Either overhaul the starting pitching development staff, or stop burning high draft picks on pitchers

[weams]

8 hours ago, Tom13206 said:

I’m really hoping we spend our first pick next year on something other than a pitcher. My brain says, “best player available regardless of position” but my heart says “best position player available”. I would hate to waste our best pick in a long time on a pitcher for him to turn out to be a bust. I know it can happen with any player but for whatever reason we seem to be snakebit when it comes to developing starting pitching.

I guess whoever has the number one pick will choose a pitcher. Just a guess. Next year is a long time from now.

[weams]

9 minutes ago, Tx Oriole said:

We've had bad pitching long before DD or Buck were in Baltimore. 

Camden Yards is a particularly tough place for fastball pitchers to exist. 

[Bahama O's Fan]

1 hour ago, weams said:

Camden Yards is a particularly tough place for fastball pitchers to exist. 

I agree, but they are bad outside of Camden too.

[weams]

4 minutes ago, Bahama O's Fan said:

I agree, but they are bad outside of Camden too.

Some have done better in Oakland and Seattle. 

[Bahama O's Fan]

17 minutes ago, weams said:

Some have done better in Oakland and Seattle. 

As members of the O's? 

[Orioles0615]

9 hours ago, Tom13206 said:

I’m really hoping we spend our first pick next year on something other than a pitcher. My brain says, “best player available regardless of position” but my heart says “best position player available”. I would hate to waste our best pick in a long time on a pitcher for him to turn out to be a bust. I know it can happen with any player but for whatever reason we seem to be snakebit when it comes to developing starting pitching.

If we get the first pick, and if it still looks like Bobby Witt Jr is still the top name on the board and they don't pick him I will be beyond pissed 

[weams]

18 minutes ago, Bahama O's Fan said:

As members of the O's? 

Absolutely. 

[Bahama O's Fan]

Just now, weams said:

Absolutely. 

Cool. So we can draft and develop pitchers that can pitch in two parks.

[weams]

4 minutes ago, Bahama O's Fan said:

Cool. So we can draft and develop pitchers that can pitch in two parks.

I'm sure they are awesome in San DIego and Chavez Ravine as well. 

[weams]

1 minute ago, weams said:

I'm sure they are awesome in San DIego and Chavez Ravine as well. 

I am NOT defending the merry go round of pitching development that the Oriole shave evidenced. I am simply saying the Orioles pitchers are/have been bad/injured. 

[vab]

There's definitely something wrong with the drafting or development or, most likely, some combination of the two but they're just going to have to figure it out. They're not going to be able to trade for the true future aces. Teams just don't give them up so the only way a mid-market team like the Orioles is going to get them is to draft and develop them.  

[MemorialStadKid]

15 hours ago, FanSince88 said:

 

But please.  Something is broken with how this organization develops pitchers.  This hasn't just happened a few times.  It. Happens. Every. Frickin. Time.  We are told the next ace is here, they are paraded through the yard, and then they get rocked, again and again and again.  Sure there are some rays of hope here and there.  But really, Gausman had the highest WHIP in the majors most of last year and Bundy is a now basically a batting practice pitcher against all but he most inept offenses.  There have been no aces since Mussina in the early 90s.  There haven't really been any #2 starters either.  Mid-rotation at best, and even most of that have been castoffs from other organizations.  Meanwhile, even bad teams like Tampa Bay, Cleveland, and the White Sox occasionally developed great starting pitching.  

 

Agree with this 100%. 

Does anyone remember Leo Mazzone's problems with the Orioles organization? 

SOURCE: http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/baltimore-sports-blog/bal-ex-orioles-pitching-coach-leo-mazzone-said-chain-of-command-was-broken-in-baltimore-0815-story.html

Quote

"It all starts at the top. It's called the chain of command. With the chain of command, I have experience with both ends of it," Mazzone said in the interview. "When I was with the Atlanta Braves, there was a chain of command that was in place that was never broken. It was never broken by the players. It started with ownership, with Ted Turner. Then it started with the general manager, John Schuerholz, the manager, Bobby Cox, and the coaching staff and the players. So you had a chain of command that was never broken.

I recall another interview where Mazzone said something to the effect that the Orioles lacked an organizational philosophy. I'm paraphrasing based on the fact that the interview I read is over 10 years old, but he claimed that successful baseball franchises tend to have an overall theme that they preach from the minors to the main roster. 

It could be pitching depth, or OBS %, or an emphasis on defense, etc.

Mazzone felt that the Orioles didn't have a clear organizational baseball development strategy that was applied on each level so that there would be an "Oriole Way" of playing the game. With that in mind, is it any shock that we've had serious problems developing pitchers over the last decade? If you have trainers and coaches in AA teaching different throwing styles than the trainers in AAA and then have a different way of throwing on the MLB roster, you can definitely derail and destroy the pitcher's confidence and mechanics to the point where he's ineffective. 

I look at Arrieta as the prime example of this. I also vaguely remember an interview where Arrieta discussed being told by the Orioles not to throw across his body and when he went to the Cubs, the pitching coaches figured out how he could pitch across his body without disrupting his effectiveness. 

SOURCE:  https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/the-remarkably-unpredictable-jake-arrieta-gave-the-cubs-life-in-nlcs-vs-dodgers/

Quote

As Tom Verducci detailed in his excellent book, The Cubs Way, Arrieta didn't lack talent in his O's days, not with a screaming fastball and a sharp-breaking slider. His problem was that he had no idea where his pitches were going. Arrieta used (and still uses) a crossfire delivery, and everyone from pitching coaches to scouts believe (rightfully so) that throwing across your body leaves a pitcher vulnerable to injuries, and lots of bad outcomes. The Cubs believed they could harness Arrieta's talent, plus his hellacious work ethic and fitness habits, and make him the outlier pitcher who could succeed with that risky and unorthodox pitching motion.

All this leads me to believe that the Orioles need to clean house internally. I don't mean with the GM, but with their entire coaching apparatus. If there's been a consistent level of failure across the board for 20+ years, it would stand to reason and logic that something needs to change behind the scenes. If Arrieta's talents were mismanaged or misunderstood, that indicates a massive failure in scouting and development. Someone who understands how to maximize a players talents is what's needed at this point. 

Wasting high draft picks on strong talents who get underdeveloped is a waste of resources and does nothing to promote a winning mentality. 

MSK 

 

[Tx Oriole]

14 hours ago, Roy Firestone said:

Just watch Gausman completely become a star for the Braves. He had a good one the other night...hes on his way, Something IS broken in pitching evaluation and development with our pitching...and its been that way for a long time....

I don't expect Kevin G. to become to become a star for the Braves. 

[Tx Oriole]

12 hours ago, Obando said:

I’m convinced that Buck is the ultimate source of the pitching issues.  Before Buck got here, our former Calvary was developing well under Rick Kranitz, and then Buck brought in his guy Mark Connor, who screwed up our young pitchers and then conveniently quit after 3 months on the job.  Then Rick Adair took over and continued to screw up our young Calvary, resulting in Arrieta getting traded, Matusz moving to the bullpen after failing as a starter, and Britton failing as a starter and only reviving his career as a dominant reliever because of the foresight of Dave Wallace & Dom Chiti.  The only Calvary pitcher that made any real progress under Adair was Tillman, so I’ll give him credit for that.  Maybe you could add Miguel Gonzalez to that credit list as well.  Otherwise, Adair did much more harm than good to our young pitchers.

In all honesty, I think Wallace & Chiti were very good for our entire pitching staff, and had both young & veteran pitchers pitching their best ball from 2014-2016, including Bud Norris having his best year in 2014 and Gausman making real progress in 2016, only to regress in 2017 and into this year.  Hell, they even got Miley & Ubaldo pitching well down the stretch in 2016, which was a huge reason we got to the wild card game.  And we saw what happened to both of them last year.

Roger McDowell & Alan Mills have mostly done nothing to help our pitchers improve as a whole, and I would say the majority of our entire pitching staff has taken a step back since they both came aboard in 2017.

But the common element throughout it all has been Buck, and I think he is much more responsible for how poor our pitching has been (starting pitching specifically) than most care to admit.  Both times he had a good thing going, starting with Kranitz in 2010 when he took over as manager late in the season and Wallace/Chiti in ‘14-‘16, he found a way to screw it up, although to be fair, I think Dave & Dom leaving was more about Brady interfering than anything else.  Still, it should have never come to that, and Buck should have had Dave & Dom’s backs, rather than catering to what Brady wanted.  They were his coaches, and he should have had the balls to tell Brady to back off and let them do their job.

I appreciate all that Buck did to bring winning baseball back to Charm City, but I’m just so ready for the Buck era to end.  He has worn out his welcome, and it’s simply time for a new voice and fresh ideas in the manager’s chair.  I would rather keep DD instead of Buck if I had to pick one of them to stay, but I would rather get rid of both and start fresh with a new GM/manager combo under the new ownership direction of John & Lou Angelos, who seem to “get it,” unlike their father.

Then how come the O's have had bad pitching before DD and Buck? Pitching has been bad for 20 plus years. Where was the pitching in 14 years of losing? 

[Tx Oriole]

13 hours ago, Obando said:

I’m convinced that Buck is the ultimate source of the pitching issues.  Before Buck got here, our former Calvary was developing well under Rick Kranitz, and then Buck brought in his guy Mark Connor, who screwed up our young pitchers and then conveniently quit after 3 months on the job.  Then Rick Adair took over and continued to screw up our young Calvary, resulting in Arrieta getting traded, Matusz moving to the bullpen after failing as a starter, and Britton failing as a starter and only reviving his career as a dominant reliever because of the foresight of Dave Wallace & Dom Chiti.  The only Calvary pitcher that made any real progress under Adair was Tillman, so I’ll give him credit for that.  Maybe you could add Miguel Gonzalez to that credit list as well.  Otherwise, Adair did much more harm than good to our young pitchers.

In all honesty, I think Wallace & Chiti were very good for our entire pitching staff, and had both young & veteran pitchers pitching their best ball from 2014-2016, including Bud Norris having his best year in 2014 and Gausman making real progress in 2016, only to regress in 2017 and into this year.  Hell, they even got Miley & Ubaldo pitching well down the stretch in 2016, which was a huge reason we got to the wild card game.  And we saw what happened to both of them last year.

Roger McDowell & Alan Mills have mostly done nothing to help our pitchers improve as a whole, and I would say the majority of our entire pitching staff has taken a step back since they both came aboard in 2017.

But the common element throughout it all has been Buck, and I think he is much more responsible for how poor our pitching has been (starting pitching specifically) than most care to admit.  Both times he had a good thing going, starting with Kranitz in 2010 when he took over as manager late in the season and Wallace/Chiti in ‘14-‘16, he found a way to screw it up, although to be fair, I think Dave & Dom leaving was more about Brady interfering than anything else.  Still, it should have never come to that, and Buck should have had Dave & Dom’s backs, rather than catering to what Brady wanted.  They were his coaches, and he should have had the balls to tell Brady to back off and let them do their job.

I appreciate all that Buck did to bring winning baseball back to Charm City, but I’m just so ready for the Buck era to end.  He has worn out his welcome, and it’s simply time for a new voice and fresh ideas in the manager’s chair.  I would rather keep DD instead of Buck if I had to pick one of them to stay, but I would rather get rid of both and start fresh with a new GM/manager combo under the new ownership direction of John & Lou Angelos, who seem to “get it,” unlike their father.

I'm sorry I miss read your post.