Target: Under 800 Runs Allowed

[HowAboutThat]

Just now, Sports Guy said:

Except he’s not an example.  He was still a 2+ WAR guy who provided surplus value.

His offense made him a positive player, despite subpar OF defense.

I don’t recall who pointed it out but he had the worst(or near worst) 47-hr season in history. That’s giving it back.

[Can_of_corn]

Just now, Philip said:

I don’t recall who pointed it out but he had the worst(or near worst) 47-hr season in history. That’s giving it back.

Holy arbitrary cutoffs batman!

He would have been the third most valuable position player on this year's team.

 

[HowAboutThat]

And I’m done. I made my point and I stand by what I mean(and not what you claim I mean) and we shall see what happens.

 

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, Philip said:

I don’t recall who pointed it out but he had the worst(or near worst) 47-hr season in history. That’s giving it back.

Well he also had a low OBP.  That doesn’t help.

And so what?  He was still a good player who provided the team good value despite poorish defense. 

Yes, his defense took away some value but the value was still there nonetheless.

[Sports Guy]

If Stewart is never more than a 720ish OPs guy with occasional HR power and a 320 OBp, I would take McKenna too.

If Stewart can have a 350 OBP and an 800+ OPS, I would take him over McKenna.  He has the ability to post those numbers but I don’t think he will do it.

[Frobby]

4 hours ago, Philip said:

Your comment is kind of irrelevant. What you were saying is that we have a bad defense, then you’re saying why we are bad at defense. Everybody knows why we are bad at defense. We need better defenders to help our young pitching.

In the dumpsters where we are digging, we are, only through great good fortune, going to find a guy who can defend and hit well. Defense is more valuable at the moment.

No it isn’t.   We are far below average offensively, and our pitching isn’t only bad because of our defense.   Depending which metric you like, our defense is 30-45 runs below average.   Our offense was 86 runs below average. Even if you deduct 45 runs attributable to the defense, the pitching was 168 runs below average.   You can’t defend a ball that’s 50 feet over the fence.  

I totally understand that defense is important.   Anyone who watched our team blossom in 2012 when Manny took over from Betemit/Reynolds at 3B and McLouth took over in LF knows that made a HUGE difference.   But it’s not the only thing, and a team that’s good defensively but can’t hit is not going to be successful at all.   I just want players that improve our ratio of runs scored to runs allowed.   I’m indifferent to which side of that equation they improve.   
 

[NCRaven]

On 11/16/2021 at 10:35 PM, Frobby said:

Anyway, it’s not worth too much more ink. 

Wait, was I supposed to be writing this down in ink?

BTW, as of now, the top not worth more discussion has apparently gone two more pages.

 

[Aristotelian]

8 hours ago, NCRaven said:

Wait, was I supposed to be writing this down in ink?

BTW, as of now, the top not worth more discussion has apparently gone two more pages.

 

It's almost as if people like to create and magnify disagreement just for the sake of argument. 

[BRobinsonfan]

On 11/16/2021 at 9:43 AM, Frobby said:

Last year, the O’s allowed 956 runs, worst in the AL by 122 runs.   If we want to see a dramatic improvement in the team’s W-L record, there’s the low hanging fruit.   

In 2020, the team allowed only 4.90 runs per game, a 794-run pace over 162 games.   I think that should be the goal for 2022 — under 800 runs allowed.   

A good bit of that needs to come from internal improvement.  Guys who I hope can do way better include Akin, Kremer, Wells, Lowther, Baumann, Lopez, Fry and Scott.   Together, that group allowed 334 runs in 454 innings.   To me, in a successful 2022 they should be able to throw more like 700 innings and yet not allow many more than 350 runs.   I think a lot of the team’s success or failure relates to whether that group improves.   

Second, I think we need two vets to fill rotation spots more ably than Harvey and Lopez did last year.   We ought to be able to find two guys who can keep their ERAs down in the 5ish range rather than over 6.    Spend a few million to do it, please.   

Finally, we hopefully get 100+ innings from Grayson Rodriguez and some more innings from Means and Zimmermann.  Less innings from guys like Watkins.

Things would have to go very well for the O’s to allow under 800 runs next year, but I think it’s a realistic objective.   



 

What's the incentive for them to spend a few million on a couple of veteran pitchers if their focus is still on accumulating draft picks?  The current system doesn't incentivize incremental improvements very much. 

 

[Frobby]

On 11/16/2021 at 9:43 AM, Frobby said:

Last year, the O’s allowed 956 runs, worst in the AL by 122 runs.   If we want to see a dramatic improvement in the team’s W-L record, there’s the low hanging fruit.   

In 2020, the team allowed only 4.90 runs per game, a 794-run pace over 162 games.   I think that should be the goal for 2022 — under 800 runs allowed.   

Crushed it, allowing only 688 runs, 112 below the “goal” I suggested.   Of course, the league average was down by  61 runs, but even if you make that adjustment, we still were 50 runs better than my goal.

For 2023, I’d say the goal should be 50+ runs below whatever the league average is.  Last year we were 4 runs over the average.