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What does this draft "mean" in terms of the Elias plan?


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In regards to age, I see that as obvious.  Elias appears to think that the mid/upper levels need stocking.  He needs guys that can contribute in Baltimore maybe as soon as next summer.  He knows he can't wait.

He also seems very risk adverse.  Unless the HS talent is undeniable, he's taking college players all day with a preference to college bats over college arms.  

The organization needs pitching.  We've got G-Rod and Hall...after that there are some intriguing names and guys having good seasons this year but we need more top flight pitching.  I don't know where he expects to acquire it but his drafts are leaving a lot to be desired from a pitching perspective.

 

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3 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

In regards to age, I see that as obvious.  Elias appears to think that the mid/upper levels need stocking.  He needs guys that can contribute in Baltimore maybe as soon as next summer.  He knows he can't wait.

He also seems very risk adverse.  Unless the HS talent is undeniable, he's taking college players all day with a preference to college bats over college arms.  

The organization needs pitching.  We've got G-Rod and Hall...after that there are some intriguing names and guys having good seasons this year but we need more top flight pitching.  I don't know where he expects to acquire it but his drafts are leaving a lot to be desired from a pitching perspective.

 

Here's a question I'll pose to you. Would you rather have a diamond studded rotation like the Indians had in prior years and even this year, but know that you can't keep everyone; or would you rather have the Tampa bay strategy where you have a ton of depth but no one who will wow you? Something tells me they're trying the tampa bay approach or a similar strategy to it.

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28 minutes ago, SteveA said:

   -- Is it an indication of the fact that he simply cannot get the data he needs to evaluate high school players the way he likes, and thus stuck with older players for which a lot more data is available?   And if that is the case, does that mean we are missing out on a potential source of talent that other teams are taking advantage of?

Really thoughtful post with a bunch of interesting questions. 

1) I'm not sure the college "seniors" have their typically low leverage. It's clearly lower than younger guys, but they can go back to school this year if they want, so they do have some leverage.

2) Most will focus on the $ and points will be made. If he's directed by ownership not to spend on this talent then that's his directive and it sucks. We just have to hope the team sells soon. 

3) the quoted point above is what's of interest to me. If talent acquisition is of primary importance, and we have a blind spot into high school in general, then isn't that akin to sitting out the international market? You could say it's also even true of college pitching. If that's the case, I want a solution. If it's a Covid issue and all will be fine by next year, ok. However, if it's an issue of getting boots on the ground with more tools to evaluate people (even gathering data remotely), than it seems like a place the O's should be investing and one where they likely have mistakengly cut back in recent years. I just hate the idea that we're eliminating ourselves from a talent pool. It's what Elias was brought here to fix and now another blind spot might be apparent.

If this is all chalked up to Covid (even budget issues), then I guess we have to deal with it. Whether for sale or Covid or both, the O's seem to be completely out of money. I hope that's not what we saw here.

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Elias seems to love college guys. I wonder what numbers they have on higher school vs college.

My take is the selections appear to reflect a pick based on talent not need, otherwise you would not have had so many OFs on the first day. Even if you believe our OFs stink you would still try to be filling other holes if that was your strategy. If we are not picking based on need that tells me we are still in stockpiling mode.

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14 minutes ago, MDtransplant757 said:

Here's a question I'll pose to you. Would you rather have a diamond studded rotation like the Indians had in prior years and even this year, but know that you can't keep everyone; or would you rather have the Tampa bay strategy where you have a ton of depth but no one who will wow you? Something tells me they're trying the tampa bay approach or a similar strategy to it.

Here's a question I'll pose to you:  Do you think that teams look at these things in a binary way?  Does Cleveland approach team building in the way you just outlined it?

Anyway, to answer your questions, I'd pick the Rays method.  Ton of depth.  

But Tampa has the #1 ranked system, they have talent that will wow you.  Maybe they're not household names yet, but they're still very, very good.  Let's not pretend that they've got a bunch of Kremers and Akins and are somehow making it work.

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28 minutes ago, MDtransplant757 said:

Here's a question I'll pose to you. Would you rather have a diamond studded rotation like the Indians had in prior years and even this year, but know that you can't keep everyone; or would you rather have the Tampa bay strategy where you have a ton of depth but no one who will wow you? Something tells me they're trying the tampa bay approach or a similar strategy to it.

For the record, Tampa's draft this year went:

Position Player
Position Player
Position Player
Position Player
Position Player
Position Player
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Position Player
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Position Player
Pitcher
Pitcher

So in some ways similar to ours but they started grabbing their pitchers in Round 6 rather than Round 11.

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6 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

Here's a question I'll pose to you:  Do you think that teams look at these things in a binary way?  Does Cleveland approach team building in the way you just outlined it?

Anyway, to answer your questions, I'd pick the Rays method.  Ton of depth.  

But Tampa has the #1 ranked system, they have talent that will wow you.  Maybe they're not household names yet, but they're still very, very good.  Let's not pretend that they've got a bunch of Kremers and Akins and are somehow making it work.

Teams don't, they look what they have and look around and see what they can get to add to be competitive. No way of building a team is "Right".

Yeah they aren't getting by with Akin's and Kermer's of the world. What I'm getting at is overall strategy of decent to above average pitching depth. Something tells me that's what Elias and Co are pushing for.

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1 minute ago, SteveA said:

For the record, Tampa's draft this year went:

Position Player
Position Player
Position Player
Position Player
Position Player
Position Player
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Position Player
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Pitcher
Position Player
Pitcher
Pitcher

So in some ways similar to ours but they started grabbing their pitchers in Round 6 rather than Round 11.

They did, but that's also just this year. They've also got a better Latin America pipeline than we do. Most of the pitching in the upper minors was acquired through trading, as they've had a lot of good players who got shipped off over the years.

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12 minutes ago, MDtransplant757 said:

Teams don't, they look what they have and look around and see what they can get to add to be competitive. No way of building a team is "Right".

Yeah they aren't getting by with Akin's and Kermer's of the world. What I'm getting at is overall strategy of decent to above average pitching depth. Something tells me that's what Elias and Co are pushing for.

Sure there's a right way to build a team...and that's always to be competitive.  Being able to sustain a winning ML product and having consistent talent coming through the pipeline.  

How teams achieve that with the resources they have will vary.  Obviously the Rays can do it, they've been doing it for years.  The Cardinals are almost always good.  I'm assuming those two organizations have very different resources and methods in which they go about achieving winning results.  And yet, they're always in the thick of it come September/October.   The Braves are another organization that comes to mind.

The more we plod along here, the more I watch the Rays win 90+ games a year I think the whole talk of having a "window" is complete bull****.  The Rays window is always open, has been for years.   The notion that the Orioles will have a 3-4 year "window" to compete doesn't have to be a reality if Elias does things correctly.

I would like nothing more than this organization to be able to bring up consistent GOOD pitching talent to the majors like the Rays have been able to do.  I would hope that's something Elias is looking to do.

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7 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

The more we plod along here, the more I watch the Rays win 90+ games a year I think the whole talk of having a "window" is complete bull****.  The Rays window is always open, has been for years.   The notion that the Orioles will have a 3-4 year "window" to compete doesn't have to be a reality if Elias does things correctly.

Elias has said multiple times that if you do your rebuild right, you should never need to do it again.   He’s definitely not aiming for a finite window in which to compete.  

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7 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

Sure there's a right way to build a team...and that's always to be competitive.  Being able to sustain a winning ML product and having consistent talent coming through the pipeline.  

How teams achieve that with the resources they have will vary.  Obviously the Rays can do it, they've been doing it for years.  The Cardinals are almost always good.  I'm assuming those two organizations have very different resources and methods in which they go about achieving winning results.  And yet, they're always in the thick of it come September/October.   The Braves are another organization that comes to mind.

The more we plod along here, the more I watch the Rays win 90+ games a year I think the whole talk of having a "window" is complete bull****.  The Rays window is always open, has been for years.   The notion that the Orioles will have a 3-4 year "window" to compete doesn't have to be a reality if Elias does things correctly.

I would like nothing more than this organization to be able to bring up consistent GOOD pitching talent to the majors like the Rays have been able to do.  I would hope that's something Elias is looking to do.

Elias has said he is influenced by the Tampa Model and specifically talked about high turnover. I don't think he has ever said anything about a window. Just because we are rebuilding now doesn't mean we are trying to compete for a short window. Either way you have to rebuild and it is going to be painful. Even Tampa has gone through ups and downs. St. Louis is another organization to look at.

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3 hours ago, LookinUp said:

3) the quoted point above is what's of interest to me. If talent acquisition is of primary importance, and we have a blind spot into high school in general, then isn't that akin to sitting out the international market? You could say it's also even true of college pitching. If that's the case, I want a solution. If it's a Covid issue and all will be fine by next year, ok. However, if it's an issue of getting boots on the ground with more tools to evaluate people (even gathering data remotely), than it seems like a place the O's should be investing and one where they likely have mistakengly cut back in recent years. I just hate the idea that we're eliminating ourselves from a talent pool. It's what Elias was brought here to fix and now another blind spot might be apparent.

Earlier I said Elias’ approach is so risk averse that it is actually risky and this is a great way of articulating it. To me ignoring high ceiling high school talent is akin to ignoring the international market. Very well said.

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6 minutes ago, Sydnor said:

Earlier I said Elias’ approach is so risk averse that it is actually risky and this is a great way of articulating it. To me ignoring high ceiling high school talent is akin to ignoring the international market. Very well said.

What is interesting that one of the reasons the Orioles avoided the International market was that they viewed 16 year olds as being too risky.

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Holistically, the prime for most players is 24-29 age group.  Drafting 21 year olds puts them in the majors at their peak and still under team control.  Drafting latter round pitchers equals Macphail mantra of “from quantity comes quality “.  I am hoping 2022, Elias brings in some priced veterans to begin to quest to respectability.

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