Not gonna lie: this team looks awful

[wildcard]

Today lineup reflects why the stats are poor.

Sanchez 2b, Santander rf, Mountcastle lf, Valaika ss, Urias 3b, Wilkerson 1b, Rutschman dh, McKenna cf, Wynns c

 

 

[Morgan423]

29 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

So a year behind.

Then that's on me.  I thought Ludnow was hired a year earlier than he was.

[wildcard]

41 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

So a year behind.

If win percentage is the measure:

In the 2nd year of the rebuild the Astros win percentage was .315 , the O's was .417.   

So from that stand point he O's are ahead.

[spleen1015]

I'm fine with it. They screwed up last year by playing good enough to get the #5 pick.

[HowAboutThat]

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

It’s still important.   Thing is, defense is always subpar in spring training with sporadic play, players shaking off rust, experimenting with players at different positions, and sun- and wind-related issues in the Florida environs.   As I said, the defense has looked pretty bad, but that’s one thing I think is sure to improve.    Honestly this should be a decent defensive team.    

Balls in play go somewhere. A clean defense limits pitch counts, especially for contact pitchers. We don’t have any high K guys. Our pitchers tend to focus on ONE true outcome and that’s the Home run. But the ground balls are going somewhere. The line drives are going somewhere.  The better the defense, the easier the job on the pitchers. That’s prima facie obvious.

[Can_of_corn]

3 hours ago, wildcard said:

If win percentage is the measure:

In the 2nd year of the rebuild the Astros win percentage was .315 , the O's was .417.   

So from that stand point he O's are ahead.

Win percentage isn't the measure.

Also, short season.  The O's were already fading in a 60 game season. 

[Oriole1940]

19 hours ago, Frobby said:

I certainly don’t put much stock in spring training, especially the first half of spring training.    But lord does this team look pathetic.   Thirteen games played and they’ve been outscored 72-45 on their way to a 3-9-1 record.    Allowing 5.5 runs a game is terrible,   Scoring 3.5 runs a game is worse.    And the defense appears to have been terrible as well.    

Trying to stay calm but it’s tough to get excited about an invisible inaudible team by reading horrible looking box scores.   
 

 

I do not know when I have felt as low as I do now, about an Orioles team.  And that is saying some thing,  as they have had some stinkers.  That away lineup is just not close to a major league lineup.  If that is the best we have to field as an away lineup, it is going to be more than one loooong hot Summer.  And the home lineup is so pathetically poor, also, that I just do not know if they can fill the  allocation up or not,  on many occasions.  The competitive baseball team here seems so  far away.  I know it is darkest just before a dawn, but  this is really  something.     

[Barnaby Graves]

3 hours ago, Oriole1940 said:

I do not know when I have felt as low as I do now, about an Orioles team.  And that is saying some thing,  as they have had some stinkers.  That away lineup is just not close to a major league lineup.  If that is the best we have to field as an away lineup, it is going to be more than one loooong hot Summer.  And the home lineup is so pathetically poor, also, that I just do not know if they can fill the  allocation up or not,  on many occasions.  The competitive baseball team here seems so  far away.  I know it is darkest just before a dawn, but  this is really  something.     

I agree, and personally I've gotten really disinterested in baseball the last few years because the Orioles are so terrible and boring and we seem so far from being competitive or even interesting.

It takes way too long to turn around a franchise and the fact teams are incentivized to keep their most interesting young talent off the roster as long as possible seems like a bad business model.  I really don't look forward to watching Felix Hernandez and Matt Harvey slog through the season, and that's -probably- most of what we have in front of us, a season of passing the time.

Now, 2012 caught me completely by surprise, and it's always possible the 2021 team is a fluke and plays well.  But we're coming off a 47-115 season, a 54-108 season, and a 25-35 season.  2018 and 2019 were just abusive seasons to watch.  I don't want to go through it again.  I don't enjoy following the team when it's just death marching through game after game of certain futility.  I'll still go down for at least one series a year because Camden Yards is the best and I enjoy Baltimore.  But in mid-August, when we've been out of the playoff race for 3 months already, and we're losing 8-1 in the 6th inning and I'm watching some scrub reliever take 30 seconds between throwing pitches in the dirt to some YankSox batter, am I going to watch that game or am I going to do literally anything else?

[interloper]

It feels a little bit like this team could use a lineup lynchpin. Like an in-his-prime, veteran All-Star type. Someone the offense can kind of gel around. Normally that's maybe Mancini, but I don't really think anyone has expectations like that for Trey this year. Everyone's just glad he's healthy and rounding into baseball shape. Santander is still pretty new and finding his ML game. Then it's a bunch of promising young guys (Mountcastle, Hays, Mullins) and no-bat vets (Sanchez, Galvis). 

It's kind of an old-school line of thought, but it just feels like they're missing The Guy in the middle of the lineup. Someone to take the pressure off. 

[bobmc]

1 minute ago, interloper said:

It feels a little bit like this team could use a lineup lynchpin. Like an in-his-prime, veteran All-Star type. Someone the offense can kind of gel around. Normally that's maybe Mancini, but I don't really think anyone has expectations like that for Trey this year. Everyone's just glad he's healthy and rounding into baseball shape. Santander is still pretty new and finding his ML game. Then it's a bunch of promising young guys (Mountcastle, Hays, Mullins) and no-bat vets (Sanchez, Galvis). 

It's kind of an old-school line of thought, but it just feels like they're missing The Guy in the middle of the lineup. Someone to take the pressure off. 

Like Chris Davis in his prime?

[wildcard]

2 minutes ago, interloper said:

It feels a little bit like this team could use a lineup lynchpin. Like an in-his-prime, veteran All-Star type. Someone the offense can kind of gel around. Normally that's maybe Mancini, but I don't really think anyone has expectations like that for Trey this year. Everyone's just glad he's healthy and rounding into baseball shape. Santander is still pretty new and finding his ML game. Then it's a bunch of promising young guys (Mountcastle, Hays, Mullins) and no-bat vets (Sanchez, Galvis). 

It's kind of an old-school line of thought, but it just feels like they're missing The Guy in the middle of the lineup. Someone to take the pressure off. 

Maybe Adley in the 2nd half.

[interloper]

2 minutes ago, bobmc said:

Like Chris Davis in his prime?

Well, yeah, exactly. 

[interloper]

2 minutes ago, wildcard said:

Maybe Adley in the 2nd half.

Maybe. But he still looks like he might try to do too much. I think Trey is that guy, but until he proves he's back to mashing the ball, the lineup might be searching to find itself. 

[HowAboutThat]

Well we have 162 chances to find the best options.

[SteveA]

On 3/13/2021 at 10:49 PM, Frobby said:

“Spring training numbers can be deceiving and need to be processed in the appropriate manner, but the Orioles are slashing .202/.304/.295 in 13 games. The average and OPS rank last in the majors and their 45 runs are tied for 25th.”   https://www.masnsports.com/school-of-roch/2021/03/rutschman-provides-lone-offensive-highlight-in-5-0-loss.html

12 runs on 15 hits today should make those n umbers look a bit better.