Left field at OPACY going through a big change

[Can_of_corn]

6 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

I'm OK with that. Adley is LH and we want him nice and comfortable in his home ballpark while helping his pitchers against RHB's.

He's a switch hitter.

He also throws right handed and kicks left footed.

[Aristotelian]

Just now, jamalshw said:

I think it's interesting how OPACY is now going to be more of a lefty hitter's park. The right field line is already closer to the plate than the left-field line and although the right-field power alley is a bit deeper, the difference is only 9 feet so the swing will be to make the LF power alley as much as 21 feet deeper than RF. 

Ultimately, this probably helps the team and makes the park play a bit more fairly to pitchers, but just pondering the resulting imbalance between left and right field. Will be quite interested to see the official team mock up of what it will look like. 

Especially with our lineup currently RH dominant... and all of our top three position player prospects either S or L.

[LookinUp]

21 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

I don't see how this change makes the team more competitive now or in the future but it also doesn't do any harm so pretty ambivalent towards it from an actual game impact standpoint.

See, I think with all of the talk of FA in this thread that we're missing what is a likely goal of this...to be more competitive.

I'd be really interested to learn why they did this. I doubt it's ONLY because we've become a HR park. Might it have something to do with the typical make-up of our two competitors in NY and BOS? Might it be to counter how the whole game is building teams off of power? Is this a moneyball thing?

I'd wager it does have a moneyball aspect to it. Elias and Sig think they can get more out of hitting and pitching talent with these dimensions and gain a leg up on teams that put Giancarlo Stanton in LF, while allowing us to give more innings to Zac Lowther types. We don't have to try to be competitive to sign Gerrit Cole for $500 million because you get away with a little more contact.

 

 

[Can_of_corn]

4 minutes ago, LookinUp said:

See, I think with all of the talk of FA in this thread that we're missing what is a likely goal of this...to be more competitive.

I'd be really interested to learn why they did this. I doubt it's ONLY because we've become a HR park. Might it have something to do with the typical make-up of our two competitors in NY and BOS? Might it be to counter how the whole game is building teams off of power? Is this a moneyball thing?

I'd wager it does have a moneyball aspect to it. Elias and Sig think they can get more out of hitting and pitching talent with these dimensions and gain a leg up on teams that put Giancarlo Stanton in LF, while allowing us to give more innings to Zac Lowther types. We don't have to try to be competitive to sign Gerrit Cole for $500 million because you get away with a little more contact.

 

 

I don't see how moving the fence back makes the team more competitive.

It's the same stadium for both teams.  I don't think emphasizing right handed power by a certain small percentage is going to translate to greater competitiveness.

You want your pitchers to miss bats, that isn't going to change because you pushed a wall back X number of feet.

 

I think it's mostly about lowering the seating capacity along with some negotiations with the MSA and the lease extension.

I think the timing makes a lot of sense as the current lease expires after next year.

[LookinUp]

5 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

I don't see how moving the fence back makes the team more competitive.

It's the same stadium for both teams.  I don't think emphasizing right handed power by a certain small percentage is going to translate to greater competitiveness.

You want your pitchers to miss bats, that isn't going to change because you pushed a wall back X number of feet.

 

I think it's mostly about lowering the seating capacity along with some negotiations with the MSA and the lease extension.

I think the timing makes a lot of sense as the current lease expires after next year.

Just because you don't see the math doesn't mean it doesn't exist. In the 90's you probably wouldn't have thought that getting guys that can walk would allow the A's to be competitive on a small budget.

The whole point is to be as competitive as possible for each dollar spent. It's why we draft hitters instead of pitchers. The latter are probably more likely to bust. If there's data showing dimensions can make a certain, more affordable, profile of pitcher significantly more effective, I'd bet Sig knows about it and I'd bet that influenced this decision is a very big way.

Why you would assume that this team, led by Elias and Sig, are doing this for seating capacity issues is beyond me. 

[Frobby]

9 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

I don't see how moving the fence back makes the team more competitive.

It's the same stadium for both teams.  I don't think emphasizing right handed power by a certain small percentage is going to translate to greater competitiveness.

You want your pitchers to miss bats, that isn't going to change because you pushed a wall back X number of feet.

 

I think it's mostly about lowering the seating capacity along with some negotiations with the MSA and the lease extension.

I think the timing makes a lot of sense as the current lease expires after next year.

Why is it good to lower seating capacity?   All that does is ensure there’s fewer tickets to sell on Opening Day and in the playoffs.   If the team gets good, they might even return to having occasional near sell-outs in important series or for certain promotions.   

If you’re concerned with the optics of empty seats, eliminating a couple thousand doesn’t really help the optics much.   
 

[Can_of_corn]

Just now, Frobby said:

Why is it good to lower seating capacity?   All that does is ensure there’s fewer tickets to sell on Opening Day and in the playoffs.   If the team gets good, they might even return to having occasional near sell-outs in important series or for certain promotions.   

If you’re concerned with the optics of empty seats, eliminating a couple thousand doesn’t really help the optics much.   
 

Improved optics, lower cost for maintenance and for support personnel.  Looking at the prices these aren't the more expensive seats out there that they are losing.  If you have two thousand seats you aren't selling for 80 of the 81 games why have them?  Particularly if you have more expensive seats unsold that the fans might migrate toward.

https://www.mlb.com/orioles/tickets/group-tickets/pricing

I also think the days of 3M+ are long gone.  They couldn't break 2.5 during the last competitive stretch.

 

 

 

 

[Frobby]

Just now, Can_of_corn said:

Improved optics, lower cost for maintenance and for support personnel.  Looking at the prices these aren't the more expensive seats out there that they are losing.  If you have two thousand seats you aren't selling for 80 of the 81 games why have them?  Particularly if you have more expensive seats unsold that the fans might migrate toward.

https://www.mlb.com/orioles/tickets/group-tickets/pricing

I also think the days of 3M+ are long gone.  They couldn't break 2.5 during the last competitive stretch.

I agree the days of 3 mm+ are gone.   Maybe they could top 2.5 in a long competitive stretch.   Honestly at the base they’re at now, I’d say they’d need at least 5 straight contending seasons to get to that level.   

Still, I don’t think the cost of maintaining the extra seats is very high, compared to the cost of reconfiguring the stadium to take them out.   And in a playoff scenario, losing those seats might cost $80-100 k per game.  

In any event, it will be interesting to see how the stadium feels and plays with these changes.   I used to have seats out there when OPACY first opened, and was in those seats the days that Cal broke Gehrig’a record.   Not sure if those seats (11 rows back, I think) will we wiped out).

 

[wildcard]

4 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I agree the days of 3 mm+ are gone.   Maybe they could top 2.5 in a long competitive stretch.   Honestly at the base they’re at now, I’d say they’d need at least 5 straight contending seasons to get to that level.   

Still, I don’t think the cost of maintaining the extra seats is very high, compared to the cost of reconfiguring the stadium to take them out.   And in a playoff scenario, losing those seats might cost $80-100 k per game.  

In any event, it will be interesting to see how the stadium feels and plays with these changes.   I used to have seats out there when OPACY first opened, and was in those seats the days that Cal broke Gehrig’a record.   Not sure if those seats (11 rows back, I think) will we wiped out).

 

If the O's wanted to lower the capacity of the Park they would take seats out of the upper deck not seats that next to the field.     This is being done to make the Park less hitter friendly IMO.

They can't do too much in right field because the Flag Court is an interesting part of the Park.   Its much easier to make the park more pitcher friendly by making left field bigger.

[Can_of_corn]

13 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I agree the days of 3 mm+ are gone.   Maybe they could top 2.5 in a long competitive stretch.   Honestly at the base they’re at now, I’d say they’d need at least 5 straight contending seasons to get to that level.   

Still, I don’t think the cost of maintaining the extra seats is very high, compared to the cost of reconfiguring the stadium to take them out.   And in a playoff scenario, losing those seats might cost $80-100 k per game.  

In any event, it will be interesting to see how the stadium feels and plays with these changes.   I used to have seats out there when OPACY first opened, and was in those seats the days that Cal broke Gehrig’a record.   Not sure if those seats (11 rows back, I think) will we wiped out).

 

Is the team paying for the renovation?

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, wildcard said:

If the O's wanted to lower the capacity of the Park they would take seats out of the upper deck not seats that next to the field.     This is being done to make the Park less hitter friendly IMO.

They can't do too much in right field because the Flag Court is an interesting part of the Park.   Its much easier to make the park more pitcher friendly by making left field bigger.

They can have multiple reasons for doing something.

[connja]

I just want to thank the Orioles for giving us something fun to talk about during this otherwise extremely dead period!  Can't wait to see the actual design images - does seem strange that they made the announcement without that....like they weren't prepared.  But whatever - more to speculate about!

[RZNJ]

Obviously, this is going to affect every hitter at least to some degree.   The first two that come to mind are Hays and Mountcastle.   Both had significant home/road splits as far as OPS goes.  Hays hit 9 homers and the road and 13 at OPACY.  Mountcastle hit 11 on the road and 22 at OPACY.   SSS alert!

[Sports Guy]

I don’t think getting rid of seats is a money driven thing.  I get what CoC is saying but I think he’s just being cynical(which is normally the right approach when it comes to this franchise)

I think it is performance driven.  I think there is a competitive aspect to this.  Whether it plays out that way is a different story but I do think that’s what they are thinking.  

[Redskins Rick]

2 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

He's a switch hitter.

He also throws right handed and kicks left footed.

I was talking about a switch hitter the other day, and one of the numnuts in the conversation, thought that I was talking about a bi-sexual person, he said, never heard it called switch hitting before.

Im like dude, in the middle of an long conversation about baseball, why would this be anything but a baseball term.?