Jose Iglesias traded to Angels.

[Philip]

3 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

They absolutely promote him unless he is hurt or not performing well. 

I think he gets into somewhere between 60-80 games in 2021 if things go according to plan.

Why waste a pre-arb season on a non-contending team? Even if the Orioles are 50-30 at the half way point, do you think they’d bring him up? MAYBE. After all, Manny was brought up quite young in ‘12, but things were completely different then. 

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, Philip said:

Why waste a pre-arb season on a non-contending team? Even if the Orioles are 50-30 at the half way point, do you think they’d bring him up? MAYBE. After all, Manny was brought up quite young in ‘12, but things were completely different then. 

Because sometimes, you get a player that is just so good that you don’t keep him down.  You get the extra year this year by waiting until late April but once he is ready, you get him up.  Also, if you think he is that good and a franchise player, you sign him to a long term deal right out of the gate and then the service time doesn’t matter.

If you are elite, no need to languish in the minors.

[Philip]

2 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

Does it, or is his given budget requiring him to make these decisions?

I hardly think 300,000 here and there is going to make any kind of dent in the budget restrictions. I don’t know why they gave Sevi 1.4, but the money difference between him and his Minimum wage alternative is peanuts.

[Roll Tide]

3 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

They absolutely promote him unless he is hurt or not performing well. 

I think he gets into somewhere between 60-80 games in 2021 if things go according to plan.

This would be a very disturbing sign from a GM who is obviously a resource guy working for a penny pinching ownership group. There is no need to waste a half season of control this season when you are playing with a bunch of spare parts playing all over the diamond.

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, Roll Tide said:

This would be a very disturbing sign from a GM who is obviously a resource guy working for a penny pinching ownership group. There is no need to waste a half season of control this season when you are playing with a bunch of spare parts playing all over the diamond.

Except they aren’t playing with spare parts and more of the (hopeful) long term pieces will be up this year too.

[Just Regular]

6 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Wasting service on Mountcastle would have been stupid.

We ended up 7 games behind the Blue Jays, and Elias couldn't have known there'd be good cluster luck in the first half atop the expanded playoffs, but I can certainly imagine a 2020 in which we got Week 2 Mountcastle, Baumann, Kremer, etc and kept things closer than they were.  I don't know if Mountcastle's measured to miss Super Two, or if it will even be a thing in the next CBA, but I think that's the only difference between Mountcastle having maybe double the reps at seeing MLB pitching than he actually does entering '21.   He would have had to take his swing decision classes in Baltimore instead of Bowie though, and maybe the faculty was better there.

On another note, I'll pick the nit of Iglesias's expected forward-going defense.  This is mostly just straight SS-ageism, but only Andrus and Brandon Crawford were regulars at Age 31 or above last year, and Iglesias's Age 30 year his legs were hurt most of the summer.  You could argue the hurt old shortstop thing just like for pitchers.   Its funny because the shape of it was so surprising, but with the positional penalty I feel like we just got an "average" Iglesias year, not even any kind of a star turn.

[LTO's]

20 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

I don't think we end up with someone comparable, and I'm not expecting him to repeat 2020 with the bat.

This is what basically everybody said when they dumped Villar and he was dreadful last year. Peak overreaction time right now considering they haven't yet made a move to address the position as they said they will. It's disappointing that O's will be bad for another year but because of previous administrations' ineptitude there was no way the Os were going to be able to fully compete with the Yankees, Rays and Blue Jays in 2021. Just wasn't going to happen. Iglesias playing shortstop was not going to make the difference. If next year they don't bring up Adley and make some FA moves I will be upset, but the team just isn't at the level it needs to be yet. Last year was a short sample aberration.

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, OrioleDog said:

We ended up 7 games behind the Blue Jays, and Elias couldn't have known there'd be good cluster luck in the first half atop the expanded playoffs, but I can certainly imagine a 2020 in which we got Week 2 Mountcastle, Baumann, Kremer, etc and kept things closer than they were.  I don't know if Mountcastle's measured to miss Super Two, or if it will even be a thing in the next CBA, but I think that's the only difference between Mountcastle having maybe double the reps at seeing MLB pitching than he actually does entering '21.   He would have had to take his swing decision classes in Baltimore instead of Bowie though, and maybe the faculty was better there.

On another note, I'll pick the nit of Iglesias's expected forward-going defense.  This is mostly just straight SS-ageism, but only Andrus and Brandon Crawford were regulars at Age 31 or above last year, and Iglesias's Age 30 year his legs were hurt most of the summer.  You could argue the hurt old shortstop thing just like for pitchers.   Its funny because the shape of it was so surprising, but with the positional penalty I feel like we just got an "average" Iglesias year, not even any kind of a star turn.

I think an argument is there that Mountcastle could have been up a few weeks sooner.  

He definitely cleared super 2 if it still exists.  I’m not as concerned about that but gaining the extra year when you suck is 100% the right move.  
 

Now, if the Os were a good team and a legit contender, you get them up immediately but that’s obviously far from the case.

[Sports Guy]

If we end up with Galvis, you won’t see any drop off imo.

[Just Regular]

2 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

I think an argument is there that Mountcastle could have been up a few weeks sooner.  

He definitely cleared super 2 if it still exists.  I’m not as concerned about that but gaining the extra year when you suck is 100% the right move.  
 

Now, if the Os were a good team and a legit contender, you get them up immediately but that’s obviously far from the case.

We definitely have a few interesting cases to watch whenever next year gets underway.   I imagine I'll be parsing the Opening Day or Week 2 decisions of our guys and others as leading indicators of is Ownership throwing the Players any bones trying to avoid a 2022 Year 3 disruption, or is April/May 2021 just full cold shoulder and only Pat Valaika gets to be employed on a split contract.

[LTO's]

I actually have agreed with almost every move Elias has made recently but one gripe I have is the way he talks to the media. How he addressed the Alberto situation referencing the CBA and the winning "switch" was a horrible look. I think he is too smart for his own good and thought the brutally honest route was the way to go without realizing that sports deal with a lot of real human emotion. There's a definite middle ground between the non-speak mumbo jumbo that plagued Duquette towards the end and outright saying we aren't trying to spend money on our product. I ultimately think that if he brings a winning team to Baltimore all will be forgiven and we won't be thinking about the 2020 offseason. I personally believe he will because he's incredibly bright and has already improved the farm by some 20 odd spots in two years while delivering on his promise to give out high bonuses to international players.

I'll continue to watch the ML product because I like rooting for the players coming through our system and know that throwing tens of millions of dollars at aging FAs in order to "compete" isn't going to help either. Compare how happy people were when we signed Davis, Cobb and Trumbo to how they feel about them now.

[Roll Tide]

25 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Except they aren’t playing with spare parts and more of the (hopeful) long term pieces will be up this year too.

Sanchez, Ruiz, Mullins, Valaika , and Davis are all spare parts that will be playing. This is likely 3 to 4 of your starting infield unless Mancini is ready. Hayes may or may not be a spare part if he's healthy and then productive. I'd say we are playing spare parts!

[Sports Guy]

6 minutes ago, Roll Tide said:

Sanchez, Ruiz, Mullins, Valaika , and Davis are all spare parts that will be playing. This is likely 3 to 4 of your starting infield unless Mancini is ready. Hayes may or may not be a spare part if he's healthy and then productive. I'd say we are playing spare parts!

Well, in that sense, we should just get rid of Adley now.  You will always have spare parts on your team.  There has never been a team in the history of organized sport that didn’t have spare parts on it.

However, this year Adley will be surrounded by several young pitchers and hitters who could all be here foe the next contending team.

[Just Regular]

I'd characterize the winning switch comment as about league average candor for a veteran of the Astros process.

Who is ready to be excited sometime in 2021 or 2022 when we get some variation on the classic, "The only thing separating this organization from being considered one of the best in baseball is Wins and Losses at the major league level".

Chuck LaMar the original artist.   We should do a poll on is it better if Elias or Angelos says it.

“The only thing that keeps this organization from being recognized as one of the finest in baseball is wins and losses at the major league level.” — Rays GM Chuck LaMar, after the club compiled a 451-680 record and six last-place finishes in its first seven seasons

https://www.yoursun.com/sports/some-of-the-greatest-quotes-in-rays-history/article_eec274ba-955c-11ea-bd67-a76eab26cad2.html

[Roll Tide]

22 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Well, in that sense, we should just get rid of Adley now.  You will always have spare parts on your team.  There has never been a team in the history of organized sport that didn’t have spare parts on it.

However, this year Adley will be surrounded by several young pitchers and hitters who could all be here foe the next contending team.

When the starting pitching is ready you can bring up Adley, Gunnar, Hjerstad, DIaz etc .... For now it makes no sense to waste pre-arb years when you goal is to be cheap and lose 100 games. I believe thats Elias' plan ..... Buy a sell high potential free agent or 2 , play cheap, and lose to get high draft picks.