Lowball history of the Orioles since 2000

[Frobby]

Not a big fan of this thread at all. Teams start with lower offers ALL THE TIME - and it is really ignorant to claim otherwise.

Even in the Os recent history, we started off low with Mora and Huff and received a reduced asking price. The Vlad example is twisted ridiculously - "tell us what it takes to sign you in orange and black" (???) - when does that happen in early negotations. Didn't Jason Schmidt ask us to stop bidding on him? Pretty much the same with Richie Sexson ... What good would that question have done in those situations? And with 30 teams out there, do you really think we would identify a "must-have" free agent and not have a few other teams say the same question with their team colors to the same guy?

The posts in this thread imply that recent LT deals with players like Sizemore and Bonderman took place over a five minute period while waiting in line at Starbucks with no resistance whatsoever from management - or imply that our FO should show little resistance in such cases.

Frobby and Drungo post the best stuff out there, IMO, but this thread is a head-scratcher to me.

I am not saying we have lowballed every player we've ever gone after. I don't feel we lowballed Derek Lee, or Carlos Lee for that matter. I don't feel we lowballed Richie Sexson. We certainly didn't lowball Paul Konerko.

But the players we have lowballed, as identified in my original post, were stupid guys to lowball. And I understand you don't want to make an initial offer that is the highest you are willing to go, but when you make an offer that significantly and obviously undervalues the player compared to his peers, you insult him and that's not a good way to negotiate.

Now I will give one caveat here -- I was reacting to what Peace21 posted about Bedard and we don't have any specifics on him. But, the version he gave is pretty darned plausible given the Orioles' past tactics.

[Oriole Baseball]

Where are the rumors and gossip about the Orioles slapping down a check in front of a star player and saying "what'll it take to put you in Orange and Black?" There aren't any.

Albert Belle

As far as lowballing Bedard, no offense to Peace or his contact, but until we start hearing it from people with O's connections or from reporters, I won't believe it.

Plus, you always low ball when it comes to negotiations. Thats how it works. You go under and the player oges over and then you work to meet somewhere in the middle. The Orioles could throw down 5 year/60 mil and Bedard will immediatly come back with a higher number.

I wouldn't count the Mussina negotions as a fault of the O's. As I remember, Mussina told Angelos he would let the Orioles counter offer the Yanks and then never came back after visiting NY.

[Dipper9]

The Orioles offer guaranteed that Vlad wouldn't sign here. If they'd opened with a killer offer I'd bet he'd have listened, and maybe actually signed. At least they'd have driven up the price. Worst case they overpay for a superstar... ooohh, that would have been terrible, wouldn't it?

The Orioles basically went to the BMW dealer, saw a $75,000 M5 that had been on the lot for a couple months. They offered the salesman $40k. The guy rolled his eyes and said "I'll call you back." After another month no call. The Orioles response? "Screw that guy, he doesn't want to sell the car." The salesman knew he had a quality product, and eventually someone would pay a lot closer to sticker.

This is just plain WRONG and you are twisting the facts to make your argument. The truth is we got Miggy the SAME year that the Vladdy offer was on the table. Miggy's deal was a shock around the league because of the fact that we got him at such a reduced rate. In your argument, why didn't Miggy's low offer "guarantee that he wouldn't sign here" either? We had the best deal on the table for Vladdy, and he turned it down. PERIOD!

As for Delgado...we definitely would have gotten him had we added to the paycheck. No doubt there we lowballed him.

Ryan COULD have been signed on the cheap the year before his free agency, but the O's took a chance and lost on that one. Had we given him the contract and then he came out and BOMBED as closer, you all would have crucified the FO for that as well. Remember that WAS his first season closing.

The one that really gets my goat that I cannot defend in any way shape or form is Moose. I get into arguments with Mrs. D all the time about this because Moose was LOWBALLED by Angelos, yet Moose gets all the grief from O's fan. PA certainly screwed up there. Moose should have been our 2nd Palmer!

[bomp]

Give MacPhail a chance! He just got here! he might be able to right the ship. Up till now it's been rearranging the deck chairs on the Titantic. Give the guy a chance!

[Three Run Homer]

No... that just proves that the Orioles have no problem spending a little bit of money, even if it's on a mediocre player. Where they almost always balk is in signing true star talent to market rate deals.

A great model for team development is to maximize the number of sub-$1M players, sign a fair number of big stars, and save by rarely dipping into the treacherous waters of mid-range, declining free agents. The Orioles build their "foundation" with a large number of those players, most of whom are in decline or have already bottomed out.

I think we have the makings of a Grand Unifying Theory of Everything here.

The fundamental problem is that Angelos is a union guy (AFL-CIO, not MLBPA) who takes a union mindset to building a team. His ideal team is a bunch of old guys who all make about the same salary. He doesn't want to pay big stars a lot of money because that would create inequality and resentment. He believes in rewarding loyalty and longevity above performance. He believes that young players should have to pay their dues before getting a chance, unless they have some personal or ethnic connection (like being Greek) that exalts them to favored status.

[Sports Guy]

Good thread Frobby.

It amazes me how many naive people there still are on this board.

The benefit of the doubt this piss poor organization is given is mind boggling to me.

[geschinger]

I think we have the makings of a Grand Unifying Theory of Everything here.

The fundamental problem is that Angelos is a union guy (AFL-CIO, not MLBPA) who takes a union mindset to building a team. His ideal team is a bunch of old guys who all make about the same salary. He doesn't want to pay big stars a lot of money because that would create inequality and resentment. He believes in rewarding loyalty and longevity above performance. He believes that young players should have to pay their dues before getting a chance, unless they have some personal or ethnic connection (like being Greek) that exalts them to favored status.

Interesting theory.

[NewMarketSean]

Don't forget about the lowballing of Derek Lee and Rafael Palmeiro.

[geschinger]

Good thread Frobby.

It amazes me how many naive people there still are on this board.

The benefit of the doubt this piss poor organization is given is mind boggling to me.

The Orioles organization has certainly been dysfunctional and deserves most of the criticism it receives. But it also amazes me how every move that one disagrees with is spun to try and make the Orioles look as bad as possible.

One of the primary examples of lowballing a player is from the same year that we completely blew everyone elses offer for a former MVP shortstop. The Orioles offer for Vladdie was as good if not better than other offers received. He made it perfectly clear by refusing to meet w/the front office and later by the statements about wanting to be closer to a hispanic community that Baltimore was not a good fit for him. Yet to this day we ignore all that and spin it as if only the O's hadn't lowballed him w/their original offer he'd be an Oriole today. With all due respect that it total and complete BS.

[NewMarketSean]

The Orioles organization has certainly been dysfunctional and deserves most of the criticism it receives. But it also amazes me how every move that one disagrees with is spun to try and make the Orioles look as bad as possible.

One of the primary examples of lowballing a player is from the same year that we completely blew everyone elses offer for a former MVP shortstop. The Orioles offer for Vladdie was as good if not better than other offers received. He made it perfectly clear by refusing to meet w/the front office and later by the statements about wanting to be closer to a hispanic community that Baltimore was not a good fit for him. Yet to this day we ignore all that and spin it as if only the O's hadn't lowballed him w/their original offer he'd be an Oriole today. With all due respect that it total and complete BS.

I disagree. All it showed was that the Orioles had the best offer on the table because no one else wanted him. There was no competition. Do you honestly believe that if anyone else wanted Tejada the Orioles would have gotten him? Detroit and Seattle flirted with Tejada but none of them were serious. Ironically, Seattle is in second place and fighting for a Wild Card and Detroit was in the WS last year. I wonder if Tejada is wishing he took less to play for those teams and a chance to compete.

Anyway, what I am trying to say is, once another team showed interest in Guerrero he was gone. The Orioles didn't have a chance with competition because A) They suck, and B) they wouldn't raise their offer to get him.

If they really wanted him... they could have raised the offer and made it almost impossible for him to go elsewhere. I blame the Orioles for that.

As usual, they thought it better to save a couple million rather than sign one of the best players in the game. Shame on them.

[Sports Guy]

Bottom line on Vlad was that the orioles didn't offer him enough to make him come here.

We know he asked for 7/105 to counter the 6/78 offer...So, he was willing to come here but wanted to get paid a lot more.

We should have countered for 6/90.

If we would have done that and he still said no, then i would agree.

But we didn't, so we will never truly know.

[JohnD]

Regarding Lee. The Orioles and Lee had a 3yr/27 deal worked out after agreeing to send Dave Crouthers, who no longer is in baseball I believe, and Val Majewski to the Marlins. Angelos balked at the contract extension. It fell apart and Lee became a Cub.

[mweb]

I think it's hard to say we lowballed Vlad when he signed for 5/70, 5M more than what is being said was our initial offer. The rest I agree with.

[nadecir]

Regarding Lee. The Orioles and Lee had a 3yr/27 deal worked out after agreeing to send Dave Crouthers, who no longer is in baseball I believe, and Val Majewski to the Marlins. Angelos balked at the contract extension. It fell apart and Lee became a Cub.

What a deal that would have been for the Orioles!

[BaltBird 24]

Regarding Lee. The Orioles and Lee had a 3yr/27 deal worked out after agreeing to send Dave Crouthers, who no longer is in baseball I believe, and Val Majewski to the Marlins. Angelos balked at the contract extension. It fell apart and Lee became a Cub.

Sometimes I think it'd be best if Peter Angelos had never decided to dabble in baseball.