How long do the O’s need to be bad

[Can_of_corn]

4 minutes ago, LTO's said:

Fine. Perhaps improvement is not the right word. The Orioles farm has drastically improved after less than 1.5 drafts. My point is firing a GM after 3 or fewer drafts is reactionary. 

That I agree with.

Unless of course you have a run like Stewart did in Arizona. 

[Aristotelian]

They have already improved. 7 wins in 2019 and were on pace for additional 13 wins in 2020. 

[Can_of_corn]

35 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I think this is factual, but you have to look at each team’s situation.    I think Elias came in with two very big disadvantages:

- No top talent on the major league roster that could be traded for truly high-end prospect talent.   
- Virtually no Latin American presence, and no Latin American prospects in the pipeline.   

I think the latter is a really huge and underappreciated issue.   Elias and Perez have done a great job of addressing this, but it will be several seasons before those efforts produce results at the major league level.

I also think that the lack of a MiL season last year (1) slowed down the development opportunities for our younger players, and (2) made it impossible for outsiders to judge what progress those players made while working on their own last year.   There was no opportunity for us to say “Player X made a big leap last year.”   So in my mind it’s very difficult to say where our farm system stands relative to others right now.   Ask me in September.   

You left off the financial constraints put upon him by ownership. 

I of course don't buy the whole rapport thing is nearly as important as folks make it out to be.  Money talks, if you are a 30 year old free agent or a 16 year old kid in the Dominican.  It is just how they play the game down there, they don't want to start bidding wars.

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

They have already improved. 7 wins in 2019 and were on pace for additional 13 wins in 2020. 

Honest question.  Do you think they would have continued the pace they were on in 2020?

I think the team was flagging badly down the stretch and would have been finished as one of the two or three worst teams in baseball under a full season.

[Frobby]

2 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

You left off the financial constraints put upon him by ownership. 

I of course don't buy the whole rapport thing is nearly as important as folks make it out to be.  Money talks, if you are a 30 year old free agent or a 16 year old kid in the Dominican.  It is just how they play the game down there, they don't want to start bidding wars.

I don’t agree with you, nor would I call it a “rapport thing.”    Players make verbal deals with teams and they are honored, and it’s not considered kosher to tamper with a kid who’s made an oral commitment.    

In any event, from all accounts Elias/Perez have put together two classes that were better than anything Duquette did/was allowed to do, and at this point they’ve put the O’s in position to be competitive with any other team for the next class and beyond.   So our debate about the handicap Elias/Perez faced initially will become increasingly irrelevant going forward.

Of course, the players Elias signed in July 2019 and January 2021 have yet to play a single DSL game, which makes it tough to evaluate what we have there. 

 

[Frobby]

14 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Honest question.  Do you think they would have continued the pace they were on in 2020?

I think the team was flagging badly down the stretch and would have been finished as one of the two or three worst teams in baseball under a full season.

Agreed.    They were 6-14 over the final 20.    The shorter season and expanded rosters made them look better than they were.   I expect they would have won several more games than in 2019, though.   

[Moose Milligan]

12 hours ago, Pickles said:

I think a fan with a certain bit of refinement should understand that prospect rankings are not definitive statements on the health of a player development system.  What the O's need to be able to do to win consistently at the ML level is find and develop players better than their peers.  Taking Rutchsman doesn't actually resolve that issue.  Whiffing on 1-2 doesn't resolve that issue.  Neither does losing 100 games a year.  That issue is resolved in improving the O's processes in finding and developing amateur talent.  So if you want to criticize Elias or the rebuild, criticize that.  The fact that the O's stink in 2021, or 2020, or 2023, was predestined several years before it happened.

You hit the O's biggest organizational failure on the head: The failure to develop quality pitching.  I've said this before and I'll say it again: The reason so many highly ranked minor league arms fail here and go on to do better elsewhere in some cases is because pitching for the O's is the most difficult pitching environment in the big leagues, and I don't think it is close.  Based on who and where you pitch, this is easily the worst place to pitch in the major leagues, other than maybe Colorado.

So if Elias doesn't solve that particular riddle, he is mostly likely to fail.  I don't think he's infallible.  It's very possible he does fail.  But I'm not going to get up in arms about the O's being shit 2 and a half years into what I takes twice that time to favorably construct.

I agree that their inability to develop quality pitching has been their biggest issue.  Let's not forget Tillman was a Mariners prospect we traded for...I guess one could claim we developed him to a certain extent.  But we have been absolutely terrible at scouting, drafting and developing pitching.  You can argue that Britton was an elite pitcher we developed but he was a failed starter.  Maybe the correct statement here is that they've been terrible at scouting, drafting and developing starting pitchers.  But it's not like we've been promoting a ton of elite relievers, either.  

I will disagree that it's the most difficult pitching environment in the majors and I will also disagree that that is the reason that so many have left here and gone on to find success elsewhere.  Oriole Park ranks anywhere from the middle of the pack to the lower 3rd depending on the year and depending on the metrics that you're looking at.  It is a bad place to pitch but it's not easily the worst place to pitch in the majors behind Coors.  In 2019, the Rockies, Rangers, Tigers and Nats had worse ballparks to pitch in.  In 2018, the Orioles Park Factor ranked 18th and slightly favored pitchers.  You can look up Park Factor here:  https://www.espn.com/mlb/stats/parkfactor/_/year/2018

The failure to develop quality pitching sits squarely on a few factors:  First, lack of international talent, we've been essentially fighting a fight with one hand tied behind our backs for 20+ years. Second, bad scouting and third, bad development.  If you wanted a 4th reason, it'd be bad trades (Hader, Davies).

Jake Arrieta is the posterchild for leaving here and finding success elsewhere.  He was a stud in college that fell in the draft due to signability issues and we picked him.  And then we tried to tinker with his mechanics, I believe it was Adair that had to make him do things his way.  Arrieta threw slightly across his body which isn't good but it worked for him in college.  Adair tried to fix that and it didn't work...and when Arrieta got to Chicago they basically told him "do what works for you, throw how you naturally throw" and he did a 180.  It literally happened overnight, go look at what Arrieta was doing here and then go look at what he did in Chicago directly after the trade.  

Britton didn't like Adair, either.  Maybe we could have made something out of Matusz with a better coach.  Read this article:  https://www.camdenchat.com/2016/4/26/11506982/orioles-pitchers-arrieta-britton-pitching-coach-rick-adair

Quote

They took away the individual approach to everything. Things we did extremely well in the minor leagues to get to the big leagues - we were told that just doesn't work here. And you're like, ‘That's kind of weird, right?' You don't just reinvent yourself in the big leagues. That was the struggle. And the struggle, as we got older, was trying to get back to what made us what we were before.

The Orioles have been terrible at scouting, drafting, developing and coaching pitching.  They haven't been great at doing the same with hitters, but have been slightly better...Manny was so good, no one could mess him up, most likely.  

OPACY ain't a great place to pitch but the argument that it's the reason why we don't have good pitching is mostly false and downright lazy.

[ThomasTomasz]

On 4/15/2021 at 10:22 AM, LTO's said:

There is no true parallel for any of the teams you have listed. The Orioles have not had a meaningful int'l signing class ever. The only impact prospect they signed overseas, they traded for a rental reliever they didn't even sign the following year.  They are just now catching up to the rest of the league in terms of signing players. After that it's another 5+ years for them to reach the big leagues. 

Like him or not, there is some wisdom in Keith Law's take on the Orioles farm. I think ultimately he is wrong in his assessment of the minor league value the Orioles currently have, but the Orioles for decades neglected an area that accounts for 30% of big league players. You cannot turn around a 120 loss team with a bottom 5 farm in baseball in 3 years while having NO international prospects of note overseas and hardly any elite ML talent. That's just a fantasy. 

Add in how woefully behind this team was in their analytics infrastructure, as well as player development, and I think people really don't understand that this organization was pretty much a dinosaur in many ways.  Great post.  

[Pickles]

9 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

I agree that their inability to develop quality pitching has been their biggest issue.  Let's not forget Tillman was a Mariners prospect we traded for...I guess one could claim we developed him to a certain extent.  But we have been absolutely terrible at scouting, drafting and developing pitching.  You can argue that Britton was an elite pitcher we developed but he was a failed starter.  Maybe the correct statement here is that they've been terrible at scouting, drafting and developing starting pitchers.  But it's not like we've been promoting a ton of elite relievers, either.  

I will disagree that it's the most difficult pitching environment in the majors and I will also disagree that that is the reason that so many have left here and gone on to find success elsewhere.  Oriole Park ranks anywhere from the middle of the pack to the lower 3rd depending on the year and depending on the metrics that you're looking at.  It is a bad place to pitch but it's not easily the worst place to pitch in the majors behind Coors.  In 2019, the Rockies, Rangers, Tigers and Nats had worse ballparks to pitch in.  In 2018, the Orioles Park Factor ranked 18th and slightly favored pitchers.  You can look up Park Factor here:  https://www.espn.com/mlb/stats/parkfactor/_/year/2018

The failure to develop quality pitching sits squarely on a few factors:  First, lack of international talent, we've been essentially fighting a fight with one hand tied behind our backs for 20+ years. Second, bad scouting and third, bad development.  If you wanted a 4th reason, it'd be bad trades (Hader, Davies).

Jake Arrieta is the posterchild for leaving here and finding success elsewhere.  He was a stud in college that fell in the draft due to signability issues and we picked him.  And then we tried to tinker with his mechanics, I believe it was Adair that had to make him do things his way.  Arrieta threw slightly across his body which isn't good but it worked for him in college.  Adair tried to fix that and it didn't work...and when Arrieta got to Chicago they basically told him "do what works for you, throw how you naturally throw" and he did a 180.  It literally happened overnight, go look at what Arrieta was doing here and then go look at what he did in Chicago directly after the trade.  

Britton didn't like Adair, either.  Maybe we could have made something out of Matusz with a better coach.  Read this article:  https://www.camdenchat.com/2016/4/26/11506982/orioles-pitchers-arrieta-britton-pitching-coach-rick-adair

The Orioles have been terrible at scouting, drafting, developing and coaching pitching.  They haven't been great at doing the same with hitters, but have been slightly better...Manny was so good, no one could mess him up, most likely.  

OPACY ain't a great place to pitch but the argument that it's the reason why we don't have good pitching is mostly false and downright lazy.

Their inability to develop pitching, particularly starting pitching, has spanned several regimes.  Your point regarding the Showalter/Duquette regime is speculative but fair.  Different regimes had different failures.  I don't find it all that interesting to rehash the last 30 years of their failures.  Hopefully, Elias' regime can avoid them.

But they will face the same environment.  And I stand by my statement: Pitching for the O's is probably the hardest environment in the league.  You conveniently reduced my argument to one point: OPACY.  That's merely one part of it, and a fairly smaller one.  Though OPACY is a uniquely difficult pitch to place.

A much larger part of it, and you failed to mention it, is the weighted schedule and the competition.  In addition to pitching in a hitter's park, you pitch a lot of games in two more notorious hitter's parks, Fenway and Yankee Stadium.  Guess who occupies those parks?  Two teams which are perennially among the best offensive teams in the league, with lineups full of high-priced All-Stars and future Hall-of-Famers.  (I'll concede it's not as bad as it was in the Steroid Era.)

So, yeah, pitching in Colorado sucks.  But you know what else you get to do?  Pitch a ton of games in SF, LA, and SD, three notorious pitcher's parks, with two teams which are generally poor offensively.  You also get to face a pitcher every 9 batters.

So, as an O, you pitch in one of the harder home parks, against the better league, the best (generally) division, the better offensive league, and the best offensive division, and you do it in generally offensive environments.  So, yeah, probably hardest environment in the league.

And I definitely believe it has a large impact on the pitchers we develop.

[Moose Milligan]

12 hours ago, Pickles said:

Their inability to develop pitching, particularly starting pitching, has spanned several regimes.  Your point regarding the Showalter/Duquette regime is speculative but fair.  Different regimes had different failures.  I don't find it all that interesting to rehash the last 30 years of their failures.  Hopefully, Elias' regime can avoid them.

But they will face the same environment.  And I stand by my statement: Pitching for the O's is probably the hardest environment in the league.  You conveniently reduced my argument to one point: OPACY.  That's merely one part of it, and a fairly smaller one.  Though OPACY is a uniquely difficult pitch to place.

A much larger part of it, and you failed to mention it, is the weighted schedule and the competition.  In addition to pitching in a hitter's park, you pitch a lot of games in two more notorious hitter's parks, Fenway and Yankee Stadium.  Guess who occupies those parks?  Two teams which are perennially among the best offensive teams in the league, with lineups full of high-priced All-Stars and future Hall-of-Famers.  (I'll concede it's not as bad as it was in the Steroid Era.)

So, yeah, pitching in Colorado sucks.  But you know what else you get to do?  Pitch a ton of games in SF, LA, and SD, three notorious pitcher's parks, with two teams which are generally poor offensively.  You also get to face a pitcher every 9 batters.

So, as an O, you pitch in one of the harder home parks, against the better league, the best (generally) division, the better offensive league, and the best offensive division, and you do it in generally offensive environments.  So, yeah, probably hardest environment in the league.

And I definitely believe it has a large impact on the pitchers we develop.

I'm quite frankly tired of people whining and complaining about the competition we face.  It's not going to change anything.  

Tampa has figured it out, why haven't we been able to?  They're able to develop good pitching and yet they have to play with a weighted schedule against OHMIGOSH the Yankees and Sox!  

Even if you what you say is true, the Sox, Yanks, Jays and Rays all have to pitch in the hardest environment in the league.  And yet, they're able to have good pitching and we're not.  

 

[Can_of_corn]

4 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

I'm quite frankly tired of people whining and complaining about the competition we face.  It's not going to change anything.  

Tampa has figured it out, why haven't we been able to?  They're able to develop good pitching and yet they have to play with a weighted schedule against OHMIGOSH the Yankees and Sox!  

Even if you what you say is true, the Sox, Yanks, Jays and Rays all have to pitch in the hardest environment in the league.  And yet, they're able to have good pitching and we're not.  

 

Well yea, but the Rays get to play the Orioles, which makes up for playing the Yankees and Red Sox.

[Frobby]

10 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

I'm quite frankly tired of people whining and complaining about the competition we face.  It's not going to change anything.  

Tampa has figured it out, why haven't we been able to?  They're able to develop good pitching and yet they have to play with a weighted schedule against OHMIGOSH the Yankees and Sox!  

Even if you what you say is true, the Sox, Yanks, Jays and Rays all have to pitch in the hardest environment in the league.  And yet, they're able to have good pitching and we're not.  

 

I agree completely with this.   I’m not into excuses.    

That said, we don’t know yet whether the current regime will do a better job of developing pitching than the last several did.   The MiL performance in 2019 was strong; we have no data from 2020.   So, we’ll see.    We’ll know a lot more by the end of this year.   
 

 

[Moose Milligan]

8 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I agree completely with this.   I’m not into excuses.    

That said, we don’t know yet whether the current regime will do a better job of developing pitching than the last several did.   The MiL performance in 2019 was strong; we have no data from 2020.   So, we’ll see.    We’ll know a lot more by the end of this year.   
 

 

I think we'll know a lot more by the end of this year, too.

Furthermore, people can say "different regimes!  different scouting directors and coaches!"

Which is true.  But that only means to me that the Orioles have had, in general, a hiring problem over the past 25+ years.  

I'm in the hiring business, that's what I do each and every day.  I find people jobs.  Our clients pay us a good amount of money to find them qualified candidates for open positions.  Some of our clients are able to hire and retain people and keep them aboard for several years, some aren't.

I'm currently working with a client that's hired 3 people over the past 10 months for one position (only one of them through us).  The candidates they've chosen have been fired or quit.  They have a hiring problem.

The crux of this issue is that the Orioles have not just had a scouting, drafting, developing problem over the years but they've had a hiring problem.  They simply don't hire the right people for the job and that's been consistent for a long, long time. 

[sportsfan8703]

What’s holding us back now is our Pitching staff and our Infield. We’re set at OF, DH, and C, for the long term.
 

Harvey and Lopez/Plutko are stop gaps. So we need to figure out four SP behind Means. Zimmerman and Kremer are getting their chances now. Akin has gotten a look, and will be back for an extended look this season. Baumann injury status?  Lowther and A. Wells are on track to get looks in the 2nd half. 
 

Ideally, 2/6 of Zimmerman, Kremer, Akin, Baumman, Wells, and Lowther, would fill at least two rotation pieces going forward. The rest would be counted on as pieces of the pen going forward. Hall and Rodriguez would make up the other two spots in the rotation. By OD 2023 this should be taking place. 
 

The infield is just unknown. Not a lot of depth. Could Mountcastle even play 1B? Are Jones, Nevin, and Vavra, capable for being “starters” at the MLB level?  The rest of our IF options are really a good ways away. Probably not here by 2023, or at least established.

We really need for Mancini to get back to his .800 OPS days and trade him for a 3B, 2B.  I’m afraid that Tanner Scott is going to have to be used for us to acquire a SS.  

 

 

 

 

[LTO's]

1 hour ago, sportsfan8703 said:

Probably not here by 2023, or at least established.

I'm holding out hope that Gunnar will be on the big league team by 2023. I suppose he'll probably start this year at low A with the fast track to High-A and maybe finish at Bowie. That would put him on track for 2023. I saw he posted a picture of him and Hernaiz on the bus together. It would be nice if those two developed together with Vavra and then Hall in front of them.