Free agency thread

[Sports Guy]

Just now, seak05 said:

Anything anyone ever does has trade-offs., and baseball is no exception. Going from 60 - 75 wins is multiple players on multi-year contracts. At some point that would potentially mean blocking prospects. It also would mean not getting as good of prospects in the draft that could help you in a few years. Even the Yankees have trade-offs. At some point you start to value the short term and trade-off the long term, but the Orioles are probably a year away from that conversation. 

No they aren’t.  The conversation is now.  2 top 5 overall prospects in the game are ready now.  Another top 100 guy could be soon.  Stowers as well. 
 

You aren’t blocking anyone by adding a real SS, a real third baseman and multiples starters and relievers. 
 

And no, you don’t have to get players that are on long term deals to do that however, in some of those spots, doing so is just fine and blocks no one.

[Camden_yardbird]

42 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Because they were so far in the hole with lack of talent on the roster and in the minors and international that they weren’t in a position to dig out in that time frame.  

How would that be different from the current pirates or rockies teams?

 

[Sports Guy]

Im not interested in waiting 2 or more years away from being a legit contender.  We should be a legit contender in 2023. It will be a failure by the organization to not do that.

[geschinger]

3 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Im not interested in waiting 2 or more years away from being a legit contender.  We should be a legit contender in 2023. It will be a failure by the organization to not do that.

Improving by approximately the 40 wins it would take to be a legitimate contender in 2023 seems unrealstic unless the team started making some truly dumb decisions like trading prospects for established players instead of having the patience to let them develop.  

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, geschinger said:

Improving by approximately the 40 wins it would take to be a legitimate contender in 2023 seems unrealstic unless the team started making some truly dumb decisions like trading prospects for established players instead of having the patience to let them develop.  

Thus why I want them to be better in 2022 and get better players for now and the long term.

[seak05]

12 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Im not interested in waiting 2 or more years away from being a legit contender.  We should be a legit contender in 2023. It will be a failure by the organization to not do that.

This one is complex. Basically I agree with you...if the Orioles weren't in the AL East. I think in any other division in baseball the Orioles would have a shot at pushing towards the top of the division. 

Of the 6 teams in the AL with a 50%* chance or better at the playoffs this year though, 4 are in the AL East. Orioles could theoretically be the 6th or 7th best team in the AL and still finish last in the division 

*technically the Red Sox are at 49% on fangraphs, but that is pre-Story signing. 

[Frobby]

14 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Im not interested in waiting 2 or more years away from being a legit contender.  We should be a legit contender in 2023. It will be a failure by the organization to not do that.

What do you mean by legit contender?   A 90+ win team?   I don’t see any way that happens.  

[geschinger]

4 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Thus why I want them to be better in 2022 and get better players for now and the long term.

No matter what they did in 2022 I don't see how you get to 40 more wins by 2023.  It's unrealsitc.

[seak05]

28 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

No they aren’t.  The conversation is now.  2 top 5 overall prospects in the game are ready now.  Another top 100 guy could be soon.  Stowers as well. 
 

You aren’t blocking anyone by adding a real SS, a real third baseman and multiples starters and relievers. 
 

And no, you don’t have to get players that are on long term deals to do that however, in some of those spots, doing so is just fine and blocks no one.

What is your definition of "real" SS etc? Because if you're talking about a multi WAR player coming to the Orioles you're absolutely talking about a multi year deal, worth well over 10mil a year. Chris Taylor received a 4 year 60 million dollar contract. For what you're talking about you're looking at adding minimum 60mil a year to the payroll each of the next several years, and blocking guys like Westburg and Gunnar. 

[MarCakes21]

6 minutes ago, seak05 said:

What is your definition of "real" SS etc? Because if you're talking about a multi WAR player coming to the Orioles you're absolutely talking about a multi year deal, worth well over 10mil a year. Chris Taylor received a 4 year 60 million dollar contract. For what you're talking about you're looking at adding minimum 60mil a year to the payroll each of the next several years, and blocking guys like Westburg and Gunnar. 

I agree with SG on this premise in general.  If you're adding a 2 WAR guys (aka spending $15 mil) you might as well hope your prospects pan our and play to 2 WAR by 2023.  If you're adding someone though, you need to be looking at overpaying for the 4-6 WAR guys (aka 30mil).

Pitchers I feel differently about.  I'll take the 2 WAR pitchers all day long as you need serious depth and a stable that you don't even close to have with just Means and GRod.

[Sports Guy]

44 minutes ago, geschinger said:

No matter what they did in 2022 I don't see how you get to 40 more wins by 2023.  It's unrealsitc.

Well it will be dependent on your younger players getting good quickly.   But all you are saying is why we should be looking to add quality FA or trade targets to bring in real talent and start building.

To me, you sound like you are fine with giving up multiple years of Adley and GRod.  I don’t see how anyone can actually support that.

[Camden_yardbird]

2 hours ago, geschinger said:

What does short term risk to get ahead mean?  Spend $60-70 million and win and additional 15-20 games? What would that have accomplished other than putting the team further away from long term success?  Those 15-20 extra wins would have significantly reduced the draft pool the team has had available to work with to add talent and rebuild the farm system.  

Well, let's look at the 2004-2008 rays.  

In that time the rays finished with 70, 67, 61, 66, and 97 wins.  A period of time where they went from one of the worst teams in baseball to one of the best.

Their payrolls during that period:  37, 50, 57, 52, 67 million.

At the start of that period they had a few players,  Carl crawford had debuted earlier, and become a perennial all star level talent (ahem, mullins).  Aubrey Huff had debuted in 2000 and was getting near to free agency, having established himself has a mid 20's HR hitter with 100 RBI potential (cough, Mancini).  

This period saw the debut of many of the their top prospects:  

Kazmir in 2004.  Rocco Baldelli, Delmon and Upton in 2005.  Shields in 2006. Longoria in 2008.

Did they wait to see if these players established themselves and then flip the switch?  Did they wait to see the holes in their lineup?  Hardly, they took chances.  As previously mentioned they increased payroll almost every year (a payroll i will note that was $20 higher than the current Orioles 15 years ago).

They went out and tried things.  Carlos Pena was a cast off, they signed and turned into a key part of their line up.  Cliff Floyd, Troy Percival, Edwin Jackson were not insignificant additions.

If we were to take the 2022 Orioles as being the 2004 rays where they were just about to start building a contender, that would mean we should expect an Orioles contender until 2027.  And as I started in my previous post...unacceptable, mismanagement and a complete lack of attempting to give the fans a product they should spend money on.

[OriolesMagic83]

2 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

I find it interesting that people casually throw away the idea of winning an extra 20 games.

If you are building something positive and can win 75+ games, I would easily rather have that than a chance to draft Creed Willems in the 8th round or whatever. It’s not even a decision.

Trying to get to .500, it's how the O's ended up with a 14 year losing streak.  Whatever you think about Elias, I think we can agree he isn't aiming for a .500 team. 

[geschinger]

39 minutes ago, Camden_yardbird said:

Well, let's look at the 2004-2008 rays.  

In that time the rays finished with 70, 67, 61, 66, and 97 wins.  A period of time where they went from one of the worst teams in baseball to one of the best.

Their payrolls during that period:  37, 50, 57, 52, 67 million.

At the start of that period they had a few players,  Carl crawford had debuted earlier, and become a perennial all star level talent (ahem, mullins).  Aubrey Huff had debuted in 2000 and was getting near to free agency, having established himself has a mid 20's HR hitter with 100 RBI potential (cough, Mancini).  

This period saw the debut of many of the their top prospects:  

Kazmir in 2004.  Rocco Baldelli, Delmon and Upton in 2005.  Shields in 2006. Longoria in 2008.

Did they wait to see if these players established themselves and then flip the switch?  Did they wait to see the holes in their lineup?  Hardly, they took chances.  As previously mentioned they increased payroll almost every year (a payroll i will note that was $20 higher than the current Orioles 15 years ago).

They went out and tried things.  Carlos Pena was a cast off, they signed and turned into a key part of their line up.  Cliff Floyd, Troy Percival, Edwin Jackson were not insignificant additions.

If we were to take the 2022 Orioles as being the 2004 rays where they were just about to start building a contender, that would mean we should expect an Orioles contender until 2027.  And as I started in my previous post...unacceptable, mismanagement and a complete lack of attempting to give the fans a product they should spend money on.

Ia part of that salary increase for the Rays in 2008 the signing of Longoria?  If so that is absolutely the type of move I hope the Orioles would try to do with Adley.  As for comparisons, my hope that the 2022 Orioles are the 2014 Astros.  

[Can_of_corn]

22 minutes ago, geschinger said:

Ia part of that salary increase for the Rays in 2008 the signing of Longoria?  If so that is absolutely the type of move I hope the Orioles would try to do with Adley.  As for comparisons, my hope that the 2022 Orioles are the 2014 Astros.  

You want the payroll to double?