The O's crash of 2018. Who's to blame?

[brooksfrankjim]

The fish rots from the head.  Angelos and his sons dictated the strategy of going for it by allocating nearly all resources to the major league roster.  

They also implemented the flawed organizational structure.  We still have a flawed organization structure and I believe the sooner they sort that out the faster this rebuild can solidify.  If DD is the guy, announce it.  If Buck is the guy, announce it.  If either are not coming back, get it done now.  

I see the 2018 season as a product of all of the uncertainty in the organization and roster.  Fix it now.

[atomic]

Just now, brooksfrankjim said:

The fish rots from the head.  Angelos and his sons dictated the strategy of going for it by allocating nearly all resources to the major league roster.  

They also implemented the flawed organizational structure.  We still have a flawed organization structure and I believe the sooner they sort that out the faster this rebuild can solidify.  If DD is the guy, announce it.  If Buck is the guy, announce it.  If either are not coming back, get it done now.  

I see the 2018 season as a product of all of the uncertainty in the organization and roster.  Fix it now.

These are all good points. 

[Natty]

1 hour ago, Aristotelian said:

Ownership, Davis, and ownership for signing Davis.

It almost looks like the fire sale was a salary dump to compensate for Davis money.

[CheeryO]

6 hours ago, Catch 8 said:

One of two things needed to happen in the off-season at LEAST two years ago--and more like three years ago:

1) Extend Manny Machado.

2) Blow the whole thing up.

Blame whomever decided not to choose/allow one of these paths.

Wrong.  Machado never had a season like he's having now, and there was no reason to think the O's couldn't compete in 2015/2016.  O's got unlucky with injuries, especially in 2015.

[now]

I think we're past the point of "blame" now. DD put it simply: it was ownership's decision to ride with the "core." It might have worked out, but it didn't. C'est la vie. We should count ourselves lucky the fail was so epic that we had a chance to see it blown up at the deadline this year, to the maximum extent possible. 

[El Gordo]

[Morgan423]

I'm saddened that with this many responses, I did not see one of you point out the true culprit: Mark "Celebratory Pie Remover" Trumbo. 

Twas the sole thing that doomed us all!

[now]

5 minutes ago, Morgan423 said:

I'm saddened that with this many responses, I did not see one of you point out the true culprit: Mark "Celebratory Pie Remover" Trumbo. 

Twas the sole thing that doomed us all!

You could be right... We'll never know. Pretty strong circumstantial evidence, though!

[foxfield]

On 12/20/2017 at 9:31 AM, foxfield said:

One of the reasons given frequently for the Orioles beating the prognosticators predictions over the course of their run was how tight the clubhouse was.  From the night Andino laced the ball to end the Redsox Season in 2011 until the middle of 2017, this team seemed really tight.  That image frayed late this summer with a relatively small incident of Trumbo being pissed at AJ for getting him with a pie.  Is it significant?  I dont know, but a tailspin ending, some interesting AJ tweets and a franchise player on the trading block with several other "stars" and the manager and GM also on the last year of their deals and it sure looks like things are different.

 

11 minutes ago, Morgan423 said:

I'm saddened that with this many responses, I did not see one of you point out the true culprit: Mark "Celebratory Pie Remover" Trumbo. 

Twas the sole thing that doomed us all!

Not the reason by any means.  But more than just some ordinary clubhouse spat.

I do not claim to be the first to make the association, but I have been pretty faithful to say that something changed in the clubhouse and it never got better.  The post above is from December.

[weams]

We are. 

Quote

"We had a blast. My favorite stop so far in my baseball career was the time I spent in Baltimore. We put together some pretty good teams for a while," O'Day said. "I think we eventually paid the price that is coming to fruition now, just from trying to compete every year. Eventually that's going to catch up to you, and the front office and ownership did what they thought was right. ... You can't argue with that. It's the business aspect of baseball, and us as professionals have to accept that."

"One of my fondest memories as an Oriole, 2012, was kind of the year we brought back good baseball to Baltimore to a hungry fan base,"

 

[24fps]

4 hours ago, Natty said:

It almost looks like the fire sale was a salary dump to compensate for Davis money.

What?  The fire sale took place because the whole team stinks.

[Catch 8]

6 hours ago, CheeryO said:

Wrong.  Machado never had a season like he's having now, and there was no reason to think the O's couldn't compete in 2015/2016.  O's got unlucky with injuries, especially in 2015.

This isn't even Machado's best season. 

The real solution was to bend heaven and hell and extend Machado years ago.

Machado has been special for a long time.  

[CheeryO]

9 minutes ago, Catch 8 said:

This isn't even Machado's best season. 

The real solution was to bend heaven and hell and extend Machado years ago.

Machado has been special for a long time.  

Look up his stats.  This is Machado's best season with the bat -- by a decent margin.  First season he's ever had an OPS above .900; first season his average is above .300; and first season his OBP is flirting with .400.  It's pretty easily his best season offensively.  Defensively it's another story.  I always thought Machado was rather overrated -- until this season.

[Dipper9]

Blame Canada! Blame Canada !

[tntoriole]

Who is to blame?  Hillary.   Sorry...just kidding.  

Trying to get additional titles out of this flawed core was the strategy, it failed...it became way costly and led to the lack of developmental improvements and lack of replacements in the current farm system, international players, etc.  It crash landed because it was poorly designed and ill conceived and waited at least a year too long in being started as a rebuild.  Who is responsible?   Everyone involved in any of the decision making since 2012.