Bring up the kids?

[glenn__davis]

9 hours ago, Moshagge3 said:

Given how baseball is played in 2021, this has never meant less.

I agree with you, but it has been used as a negative against him all along.  I was never all that concerned about Sisco's ability to control the run game given how little the run game exists.  Honestly I think his defense at the MLB level has been fine.  Is he a plus defender there, no, but I haven't seen him as some huge liability either.  Ironically it is his bat that is going to be his undoing unfortunately.

[TommyPickles]

I'm pretty happy with Zimmerman's 4.79 ERA through 35.2 IP. 

I'm looking forward to seeing more of him, Akin, Lowther, Kremer, and Means getting starts this season.

I'd be fine with Plutko and Lopez pitching out of the pen exclusively. 

[Frobby]

23 hours ago, Philip said:

Four out of five.

Would you like to look at all the things in which he trails all of baseball?

Actually, it’s 6 out of 9.    On the year, Sisco has been worth -0.1 rWAR, -0.3 fWAR.   Thoroughly underwhelming, but not exactly unusual for a backup catcher.   Defensively, he ranks well ahead of Severino, per Fangraphs.   

I’m not going to make a loud argument in his favor.    Obviously he needs to hit much better than he has this year to stay in the majors.   But 51 PA is not a lot - it wouldn’t take much to return his numbers to a respectable level.   So I’m apathetic as to whether he gets replaced, until such time as Rutschman is knocking loudly on the door (which hopefully will be in a month or two).   

It’s interesting that he’s throwing so well this year.   To my eye, it has to do with how quickly he’s getting rid of the ball compared to in the past.   But I don’t know if there are numbers to back that up.  

 

 

[Frobby]

22 hours ago, Moshagge3 said:

Given how baseball is played in 2021, this has never meant less.

Actually, that is not even close to true.   In the AL, teams average 0.46 steals per game.   The all time low in that category was 1950, at 0.22 steals per game.  There have been 37 seasons with lower steals per game than this one - many of them a LOT lower.   Pretty much every year from 1932-1971 was lower than this, with a few exceptions.   

[Roll Tide]

23 hours ago, Philip said:

A glance at baseball savant was surprisingly sparse, but did offer a few things:

21 percentile in exit velocity

16 percentile in sprint speed

1 percentile in framing

32.2% K rate

3.9 % BB rate

Five season average of .202.

He can’t hit. He has had 576 plate appearances, or approximately one full season, so one can say it’s not too late for him to turn things around. But slow is slow. Bad framing is bad framing. 30+ % K rate is still 30% plus. His OBP is helped by a world class ability to get hit by pitches.

so yeah.

576 abs over 5 seasons means he really hasn’t gotten a chance to play. It’s hard to say he can’t hit when he’s not been allowed to play. Defensively catcher might not be his position and maybe he’s just a DH. But you will never know without giving him ar east 1/2 of seasons worth of ABs at one time.

[spiritof66]

1 hour ago, Roll Tide said:

576 abs over 5 seasons means he really hasn’t gotten a chance to play. It’s hard to say he can’t hit when he’s not been allowed to play. Defensively catcher might not be his position and maybe he’s just a DH. But you will never know without giving him ar east 1/2 of seasons worth of ABs at one time.

Ordinarily, I'd say about a guy like Sisco, who has some credentials as a hitter but looks lost at the plate, "Give him steady, regular at-bats and see whether he hits." I might still say that. But the complication is that the Orioles have a catcher they expect to be getting most of the ABs for a few years. I think it's unlikely that giving Sisco a lot more ABs will help determine whether he should be considered for the role of back-up catcher, but maybe it would help him develop better habits or gain confidence or something that would bear on his value as Adley's backup.

 

 

[DrungoHazewood]

13 hours ago, Frobby said:

Actually, that is not even close to true.   In the AL, teams average 0.46 steals per game.   The all time low in that category was 1950, at 0.22 steals per game.  There have been 37 seasons with lower steals per game than this one - many of them a LOT lower.   Pretty much every year from 1932-1971 was lower than this, with a few exceptions.   

My mental image of the 1960s is that it was a lot of low scoring pitchers duels with a lot of little shortstops bunting and stealing bases.  But the stealing bases part is all wrong.  In 1966 the Orioles had the best offense in the league and stole 55 bases all year, caught 41 times. The only teams to steal 100 bases were the White Sox and A's, and both of them were within 0.02 runs of being the worst offenses in the AL.

In '66 the average AL team stole four fewer bases than the average AL team in 2019.

In 1964 the Orioles were 4th in the majors in steals, but Luis Aparicio was the only player on the team with more than four.  Luis led the AL in steals nine straight years, but those included totals of 21, 28, 29, 31, and 40.

[SteveA]

I do think that if, a month from now, Sisco is still hitting about what he is now, and Cumberland is still doing about what he is doing now in AAA, we could see Cumberland get a look.   Sisco had a career minor league OPS of .816, Cumberland's is .784.   So Sisco had a better minor league career, but not HUGELY better.   And Cumberland is a year younger, yet still old enough that it's getting to the point where we need to start seeing what he can do at the ML level before consigning him to perennial 4A status.

The late minor league start means we only have two weeks of AAA numbers to look at so far for Cumberland, and at the traditional Memorial Day point where teams often assess what you have and make decisions to bring new guys up, we will still only have 4 weeks.   But once we get into June, IF Cumberland is still hitting well and Sisco is still not, I think at that point a change might be made.

[interloper]

Patience. We'll get there. All these moves will happen approx. 1-3 months later than we'd like, but they'll all happen. 

[DrungoHazewood]

1 hour ago, SteveA said:

I do think that if, a month from now, Sisco is still hitting about what he is now, and Cumberland is still doing about what he is doing now in AAA, we could see Cumberland get a look.   Sisco had a career minor league OPS of .816, Cumberland's is .784.   So Sisco had a better minor league career, but not HUGELY better.   And Cumberland is a year younger, yet still old enough that it's getting to the point where we need to start seeing what he can do at the ML level before consigning him to perennial 4A status.

The late minor league start means we only have two weeks of AAA numbers to look at so far for Cumberland, and at the traditional Memorial Day point where teams often assess what you have and make decisions to bring new guys up, we will still only have 4 weeks.   But once we get into June, IF Cumberland is still hitting well and Sisco is still not, I think at that point a change might be made.

I don't really know anything about Cumberland except that he's the same age as Sisco and has all of 10 games in AAA and less than half a season in AA.  A little of that is COVID, but most of his hitting has been done as an overaged guy in A ball.

I'm guessing he'll be swapped in for Sisco, won't be any better, and someone will pick Sisco up on waivers and turn him into a 1B/DH and relieved of the burden of catching he might actually have a little career.

[SteveA]

The thread is titled "Bring up the Kids?"

And the first "kid" comes up:   Lil' Stevie Wilkerson !!!

[Surhoffan17]

10 minutes ago, SteveA said:

The thread is titled "Bring up the Kids?"

And the first "kid" comes up:   Lil' Stevie Wilkerson !!!

Yep....bye, bye Rio....I did like him, but it was time to go.  

[spiritof66]

9 minutes ago, SteveA said:

The thread is titled "Bring up the Kids?"

And the first "kid" comes up:   Lil' Stevie Wilkerson !!!

Just 29 years young. The youth movement is on!

[jabba72]

8 minutes ago, SteveA said:

The thread is titled "Bring up the Kids?"

And the first "kid" comes up:   Lil' Stevie Wilkerson !!!

Well the prospects aren't exactly ready. Bannon now has a .726 OPS, and Jones hasnt played since May 9th. Ripken is in the midst of a career threatening slump.  McCoy's an option, but I guess not at this time. 

[Can_of_corn]

3 minutes ago, jabba72 said:

Well the prospects aren't exactly ready. Bannon now has a .726 OPS, and Jones hasnt played since May 9th. Ripken is in the midst of a career threatening slump.  McCoy's an option, but I guess not at this time. 

I dislike nebulous terms like ready.

What is ready?