No 4-32 Redux

[Frobby]

3 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

Arizona has a tough closing schedule.

Os schedule is actually easier than Arizona and the series with the Rangers is critical.

Pirates probably have the easiest schedule of the 4.

Honestly, I think if the Os win 52 or more games, they pick second at best.  I’m going to guess that Texas and Pitt win 55-58 games.  Arizona somewhere in the 48-51 game area.

I’d agree with this guess.  

[Just Regular]

I think it would be good business for the league to make the Orioles and Diamondbacks play wildcard or best of three for the #1 pick, Pirates and Rangers for the #3 pick, etc.

For the Bottom Six, Bottom Ten type teams, that would be one good thing to look forward to before another long winter, more "playoffs", something fresh for the off days before the initial series.

There could still be shenanigans aiming for 1/2, 3/4, 5/6, etc. but maybe the Diamondbacks of the world don't so willy nilly DFA their Asdrubal Cabreras then.    Players-wise, you have to imagine the John Means and Ryan Mountcastles of the world would be for it.

 

 

[SteveA]

Just now, OrioleDog said:

I think it would be good business for the league to make the Orioles and Diamondbacks play wildcard or best of three for the #1 pick, Pirates and Rangers for the #3 pick, etc.

For the Bottom Six, Bottom Ten type teams, that would be one good thing to look forward to before another long winter, more "playoffs", something fresh for the off days before the initial series.

There could still be shenanigans aiming for 1/2, 3/4, 5/6, etc. but maybe the Diamondbacks of the world don't so willy nilly DFA their Asdrubal Cabreras then.    Players-wise, you have to imagine the John Means and Ryan Mountcastles of the world would be for it.

 

 

Would the winner of the game or series, or the loser, get the better draft pick?

[OriolesMagic83]

You worry too much.  This is a very bad team, but not historically bad. 

[Just Regular]

45 minutes ago, SteveA said:

Would the winner of the game or series, or the loser, get the better draft pick?

Winner.

 

I would say you could put Stephen Strasburg in a bubble above the field with two off-ramps, but with Elias' style maybe you just put the cash difference between Pool 1 and Pool 2 somewhere beside the field like the final tables of the poker shows.

 

[25 Nuggets]

I just want to see a significant improvement in the W-L department next season.

[Moose Milligan]

I think we'll wind up with the #2 pick.  And not that it would mean anything, but I wouldn't mind if we somehow played spoiler to an AL East team vying for a playoff spot in the final few weeks.  There are some games against the Yankees Sept 14th-16th and they're really struggling right now.  If we could kick them down in the standings a little bit, I wouldn't mind.  I hate the Jays but I'd rather see them in the playoffs before the Yankees, that's for sure.  They're not the team of Jose Bautista anymore...it would be great to see Vlad Jr, Bichette, etc in the playoffs.  It sucks that we have to play them all the time but they are a young, talented team that should be featured on a national level.  

Or even if we played spoiler to the Jays in the last series of the season, that'd be awesome, too.  How many of us remember Andino and game #162?  If we got to do that to the Jays and it gave us the #2 pick...fine.  I can deal with that.  Of course I'd really like the #1 pick, but if there's a silver lining that we kept one of our foes out of the playoffs, I'll be alright (not thrilled) with that, too.  

21 hours ago, SteveA said:

People never seem to learn the old axiom that you are not as bad as you look during your worst losing times, nor are you as good as you look when things are going great.

During the 19 game losing streak you started to hear talk of us only winning 42 games and competing with the 1960 Mets, or how a finish like 2002 was "likely".   People take a 19 game stretch and project it out as if it is a true indicator of the team's talent.   It's no more a true indicator than our current 7-7 stretch is.  

Since the All Star Break we've had a 10-6 stretch, an 0-19 stretch, and now a 7-7 stretch (that includes 4 1 run losses so we've been in just about every game).

I think we'll probably win more than 50 and it's certainly not out of the question that we win more games this year than any Oriole team since 2017.

That old axiom is good, but I believe this team was probably playing closer to it's talent during the losing streak then the 10-6 stretch.  No, 0-19 isn't reflective of their true talent, but it's closer than 10-6, IMO.    Yes, you're not as bad as you are during the worst times and you're not as good as you are when things are looking great.  But the things average out and your team eventually settles into what they are.  That's why 162 games is great, you get to see who your team is over time.  It's a marathon, not a sprint.  

A 2002 finish could have happened.  After going 0-19, they'd only have to go 4-13 to match that futility and as bad as they were playing at the time, that looked like it certainly could have been possible. 

I agree that competing with the '62 Mets was less likely but would any of us been surprised?  This team has routinely found ways to make you think they've bottomed out and things couldn't get worse and then they do.  Didn't we have an 0-13 streak earlier this year?  Yeah, hold my beer.

1 hour ago, 25 Nuggets said:

I just want to see a significant improvement in the W-L department next season.

I do, too.  I think that should have happened this year but with all the Covid craziness and crap, things have been delayed for a year.  AR probably should have been up this year if he got a full season last summer.  

This team has to avoid 100 losses next year, for sure.  Time to make real moves in the offseason, time to call up AR and G-Rod and put forth some effort.

[LA2]

16 hours ago, OriolesMagic83 said:

You worry too much.  This is a very bad team, but not historically bad. 

But the 2002 team was very far from being historically bad; they were at .500 going into the last week of August. Actually, part of the agony of how they almost lost-out the season at 4-32 is that they had shown on the field, not just on paper, that they were just mediocre, not bad. Jeesh, if we had now the talented young starting pitching (Lopez, Ponson, and Johnson were 25, 26, and 28 yrs old respectively) that the 2002 team had it might have even been considered a cause for hope, sad to say! The current season's team is much, much worse and thus, one would think, more likely to collapse in the last month of a long season.

One doesn't have to be historically bad to go 4-32. One just has to be below average and extremely unlucky; playing in a very tough division is probably a factor, too.

[Frobby]

5 minutes ago, LA2 said:

But the 2002 team was very far from being historically bad; they were at .500 going into the last week of August. Actually, part of the agony of how they almost lost-out the season at 4-32 is that they had shown on the field, not just on paper, that they were just mediocre, not bad. Jeesh, if we had now the talented young starting pitching (Lopez, Ponson, and Johnson were 25, 26, and 28 yrs old respectively) that the 2002 team had it might have even been considered a cause for hope, sad to say! The current season's team is much, much worse and thus, one would think, more likely to collapse in the last month of a long season.

One doesn't have to be historically bad to go 4-32. One just has to be below average and extremely unlucky; playing in a very tough division is probably a factor, too.

And while 2002 was the worst example, we’ve got many other examples of the team playing far worse in the last part of the year than they did up to that point.   Off the top of my head:

2005 - 60-60 followed by 14-28

2007 - 58-65 followed by 11-28

2008 - 61-63 followed by 7-30

2017 - 71-68 followed by 4-19

Following the Orioles is like going to a horror movie — you can’t relax until the credits are rolling.   I learned that from watching Carrie.

[LA2]

48 minutes ago, Frobby said:

And while 2002 was the worst example, we’ve got many other examples of the team playing far worse in the last part of the year than they did up to that point.   Off the top of my head:

2005 - 60-60 followed by 14-28

2007 - 58-65 followed by 11-28

2008 - 61-63 followed by 7-30

2017 - 71-68 followed by 4-19

Following the Orioles is like going to a horror movie — you can’t relax until the credits are rolling.   I learned that from watching Carrie.

You have brought back many bad memories (incl. the movie)! I must say that the teams of 2001-2011, in general, were remarkably consistent in their losing ways, and under four different skippers (Hargrove, Mazzilli, Perlozzo, poor Dave Trembley). But it also reawakens the memory of happiness and hope when supposed desperate choices Buck and Duquette arrived and finally got things in order!

[Ruzious]

Or Pet Sematary.  They keep getting buried and coming back even more disturbing.    

[OriolesMagic83]

This team looks really bad vs. teams w/ a lot of talent that do all the things that good teams do.  Things such as run the bases right, situational hitting, not giving away outs.  This team also often does well against poor teams such as the Royals.  Hopefully when the talent level of this team is higher, they will stop shooting themselves in the foot and win more games. 

[SteveA]

3 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

I think we'll wind up with the #2 pick.  And not that it would mean anything, but I wouldn't mind if we somehow played spoiler to an AL East team vying for a playoff spot in the final few weeks.  There are some games against the Yankees Sept 14th-16th and they're really struggling right now.  If we could kick them down in the standings a little bit, I wouldn't mind.  I hate the Jays but I'd rather see them in the playoffs before the Yankees, that's for sure.  They're not the team of Jose Bautista anymore...it would be great to see Vlad Jr, Bichette, etc in the playoffs.  It sucks that we have to play them all the time but they are a young, talented team that should be featured on a national level.  

Or even if we played spoiler to the Jays in the last series of the season, that'd be awesome, too.  How many of us remember Andino and game #162?  If we got to do that to the Jays and it gave us the #2 pick...fine.  I can deal with that.  Of course I'd really like the #1 pick, but if there's a silver lining that we kept one of our foes out of the playoffs, I'll be alright (not thrilled) with that, too.  

That old axiom is good, but I believe this team was probably playing closer to it's talent during the losing streak then the 10-6 stretch.  No, 0-19 isn't reflective of their true talent, but it's closer than 10-6, IMO.    Yes, you're not as bad as you are during the worst times and you're not as good as you are when things are looking great.  But the things average out and your team eventually settles into what they are.  That's why 162 games is great, you get to see who your team is over time.  It's a marathon, not a sprint.  

A 2002 finish could have happened.  After going 0-19, they'd only have to go 4-13 to match that futility and as bad as they were playing at the time, that looked like it certainly could have been possible. 

I agree that competing with the '62 Mets was less likely but would any of us been surprised?  This team has routinely found ways to make you think they've bottomed out and things couldn't get worse and then they do.  Didn't we have an 0-13 streak earlier this year?  Yeah, hold my beer.

I do, too.  I think that should have happened this year but with all the Covid craziness and crap, things have been delayed for a year.  AR probably should have been up this year if he got a full season last summer.  

This team has to avoid 100 losses next year, for sure.  Time to make real moves in the offseason, time to call up AR and G-Rod and put forth some effort.

I think you are really underestimating how hard it is even for a very bad team to have a 4-32 stretch.  What the 2002 Orioles did was unbelievable and pretty much unprecedented.   The worst team in modern history, the 62 Mets, never went 4-32.   They never won less than 7 games in any 36 game stretch.   Same with the 2018 Orioles, as near as I can tell, their worst 36 game stretch was 8-28.   The 43 win Tigers of 2002 never went 4-32, they came closest at 6-30 for one stretch.

So no, as bad as we are, I never thought  we were likely to finish 4-32 again or even have a 4-32 stretch.   That is extremely, generationally rare.   And you fell into the same trap as everyone does in that time, assuming that the current stretch of bad play will prolong indefinitely.   In the bolded part above you say "as bad as they were playing at the time".... as if there was any reason for them to continue to be THAT bad.   There wasn't.   No one is that bad.

[Moose Milligan]

37 minutes ago, SteveA said:

I think you are really underestimating how hard it is even for a very bad team to have a 4-32 stretch.  What the 2002 Orioles did was unbelievable and pretty much unprecedented.   The worst team in modern history, the 62 Mets, never went 4-32.   They never won less than 7 games in any 36 game stretch.   Same with the 2018 Orioles, as near as I can tell, their worst 36 game stretch was 8-28.   The 43 win Tigers of 2002 never went 4-32, they came closest at 6-30 for one stretch.

So no, as bad as we are, I never thought  we were likely to finish 4-32 again or even have a 4-32 stretch.   That is extremely, generationally rare.   And you fell into the same trap as everyone does in that time, assuming that the current stretch of bad play will prolong indefinitely.   In the bolded part above you say "as bad as they were playing at the time".... as if there was any reason for them to continue to be THAT bad.   There wasn't.   No one is that bad.

Dude, this team went 0-19.  From there, all they'd have to do is go 4-13.  A 4-13 stretch is not hard for this team.  We were well over halfway there.  

There wasn't a reason for them to continue to be THAT bad, if we're defining THAT bad as 0-19 and not winning a single, solitary game.  4-13 is not that THAT bad.  It's a little better.  It still sucks, but it's better than what they were.  

As unprecedented as 4-32 was, 0-19 was also unprecedented.  It was historically bad (historically meaning:  of historic note, you geniuses.  I'm not getting into a semantics debate about what historic or historically means.  JFC, if someone said the sky was blue, half of you would be like "well, no, it's actually partly blue today.  And earlier it was cloud cover so the sky really was gray).  

All I'm saying is that it's not a stretch of the imagination for a team that just went 0-19 to go 4-13 in the next stretch.  That's it.  

[LA2]

23 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

Dude, this team went 0-19.  From there, all they'd have to do is go 4-13.  A 4-13 stretch is not hard for this team.  We were well over halfway there.  

There wasn't a reason for them to continue to be THAT bad, if we're defining THAT bad as 0-19 and not winning a single, solitary game.  4-13 is not that THAT bad.  It's a little better.  It still sucks, but it's better than what they were.  

As unprecedented as 4-32 was, 0-19 was also unprecedented.  It was historically bad (historically meaning:  of historic note, you geniuses.  I'm not getting into a semantics debate about what historic or historically means.  JFC, if someone said the sky was blue, half of you would be like "well, no, it's actually partly blue today.  And earlier it was cloud cover so the sky really was gray).  

All I'm saying is that it's not a stretch of the imagination for a team that just went 0-19 to go 4-13 in the next stretch.  That's it.  

I get it. Baseball has a long season, but short memory. Having gone 0-19 certainly doesn't lower the probability of going 4-32.