New Rosenthal column

[Frobby]

Your definition of rebuilding appears to be very narrow, limited to players acquired from high draft picks acquired as a result of losing a lot of games.   To me, that’s not the definition.   

If you use money saved from a trimmed payroll to build an analytics department and an international operation, that’s part of rebuilding.   

If you trade established players for prospects, that is part of rebuilding.  I recognize there are a few teams that do this as a form of reloading rather than rebuilding.  That’s not where the O’s are because they don’t have immediate replacements from the players they are trading.  

If you cut expenditures now with a plan to spend the money later once a new core is being established, that’s part of rebuilding.   

[Aglets]

17 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

This is funny, but unfortunately true. The Orioles are trying to control all information coming out of the organization and trying to funnel it through their own MASN reporters.

Meanwhile players get promoted and fall off the face of the earth and you can't get any information (See JD Mundy).

Maybe Melewski can get some info on him because unless I missed it, he hasn't wrote anything in his column about him despite the fact that he was literally promoted to Bowie, is on the active roster, but hasn't appeared in a game.

 

Roch has an update on Mundy this morning.   Just placed on injured list.   Not sure why it took a week but there you have it.

https://www.masnsports.com/school-of-roch/2021/08/more-on-the-losing-streak-and-bundy-trade.html

[Sports Guy]

That sucks.  Probably ends his year and doesn’t get a chance to play vs AA.  Wonder if he heals up in time for the AFL?

[Sports Guy]

The one thing the Cubs and Astros did do was focus on offense in the draft and trade for/sign pitching.  The thought process perhaps being it’s easier to develop hitting or needing years of development for pitchers to start producing them or some kind of combo of all of it.

I think you can take away from their success this aspect of things when it applies to the Os but I don’t think you can assume that rebuilding is why it happened for them.

[eddie83]

13 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

People say the Cubs are proof that a long rebuild works.

 

Lets look at the key guys for them that year.

Kris Bryant.  #2 pick in the draft.  Direct result from tanking.

Anthony Rizzo.  Traded to the Cubs from the Pads for 24 y/o Andrew Cashner.  Not a rebuild type move.

Baez.  Drafted 9th after a 75 win season.  Not really a result of a rebuild although the next year started the down turn of the team.

Russell.  Acquired in Jeff S deal.  This was a rebuilding type move.

Contreras was an Intl sign I believe, as was Gleyber Torres, who they traded for Chapman in 2016.
 

Traded Feldman, an impending FA for Arrieta and Strop.  Not sure I would call that a rebuilding move.  They traded an expiring asset for a lottery ticket and it paid off.  Good move but not a move you need to be rebuilding to make.  

Traded Dempster, another impending FA, for Hendricks.  Same type of thing as the Arrieta deal.

Heyward, Lackey, , Lester and Zobrist were FA signings between 2015 and 2016.  

 

Those are your key guys.  There are obviously other players who contributed for their roles but you certainly don't need to tank to acquire those types of guys.

So, did the Cubs win because of tanking and rebuilding?  I don't know.  Bryant and Russell were really the only players they got as a direct result of rebuilding.  

Seems to me that they got lucky with some trades, signed a few guys via Intl that helped and had there payroll flexibility to sign some big contracts, albeit some they probably wish they hadn't.

I don't think I can say they won because they tanked and were awful from 2011-2014.  I also think it helped that they did it but I think, outside of Bryant, that they could have done most of what they did and still won a WS without being a disaster of a team for several years.

The Cubs best players all came from draft, Intl and trades. It’s proof of what Elias is trying to do. 
 

If they were worried about maximizing wins they don’t make the trades they made. 
 

Elias is doing same thing just a deeper hole. 

[Sports Guy]

10 minutes ago, eddie83 said:

The Cubs best players all came from draft, Intl and trades. It’s proof of what Elias is trying to do. 
 

If they were worried about maximizing wins they don’t make the trades they made. 
 

Elias is doing same thing just a deeper hole. 

Obviously your best players come from those avenues.  That’s the case in every sport except for the occasional FA that lives up to expectations.

But that’s not what the discussion is about.  It’s about rebuilding, if it causes you to win and if you need to do it for 4+ years.

[eddie83]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

The one thing the Cubs and Astros did do was focus on offense in the draft and trade for/sign pitching.  The thought process perhaps being it’s easier to develop hitting or needing years of development for pitchers to start producing them or some kind of combo of all of it.

I think you can take away from their success this aspect of things when it applies to the Os but I don’t think you can assume that rebuilding is why it happened for them.

Their best players came internally. Regardless if the pick was top 5 or around 10. 
 

Same thing with Cubs. Same with when KC won.  
They added pieces when they were ready. 

[Tony-OH]

2 hours ago, Aglets said:

Roch has an update on Mundy this morning.   Just placed on injured list.   Not sure why it took a week but there you have it.

https://www.masnsports.com/school-of-roch/2021/08/more-on-the-losing-streak-and-bundy-trade.html

Well at least I know people read us here! lol

I bitch about a lack of information on a player, and the very next day, MASN reports with wrong with him. Maybe that's the way we can get some information around here! lol

 

[Just Regular]

5 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Well at least I know people read us here! lol

I bitch about a lack of information on a player, and the very next day, MASN reports with wrong with him. Maybe that's the way we can get some information around here! lol

 

I won't post the link because whoo boy very NSFW (and earmuffs kids!), but "Bryan Price how does it help the Reds" is a youtube search with some old school baseball gold.

[SteveA]

6 hours ago, Frobby said:

Your definition of rebuilding appears to be very narrow, limited to players acquired from high draft picks acquired as a result of losing a lot of games.   To me, that’s not the definition.   

If you use money saved from a trimmed payroll to build an analytics department and an international operation, that’s part of rebuilding.   

If you trade established players for prospects, that is part of rebuilding.  I recognize there are a few teams that do this as a form of reloading rather than rebuilding.  That’s not where the O’s are because they don’t have immediate replacements from the players they are trading.  

If you cut expenditures now with a plan to spend the money later once a new core is being established, that’s part of rebuilding.   

For some reason an image popped into my head of Jeff Foxworthy doing his old "You might be a redneck..." bit except it is Frobby and it's "You might be rebuilding it...".

[Frobby]

On 8/23/2021 at 8:29 AM, eddie83 said:

Haven’t read it yet. I’m glad somebody is finally talking about this. 

Bite me, Kenny!

[Uli2001]

Rosenthal has been a hack since his Baltimore Sun days. He has a big ax to grind with the Orioles.

[eddie83]

6 hours ago, Frobby said:

Bite me, Kenny!

Did you put Rosenthal into the search screen? 
 

I would like to go back and look at Rosenthal and Olney, etc comments from a couple of years ago. 

[dystopia]

Rosenthal and Olney can go eat a large bag of d***s. 

[Chelsea_Phil]

Well said, dystopia