew nearly the entire season the starting pitching was abysmal.

The numbers caught up to the Orioles. I don't care about the last few weeks.

[flyhighbirds]

It's not impossible, but how often do you find two of Chen, Gonzalez, Hamel on the cheap without giving up much?    Secondly, it just doesn't make sense when you look at the big picture.    The AL east figures to be stronger next year and we don't have a lot of young depth to sustain anything relative to the competition.    Every team in the league can say there is a chance, but at some point you have to be smart and rebuild.

[Uli2001]

18 hours ago, ORIOLE33 said:

I had honestly stopped paying attention to what our record was for about a week. I knew we were ahead of Toronto, but I didn't think we'd finish last. To finish behind Toronto after the way we started and the dreadful start they had, we must have been really, really bad. 

How did this happen. 

A 4-19 finish when they stopped caring for Ws, that's how. 

[LookitsPuck]

It's not just that, but this team needs 4-5 starters not just the 3 to remake the rotation. When's the last time Duquette rebuilt an entire rotation (effectively) in one offseason? It's a tall order.

[Morgan423]

I'm completely fine with us tanking to close the season.  Once we were out of serious WC contention, the games were meaningless, and these losses moved us right on up the draft board past our nearest neighbors in the league W-L standings like the Jays, Marlins, Mariners, Rays, and Rangers.  In fact, if we could have gotten one more loss, we could have moved past the Pirates and The A's too and drafted 9th instead of 11th (they had the same record this year, but draft before us because our 2016 record was better than theirs).

[SteveA]

7 hours ago, gmelson26 said:

In some ways, we were extremely lucky to have the record we have, given the starting pitching staff.  I think only 3 teams gave up more runs than we did but we had a better record than 8-9 teams.

And yet the 4-19 collapse to end the year was based at least as much, if not more, on lack of hitting than on starting pitching.

The bats went silent for the last 4 weeks of the season, for the most part.   Trey Mancini was the only guy who hit consistently well over that time.

[Frobby]

6 minutes ago, SteveA said:

And yet the 4-19 collapse to end the year was based at least as much, if not more, on lack of hitting than on starting pitching.

The bats went silent for the last 4 weeks of the season, for the most part.   Trey Mancini was the only guy who hit consistently well over that time.

Ironically, Trey Mancini was our most consistent hitter this year.   His .726 OPS this month was his lowest of the year.    By comparison, here's the low month for our other main players:

Davis .590

Schoop .590

Machado .587

Beckham .603 (as an Oriole)

Castillo .615

Jones .646

Smith .395

Trumbo .539

Joseph .315

Hardy .492

PS - every one of these except Castillo, Jones and Hardy was September/October.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[hoosiers]

4 hours ago, Frobby said:

Chen?   Gonzalez?   Hammel?

I don't think it's impossible for us to revert to being a team that wins in the high 80's/low 90's next year. There's almost nowhere to go but up so far as the rotation is concerned.     This one was probably in the bottom 1-2% in major league history.    Fortunately, the two guys who were decent are still under team control at pretty cheap prices, while the others are all on expiring contacts so we don't need to keep them.    It's just a matter of whether Duquette can find the right guys.

If Tillman can be signed and healthy and decent next year, that would help immensely. 

If we sign a premium FA SP, that could also help. 

There are obviously strong pieces in place with Schoop and Manny and good contributions from Mancini and perhaps Hays and a strong bullpen.  I just don't think we man up with the NYY or BoSox given their youth, the upside of the youth and the payroll capacity of those teams.  We will enter next season clearly behind the Astros and Indians as well.

IMO, our sights would be on the second WC and that's not a sufficient risk or temptation for me to avoid tearing this down and re-grouping for a few years. 

Regarding the SPs, Hammel was, like Norris, mediocre in his time with the Os overall - just a very skewed set of results.  DD gets credit for Chen and MiGon, but those guys were never part of any LT plan.