Baseball America ... 5. Orioles in their top 100. Plus the top 10 Orioles prospects

[joelala]

All aboard the hype train! Love it. And yea let’s hope there is no strike. In the event there is, will the minor leagues still have their respective seasons?

[Roll Tide]

3 hours ago, joelala said:

All aboard the hype train! Love it. And yea let’s hope there is no strike. In the event there is, will the minor leagues still have their respective seasons?

I believe the minor leagues still play.

[Frobby]

15 minutes ago, Roll Tide said:

I believe the minor leagues still play.

In 1994, the year of the long strike, Rochester played 141 games.   So, unless things have changed, yes, they play.   

[Can_of_corn]

20 minutes ago, Frobby said:

In 1994, the year of the long strike, Rochester played 141 games.   So, unless things have changed, yes, they play.   

Did the players in the minors but on the 40 man play?

[VaBird1]

19 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Did the players in the minors but on the 40 man play?

It looks like Arthur Rhodes, Benitez, and Pennington did. . Don’t have the 40 man, but assume they were on it all season.

[Frobby]

37 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Did the players in the minors but on the 40 man play?

Don’t know, nor do I know if they had a 40-man roster in 1994 and what the rules were.

[NCRaven]

3 hours ago, Frobby said:

Don’t know, nor do I know if they had a 40-man roster in 1994 and what the rules were.

Waiting for Drungo to tells us that the 40 man roster was adopted in 1889 when the Cleveland Spiders tried to have 67 players in the dugout for a double header against Cincinnati.

Edit:  The teams were probably in different leagues, but don’t let that stop me.

[Orioles0615]

On 11/14/2020 at 12:27 PM, Can_of_corn said:

I know they have different writers doing these pieces but they should coordinate a bit better they have:

1. Ryan Mountcastle as the Orioles best RoY candidate for 2021.
2. Adley Rutschman as the Orioles top impact prospect for 2021.
3. Gunnar Henderson as the projected top prospect for 2022.
4. Heston Kjerstad ranked ahead of Mountcastle.

So AR is going to have more of an impact in 2021 than Mountcastle but be less likely to win RoY?

Kjerstad is a better prospect than Mountcastle but Henderson will be the better prospect in 2022?

How much of a bump did Kjerstad get based off of his draft status?  I wouldn't, off an abbreviated college season and no pro ball, rank him over Hall and Mountcastle.

I doubt we see Rutschman this year, especially since they played no minor league ball this year. I hope we see him though. 

[DrungoHazewood]

11 hours ago, NCRaven said:

Waiting for Drungo to tells us that the 40 man roster was adopted in 1889 when the Cleveland Spiders tried to have 67 players in the dugout for a double header against Cincinnati.

Edit:  The teams were probably in different leagues, but don’t let that stop me.

I don't actually know the full history of the 40-man roster, except that it was apparently enacted in 1921.  In the 1800s it was common for teams to have far fewer players than today.  The champion 1894 Orioles had a lot of churn and chaos on the pitching staff through the year, and used 10 pitchers.  They also used 10 position players.  So at any given point in time they probably had about 16 active players.  This was driven by precarious finances, couldn't afford to pay more players.  And until the early 1890s all substitutes required the consent of the opposing team so most of today's strategies using relievers, platooning, pinch hitting, using defensive replacements, etc were unknown.  You'd ask the other manager if you can pinch hit and he'd just say no.  You'd ask the other manager if you can replace the LFer who just broke his ankle, and he'd say no.  You'd ask if you can remove the starting pitcher who'd allowed 14 runs in 2 1/3 and he'd laugh, and you'd swap him out with the RFer.

The '89 Spiders used 16 players all season, including a couple pitchers who threw 18 innings between them.

In 1889 Cleveland was in the National League, Cincy in the American Association.  In '90 the Reds moved to the NL as the AA started to disintegrate.

[Just Regular]

The BA companion podcast with Meoli came out the other day - the nuggets to me there were:

-Hall showing progress controlling his mechanics in October instructs.

-Mountcastle having had to rebuild his swing to curate more power "by himself", as he got a bad rap from some club officials (presumably from the old regime) that didn't like him and perhaps over-dramatized his defensive helplessness.  Ignoring basic player development needs is a pretty damning thing to insinuate regardless of how much any given team official might not have liked the player from a personal style choice perspective.

-Westburg presenting himself as an "obvious major leaguer" to Florida observers.  Meoli straight out said he might have juggled list to get him into the 10 if he didn't have an early October due date submitting his list.

His Rutschman timeline guess was well shy of my Team Game #30 hopes, splitting the difference between "maybe a tiny bit at the end of '21" and early 2022.  The host shared an assessment from a scout he characterized as stingy with praise saying it could be a Kris Bryant-bat with an Austin Hedges-glove.  That could get brutal if he really does stick in the Eastern League most of the year.  If we can't get May 1, my next line of retreat would be can we at least get like David Wright's 2004 (70 AA, 20 AAA, 70 MLB - postseason play 2 years later)?  He's only like the centerpiece of the Lindor Cohort a-courtin there is to be done.

(Though I suppose if he establishes the Wieters Facts brand - one year older - next year, the theater of watching whatever would be cooked up for April 2022 could flirt with being the pinnacle of the art).

 

[Frobby]

Thanks, OrioleDog.   I’m pretty psyched about the feedback on Westburg.    

I didn’t know anything about Austin Hedges’ defensive prowess until seeing the Rutschman comp here.   Apparently that’s quite a compliment.   
 

[Tony-OH]

47 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

It's good to hear but we haven't seen Westburg, Henderson, or even Rutschman assert themselves in professional ball yet.  I'm cautiously optimistic. 

The good thing about those three is that they are athletic guys that don't have known defensive limitations yet. In the past we've had Mancini or a Mountcastle coming up the system with special bats but no real defensive value. They are the first three top prospects in some time that have come through with likely outcome of having value with the bat and in the field. If they turn into impact bats, then they turn into true star players.

Saying that, I agree, we don't have professional stats to back that up and Westburg was not exactly a numbers monster in college despite his tools.

Either way, it's good to have these kinds of talents in the system.

[wildcard]

20 hours ago, OrioleDog said:

The BA companion podcast with Meoli came out the other day - the nuggets to me there were:

-Hall showing progress controlling his mechanics in October instructs.

-Mountcastle having had to rebuild his swing to curate more power "by himself", as he got a bad rap from some club officials (presumably from the old regime) that didn't like him and perhaps over-dramatized his defensive helplessness.  Ignoring basic player development needs is a pretty damning thing to insinuate regardless of how much any given team official might not have liked the player from a personal style choice perspective.

-Westburg presenting himself as an "obvious major leaguer" to Florida observers.  Meoli straight out said he might have juggled list to get him into the 10 if he didn't have an early October due date submitting his list.

His Rutschman timeline guess was well shy of my Team Game #30 hopes, splitting the difference between "maybe a tiny bit at the end of '21" and early 2022.  The host shared an assessment from a scout he characterized as stingy with praise saying it could be a Kris Bryant-bat with an Austin Hedges-glove.  That could get brutal if he really does stick in the Eastern League most of the year.  If we can't get May 1, my next line of retreat would be can we at least get like David Wright's 2004 (70 AA, 20 AAA, 70 MLB - postseason play 2 years later)?  He's only like the centerpiece of the Lindor Cohort a-courtin there is to be done.

(Though I suppose if he establishes the Wieters Facts brand - one year older - next year, the theater of watching whatever would be cooked up for April 2022 could flirt with being the pinnacle of the art).

 

Interesting that Meoili heard that Hall improved his mechanics and kept him at #3  while Tony did not hear good things about Hall's control and command and dropped him in the rankings.    Meoili rambled so much on the podcast I don't know how much to believe him.

https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/podcast-baltimore-orioles-top-10-prospects/

[Tony-OH]

12 hours ago, wildcard said:

Interesting that Meoili heard that Hall improved his mechanics and kept him at #3  while Tony did not hear good things about Hall's control and command and dropped him in the rankings.    Meoili rambled so much on the podcast I don't know how much to believe him.

https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/podcast-baltimore-orioles-top-10-prospects/

Mine was based off alternate camp reports. I heard he threw the ball well down in the instructs, but of course, he was facing much less experienced hitters there. 

[Sports Guy]

I think the bottom line is that all of these lists have to be taken with a grain of salt this year.  It’s hard to make them correctly when you have a lot of info but when you have very little, it’s really difficult .