Orioles signing Rougned Odor

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, Tony-OH said:

I don't know if you are just being hard headed at this point or just digging in your heals, but I don't think that's what this year is about at all.

The Orioles are in a different spot in any previous year because they legitimate, major league or major league ready players and pitchers to play this year.

2022  vs 2021

C- Rutschman > Severino
1B: Mouncastle year two > Mountcastle rookie season
2B - Urias > Valaika/Wilkeson/Rio/Urias 2021
SS - Mateo < Galvis (The Orioles still need some work here unless they really believe Mateo is a full time SS)
3B - Gutierrez > Franco
UTL- Odor > Valaika/Martin
LF - Hays (27) >= Hays (26)
CF - Mullins = Mullins
RF - Santander (healthy) > Santander
DH - Mancini 2 years removed from cancer >= Mancini
SP - Means = Means
SP - T Wells > Harvey
SP - Lowther > Lopez
SP  - Zimmemann > Zimmermann hurt
SP - Bradish/Baumann/A. Wells/Akin/Kremer (?) > Watkins/Kremer

I think it's very realistic that we can improve 20 games from within and this doesn't even account for Rodriguez and Stowers being ready at some point.

 

 

Hey, this should be in my "internal improvement" thread!    I think a 20 game improvement is a bit optimistic, and I doubt Mullins repeats his 2021 season, but otherwise it's a great synopsis.   I'm sure some things will go wrong that aren't accounted for here.   But there is reason to think the team will be more competitive in 2022 even without major additions.

[Philip]

We have wandered far afield from the subject of the post, which is a terrible signing of a terrible player and Apologetics from Roch.

However,I firmly believe that Mike made several moves last year that were so unjustifiable they could arguably be called deliberate sabotage. We should’ve won an additional 8-10 games last year but either because of stupid managerial decisions, or because Hyde was acting from orders from on high with the same result, we didn’t. How many wins do we gain by subtracting Valaika and Franco and Sisco, by ending that stupid “Mountcastle in left field is a good idea“ experiment, and by avoiding some of the clowns who were throwing relief innings for us?

So I don’t think we are a 55-win team I think we were closer to 65- win team last year.

That means, we can get near 80 wins without adding 20 wins of true talent, But by better use of our pitching arms, and timely promotion of our top prospects.

Edited December 1, 2021 by Philip

[interloper]

2 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

I don't know if you are just being hard headed at this point or just digging in your heals, but I don't think that's what this year is about at all.

The Orioles are in a different spot in any previous year because they legitimate, major league or major league ready players and pitchers to play this year.

2022  vs 2021

C- Rutschman > Severino
1B: Mouncastle year two > Mountcastle rookie season
2B - Urias > Valaika/Wilkeson/Rio/Urias 2021
SS - Mateo < Galvis (The Orioles still need some work here unless they really believe Mateo is a full time SS)
3B - Gutierrez > Franco
UTL- Odor > Valaika/Martin
LF - Hays (27) >= Hays (26)
CF - Mullins = Mullins
RF - Santander (healthy) > Santander
DH - Mancini 2 years removed from cancer >= Mancini
SP - Means = Means
SP - T Wells > Harvey
SP - Lowther > Lopez
SP  - Zimmemann > Zimmermann hurt
SP - Bradish/Baumann/A. Wells/Akin/Kremer (?) > Watkins/Kremer

I think it's very realistic that we can improve 20 games from within and this doesn't even account for Rodriguez and Stowers being ready at some point.

 

 

Loving the optimism here and I basically agree, with the caveat that the nebulous soup of mid-tier SP prospects we're currently featuring really has to prove they can pitch in this league. And, that I still don't think the O's are going to try T. Wells in the rotation, but they totally COULD. 

I will say that if the O's don't improve their record by at least 10 games this year, something has gone terribly wrong . 

[Hazmat]

Has anyone posted this thread from last year when Odor was cut and picked up by the Yankees?

Of course, we have another year of information but it's interesting to read some of the comments:

 

 

[Sports Guy]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

Well, I guess it depends on what you mean by overpaying players in FA.

I have said I would sign Stroman and was willing to pay him up to around what Ray and KG got…he may not take that much to sign.

I would deal Mancini to a team in hopes to get a few BP arms.  I think guys outside of a good systems top 10 is the best we can hope for w/r/t Trey and I would try to target ML ready BP assets.

I would send Mullins and a prospect or 2 outside of our top 20ish to the Marlins for Lopez, Meyer and Anderson.  If this trade couldn’t work, I would still look to move Mullins for at least one ML ready starter and another player close to Ml ready.

I would send a few outside the top 20 prospects to St Louis for DeJong and take on all of his salary (this helps the Cards sign Story, as has been reported they want to do).

Ultimately….

Mountcastle, Urias, DeJong and Anderson in the IF

Hays, Santander in the OF

Adley at C

Rotation of Stroman, Means, P Lopez and 2 of the starters in the system..probably Akin and Zimmerman..and obviously GRod as soon as they want him up..maybe immediately depending on the new CBA…Meyer waiting in the wings and a potential call up by mid season…eventual potential rotation of Stroman, Means, Lopez, Meyer and Hall and if Means is pitching well at the deadline (and especially if Meyer and Hall look good), you move him for more prospects and have even more money off the books for next offseason.  This is how you keep turning the roster and keep the payroll low.  

BP: basically all the arms here plus what we get from Trey.  Keep moving the pieces around until you find the best mix.  The fixtures should be Scott and T Wells..and then it’s a toss up after that.

The DH and other OF spot probably comes in the form of one more cheap signing and/or easily available trade.  Mateo fits into the mix and could be a platoon candidate.  This is until Stowers and whoever else shows they are ready. 
 

Would that team win 70+ games?  I think so.  The pitching is vastly improved.  The defense is very good, which should help the young arms. You have youth everywhere, which (as you pointed out) should lead to improved play. You have more a vet presence for the pitchers and young hitters.    I think how good the pen is would go a long way at determining how good that team would be.  
 

The payroll of that team would be under 75 million I believe (or if it’s not, it’s not much more than that), nothing long term is an issue (only Stroman guaranteed beyond a few years), we have kept our best prospects and we are still set for the long term.

All of these moves are right there to be made.  The one argument is, what is Mullins worth.  It sounds like he’s valued highly but we obviously don’t know how high.

 

Btw, there is an important thing to point out here.  Whether it’s this exact plan or any number of other plans I could come up, basically the only long term pieces I would be looking to acquire is pitching.  There are scenarios where a SS could also be in the mix but basically, it’s all pitching.

In this plan, you have Lopez, Meyer and Stroman as options for at least 3 years.  
 

My plan would be to continue to not block the young positional talent long term.  But I’m not sure about guys for another year or 2 and I don’t see the point in waiting to acquire quality placeholders until those guys are ready.

I feel Pretty good in saying we need to add outside pitching long term And I also feel good in saying we don’t need to wait around to do that.  No reason we can’t add pitching right now.

I also feel pretty good in saying that, for right now, we do not need to add expensive, long term options in the field.  Elias will concentrate on positional talent all the time imo.  This isn’t just how drafts have fallen.  That is his plan and I agree with him.  

 

[Aristotelian]

14 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

  Whether it’s this exact plan or any number of other plans I could come up, basically the only long term pieces I would be looking to acquire is pitching 

 

My plan would be to continue to not block the young positional talent long term.  But I’m not sure about guys for another year or 2 and I don’t see the point in waiting to acquire quality placeholders until those guys are ready.

I feel Pretty good in saying we need to add outside pitching long term And I also feel good in saying we don’t need to wait around to do that.  No reason we can’t add pitching right now.

I also feel pretty good in saying that, for right now, we do not need to add expensive, long term options in the field.  Elias will concentrate on positional talent all the time imo.  This isn’t just how drafts have fallen.  That is his plan and I agree with him.  

 

Now you are starting to make some sense (seems you are backing off of Bryant). Only question is whether there is a good reason to go after pitching now as opposed to next year. I have said I would be supportive of Stroman or equivalent but I also have no problem waiting.

[justD]

6 hours ago, spiritof66 said:

I'm surprised that so many of you don't have the same take I do as to what's going on with the Orioles.

I start with the premise that Elias has a solid and pretty conventional understanding about how to build a winning ballclub: you have to gather talent from all available sources, and try to arrange it so that players of different ages and experience levels will all be able to contribute at the same time, without trying to arrange it so that every important player's age or period of team control is virtually identical. I am confident that he appreciates that because the Orioles are so far behind the Astros and most other teams in reaping the benefits of international talent they've signed and developed, they will have to be aggressive in bringing in talent from outside the system in order to compete for a division title. 

I've never fully understood in detail how the Houston-style rebuild is supposed to work in Baltimore. But I do know that to build a contending team you can't just keep piling up high draft picks and adding prospects to your minor league teams. You have to seize opportunities, whenever they present themselves, to bring in talent that you think is going to improve the team right away. "Flipping the switch" has always seemed to me to be an unfortunate metaphor for improving an MLB team: it doesn't make sense to lock yourself into a plan that has you trying to shift instantaneously from minimizing spending, amassing minor-league talent and not caring about winning to acquiring the talent you need to compete. The opportunities aren't likely to present themselves on that kind of convenient, highly efficient timetable.

If you're serious about winning more than 60-70 games, let alone contending, you have to act when those opportunities to improve the team arise, even though it means paying much-higher-than minimum salaries before the team is very good or after a player's skills have diminished. Elias hasn't done that, and it's pretty clear as he fills up the roster with guys who won't move the needle that he's not trying to do that. I've read a lot about how he might grow or acquire bats or arms, but I see no sign, absolutely none, that he's getting ready to add established or expensive talent or that he has any plan to do that, let alone when he would do that.

To me, the only logical inference is that Elias's task isn't to build a winning team. It's to get the team ready for a sale soon after Peter Angelos dies, while trying to maintain some hope and good will from Oriole fans. Every decision the Orioles have made since 2018 is consistent with the conclusion that the Angeloses want to take reasonable steps to sell the team: Build up the most neglected pieces of the infrastructure (acquiring and developing international talent and, so we're told, analytics) that would enhance the value of the franchise (or more accurately, whose egregious absence would depress that value). Defer the promotion of the most valuable talent in the system, maximizing the term of a buyer's control. Minimize future salary commitments (including cleaning up the Chris Davis situation as best they could). Put together a minimum-cost roster that can be retained, cast off or traded, by current ownership as well as by a buyer. (This is where the Odor signing fits in. The Orioles want infield depth for 2022, but not for the reasons most teams do: to keep the team's performance up in the event of injury or unavailability for some other reason. The Orioles seek that depth so that, if one of these infielders establishes trade value, they can move him for another prospect or two, increasing the supply of low-salaried talent and furthering the illusion that they're building for the future.) This just doesn't look like a team with a capable general manager who is searching for and implementing ways to build a team that will more games, so I don't believe that's what it is. 

There is a lot of overlap between things a team does in the early stages of a Houston-style rebuild and reasonable things to do when the 92-year-old owner can't sell the team now (for tax reasons, and maybe others) but whose heirs expect to sell it when he succumbs. But eventually those two paths will start to diverge, as the rebuilding takes steps to improve the team: acquiring better talent, even though that requires payroll increases and multi-year commitments; promoting the best MiL players, even rushing them in some instances; trading surplus talent for talent where there's a shortage; entering into and extending contracts of valuable players. To me, the Orioles should have begun to do some of those things a year ago, but I can see an argument for deferring it to this off-season. The fact that the Orioles haven't begun and don't appear about to begin the process of building the team, now that it's been fully torn down, tells me that's not the plan and won't be the plan until there's new ownership in place.

I don't expect the Angeloses or Elias (or anyone else) to share their intentions with us. All I can do is try to figure out what's going on from what they do. (They say virtually nothing, and I discount that anyway.) What they do tells me that, right now, there's no plan to try to build a winning team. (There is a potential flaw in what I believe is the Angelos's plan: if Peter Angelos lives beyond another five years or so, the team may be embarrassed into spending some money. Of course, the Angeloses may know much more about the likelihood of that than I do.)

Am I missing something? Have the Orioles done anything that supports the conclusion that present ownership intends to take steps to build the Orioles into a competitive team, including spending the many, many millions of dollars that will be needed to do that?

Pretty outside the box idea, but I find it intriguing.  Will definitely keep it in the back of my mind as time rolls on and nothing transpires.  Thanks for the alternate take.

 

[Roll Tide]

From MLBTR

 

Quote

Odor is still just 27 years old (28 in February). He’s young enough that teams can continue to hold out hope he may yet find his stride offensively, but it’s been quite some time since he was a capable everyday player. There’s no financial risk for the O’s in integrating him into the infield mix, though. Under the terms of the Rangers – Yankees swap, Texas remains on the hook for almost all of the $12.3MM in guaranteed money remaining on his deal. Baltimore will only be responsible for the league minimum salary.

 

[Sports Guy]

1 hour ago, Aristotelian said:

Now you are starting to make some sense (seems you are backing off of Bryant). Only question is whether there is a good reason to go after pitching now as opposed to next year. I have said I would be supportive of Stroman or equivalent but I also have no problem waiting.

I’m still ok with Bryant because he can play so many different positions..I would be happy to sign him.  There are many ways to build a team.  We can sign Bryant to play third for a few years…maybe he moves out to a CO spot if other guys struggle..or maybe you trade Mountcastle as he starts to get expensive and he goes to first.  His versatility allows a lot of different things.

That being said, this team won’t sign 2 9 figure guys..I mean, we know they won’t sign one but if I’m trying to answer Tony question and build the team, this is one way to do it while not adding multiple long term deals.

[wildcard]

Looks like Tony took over my job.

[waroriole]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

I’m still ok with Bryant because he can play so many different positions..I would be happy to sign him.  There are many ways to build a team.  We can sign Bryant to play third for a few years…maybe he moves out to a CO spot if other guys struggle..or maybe you trade Mountcastle as he starts to get expensive and he goes to first.  His versatility allows a lot of different things.

That being said, this team won’t sign 2 9 figure guys..I mean, we know they won’t sign one but if I’m trying to answer Tony question and build the team, this is one way to do it while not adding multiple long term deals.

Why do we need Bryant in 2 years when he’s reduced to LF/DH and making 20M+? As soon as we’re good, he’s just a much more expensive Mancini. 
 

Bryant is a bad contract unless you can get him for just 3 years. And we don’t need him for those years. 

[Tony-OH]

3 hours ago, Philip said:

However,I firmly believe that Mike made several moves last year that were so unjustifiable they could arguably be called deliberate sabotage. We should’ve won an additional 8-10 games last year but either because of stupid managerial decisions, or because Hyde was acting from orders from on high with the same result, we didn’t.

Let's say Elias did and the Orioles would have won 62 instead of 52. They still finish dead last, lose 100 games, and they get the #4 overall pick vs the #1. 

Are those ten wins worth getting the 4th over pick vs the #1 overall pick?

 

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, waroriole said:

Why do we need Bryant in 2 years when he’s reduced to LF/DH and making 20M+? As soon as we’re good, he’s just a much more expensive Mancini. 
 

Bryant is a bad contract unless you can get him for just 3 years. And we don’t need him for those years. 

I disagree..he is a way better hitter than Mancini.   I think Bryant has the ability to be an 850+ OPs guy in OPACY for another 3-4 years.

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, Tony-OH said:

Let's say Elias did and the Orioles would have won 62 instead of 52. They still finish dead last, lose 100 games, and they get the #4 overall pick vs the #1. 

Are those ten wins worth getting the 4th over pick vs the #1 overall pick?

 

Depending on why they won those games…absolutely.

[Tony-OH]

1 hour ago, wildcard said:

Looks like Tony took over my job.

Nah, I'm just telling it like I see it. I don't think I'm looking at things with orange colored glasses. With all the unknowns of the CBA this offseason, it makes little sense for a 110 loss team to be aggressive in free agency. Besides, no starting pitcher is signing here unless grossly overpaid.