Fangraphs’ Ben Clemens on the Orioles’ FA Needs

[wildcard]

3 hours ago, UMDTerrapins said:

I'm pretty open-minded, but there is no way to change my mind that we should be pursuing a starter from outside the organization who profiles as a #2 or #3. Pair such a guy with Means/Rodriguez and you significantly alter the time frame it will take us to emerge from the rebuild. Waiting for us to become competitive before making such an acquisition is inverted logic to me. 

Its an appealling thought to add a 2 or 3, but seems unlikely to me.   DL Hall should be ready for the majors by the end of the season.   The O's are going to want to see what Baumann and Bradish can do in the rotation.  That could happen early in the year.  And there are 4 or 5 others starters that could develop from the O's system.

2s and 3s are expensive  in years and money.  Then there is trying to attract them to pitch in Camden Yards and the O's being a down the list of team with the high revenue.

It seems more likely that the O's will try to get a less costly  starter and try to grow their own starters.   I am not saying they shouldn't try to get a 2 or 3, just that it seems unlikely.

[UMDTerrapins]

38 minutes ago, wildcard said:

Its an appealling thought to add a 2 or 3, but seems unlikely to me.   DL Hall should be ready for the majors by the end of the season.   The O's are going to want to see what Baumann and Bradish can do in the rotation.  That could happen early in the year.  And there are 4 or 5 others starters that could develop from the O's system.

2s and 3s are expensive  in years and money.  Then there is trying to attract them to pitch in Camden Yards and the O's being a down the list of team with the high revenue.

It seems more likely that the O's will try to get a less costly  starter and try to grow their own starters.   I am not saying they shouldn't try to get a 2 or 3, just that it seem unlikely.

I think our best way to add a #2/3 type is through trade (Mullins), which is realistic. I like our outlook if we have Hall, Bradish, Lowther, Zimmerman, Kremer, Akin, Baumann, Wells fighting it out for two spots in the rotation and several spots in the bullpen. If you dealt Mullins for Max Meyer (and more) for example, that would be a good use of our resources. I agree it's very unlikely we're going to be able to sign a #2/3 free agent pitcher. And while I don't love the idea of entrusting CF to Hays for the next couple of seasons due to injury concerns, I do like the idea of selling high on Mullins and redistributing our talent more favorably to the rotation. You can never have enough pitching. 

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, wildcard said:

Its an appealling thought to add a 2 or 3, but seems unlikely to me.   DL Hall should be ready for the majors by the end of the season.   The O's are going to want to see what Baumann and Bradish can do in the rotation.  That could happen early in the year.  And there are 4 or 5 others starters that could develop from the O's system.

2s and 3s are expensive  in years and money.  Then there is trying to attract them to pitch in Camden Yards and the O's being a down the list of team with the high revenue.

It seems more likely that the O's will try to get a less costly  starter and try to grow their own starters.   I am not saying they shouldn't try to get a 2 or 3, just that it seem unlikely.

To me it’s a matter of when, not if, we should spend to acquire a frontline starter.  The Tigers have a fair number of decent home grown rotation pieces, including the former 1:1 Mize (ranked as high as 13 overall by BA as a minor leaguer), Skubal (ranked 20th going into this year) and Matt Manning (ranked as high as 17th).   Three guys BA has ranked in the top 20 in the last couple of years, two of whom (Mize and Skubal) pitched very well this year.   Yet, they’re going out and getting EdRod.    You can’t expect to fill a championship rotation with home grown guys, especially when you’ve been drafting mostly hitters for three straight years.   
 

[NCRaven]

1 hour ago, UMDTerrapins said:

I think our best way to add a #2/3 type is through trade (Mullins), which is realistic. I like our outlook if we have Hall, Bradish, Lowther, Zimmerman, Kremer, Akin, Baumann, Wells fighting it out for two spots in the rotation and several spots in the bullpen. If you dealt Mullins for Max Meyer (and more)…

I agree.

[wildcard]

I am not in favor on trading Mullins.  When the O's have a surplus, maybe next off season they could trade a corner outfielder like Santander if Stowers is ready to take over.  I would love to see Santander to put up 35 homers and 100 RBI  next year.

[higgybaby]

3 hours ago, UMDTerrapins said:

I'm pretty open-minded, but there is no way to change my mind that we should be pursuing a starter from outside the organization who profiles as a #2 or #3. Pair such a guy with Means/Rodriguez and you significantly alter the time frame it will take us to emerge from the rebuild. Waiting for us to become competitive before making such an acquisition is inverted logic to me. 

Eduardo Rodriguez was the perfect candidate to sign this year on a 4-5 year deal. 

Edited November 16, 2021 by higgybaby

[cnmilton]

I have said it before, and I will reiterate now: Jon Gray is a pitcher who could work at Camden Yards. He isnt expected to be super expensive,and he has had success in Coors Field, probably more of a hitters park than Camden Yards

[Orioles0615]

Infield market looks slim next year. O's should get there guy now, but they won't 

[OriolesMagic83]

What kind of contract will Matz probably sign?  3 years?  O's really need to sign a dependable FA starter.  The rotation going into 2021 was a disaster waiting to happen.  Depending on Harvey and a bunch of rookies to be reliable is not a strategy for success. 

[sportsfan8703]

14 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

I don't see any excuse for why the team can't at least attempt to be competitive in 2023.

2023 is the year to compete. As sad as this sounds, this year at the mlb level will be seeing what we have in Mateo, Guiterrez, and the same cast of SP. Hopefully, we can find some nuggets to supplement are arriving prospects in 2023. 

[Aristotelian]

14 hours ago, wildcard said:

Its an appealling thought to add a 2 or 3, but seems unlikely to me.   DL Hall should be ready for the majors by the end of the season.   The O's are going to want to see what Baumann and Bradish can do in the rotation.  That could happen early in the year.  And there are 4 or 5 others starters that could develop from the O's system.

Too early to give up on Lowther, Kremer, Akin, and Wells too. Hopefully we are done with the Lopez experiment so there should be more opportunities to go around even with one FA signing. I'd like someone better than Harvey for sure but I also like getting guys on one year "prove it" deals. They have every incentive to get in shape and outperform and Harvey aside we have a decent track record of getting production from short term guys.

[wildcard]

31 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

Too early to give up on Lowther, Kremer, Akin, and Wells too. Hopefully we are done with the Lopez experiment so there should be more opportunities to go around even with one FA signing. I'd like someone better than Harvey for sure but I also like getting guys on one year "prove it" deals. They have every incentive to get in shape and outperform and Harvey aside we have a decent track record of getting production from short term guys.

Zimmermann, Lowther , Kremer and Akin have a lot to prove and some of that probably needs to be worked on in the minors.   Alex Wells is probably a long reliever as Hyde said at least to begin the season.

I like Means, Grayson, Baumann, Bradish and Tyler Wells as  starters.  I would like to see Ellis signed and add another starter.

[LookinUp]

47 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

Too early to give up on Lowther, Kremer, Akin, and Wells too. Hopefully we are done with the Lopez experiment so there should be more opportunities to go around even with one FA signing. I'd like someone better than Harvey for sure but I also like getting guys on one year "prove it" deals. They have every incentive to get in shape and outperform and Harvey aside we have a decent track record of getting production from short term guys.

Getting other good starting pitchers does not mean we're giving up on in-house guys. There's plenty of innings to go around and we're not close to filling them with what we have now.

[Porky]

17 hours ago, BohKnowsBmore said:

I think there's a nuance to it. You certainly have a lot of holes, but you don't want to potentially block talent that's coming through the system with expensive FA.

Outside of Rutschman, I don't really think there's a slam dunk player in the minors we would have to worry about being blocked. Teams need many pitchers, there's three outfield positions, and the infield talent can play around the diamond. They can always be traded too. 

[BohKnowsBmore]

2 hours ago, Porky said:

Outside of Rutschman, I don't really think there's a slam dunk player in the minors we would have to worry about being blocked. Teams need many pitchers, there's three outfield positions, and the infield talent can play around the diamond. They can always be traded too. 

But you want to see what you have with a Gunnar or Westburg, etc. Signing guys to all three of 2B/3B/SS for several years at decent money may actually be destructive to the future of the club. You will want to leave some space on the roster to find out what we have in the top guys on the farm, then supplement where there are still holes therefter IMO.

I'm not saying we shouldn't sign anyone, just responding to the notion of why it wouldn't make sense to plug every current hole via FA.