The LF wall tracker

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, OriolesMagic83 said:

If the O's owners wanted to sign free agent pitchers and offered the most money, maybe w/ a 10% premium for being a losing team, you would hear free agent pitchers wax poetic about how wonderful the Baltimore metro area is.

They would relish the challenge.

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

1 minute ago, OriolesMagic83 said:

If the O's owners wanted to sign free agent pitchers and offered the most money, maybe w/ a 10% premium for being a losing team, you would hear free agent pitchers wax poetic about how wonderful the Baltimore metro area is.

You're correct and if the team actually improved and remained a consistent winner, then the 10% premium would eventually go away. 

[OriolesMagic83]

Just now, Can_of_corn said:

They would relish the challenge.

They would be bigger cheerleaders for the farm system than that guy Tony can't stand (can't remember his name).

[oldfan]

I get why right field is the way it is, warehouse, Eutaw Street. But is there something behind left, why didn't they make it 375 to the power alley when the park opened, First time I saw it, I said that is too short. I don't mined the distance of the new wall, it's the height, should be height to match bullpen wall. 375 in left center, then curve to bullpen.

[InsideCoroner]

5 hours ago, OriolesMagic83 said:

Hasn't worked so far.  There's been a decided advantage to the O's opponents on home runs lost to the Wall.

I can’t imagine that anyone could foresee the O’s having a team ERA two full runs per game lower than last year (from 5.85 to 3.76). If/when the pitching falters, the wall will come more into play on defense. 

[deward]

9 hours ago, oldfan said:

I get why right field is the way it is, warehouse, Eutaw Street. But is there something behind left, why didn't they make it 375 to the power alley when the park opened, First time I saw it, I said that is too short. I don't mined the distance of the new wall, it's the height, should be height to match bullpen wall. 375 in left center, then curve to bullpen.

It's not possible to move the wall back to the new distance without having the height. It wouldn't work otherwise with the angle of the seating bowl. I suppose they could draw a yellow line at the old height and put a scoreboard or something over it.

[Ripken]

I sure hope it helps get good FA pitching here because it may make good RH hitters not want to stay.

[jabba72]

15 hours ago, Orioles0615 said:

What a joke

 

Yeah this is a little bit unbelievable. 

[Frobby]

Unfortunately I think the intent of this thread, which was to keep track of the balls affected by the new dimensions has gotten drowned out by all the commentary.   That’s a shame, because there already was a thread where people were commenting on the wall.    

In any event, here’s what I believe are the balls affected by the new dimensions so far:

4/12 Mancini 358 foot double

4/29 Bogaerts 372 foot fly out

5/1 Santander 378 foot sac fly (would have been a grand slam)

5/4 Chirinos 369 foot fly out

5/4 Polanco 383 foot fly out

5/4 Mateo 359 foot fly out

5/5 Chirinos 376 foot fly out

5/8 Mountcastle 407 foot double

5/8 Mancini 367 foot fly out

5/8 Benintendi 356 foot fly out

So, that’s 7 homers taken from the Orioles (5 fly outs, two doubles), three taken away from their opponents (all fly outs).    If anyone thinks I’ve missed some, or that I’m wrong about any of these, let me know.   

As you can see, the dimensions have been a much bigger factor in May than in April.   Mostly hurting us so far, but we’ll see what happens in a bigger sample.   

Please be sure to post it in here any time you see a ball that you think was affected by the new dimensions.   

I do think we’ve seen some singles that fell in, but those are too hard to judge.  And Odor had a triple near Elrod’s corner that might have been either a double or a fly out with the old dimensions but the LF got intimidated by the corner of the wall.  

[deward]

I don't know that the Benintendi fly ball would have been out, looks like it would have been on the old warning track by this graphic

[Frobby]

6 minutes ago, deward said:

I don't know that the Benintendi fly ball would have been out, looks like it would have been on the old warning track by this graphic

I did not realize that the dark line on the graphic represented the old dimensions and the lighter one was the old warning track.   If so, then I agree that Benintendi’s ball might have been caught under the old dimensions.   

[deward]

56 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I did not realize that the dark line on the graphic represented the old dimensions and the lighter one was the old warning track.   If so, then I agree that Benintendi’s ball might have been caught under the old dimensions.   

That's how I've been interpreting it. I hope they don't change the outline to the new dimensions any time this season, it would make this harder to track.

[DrungoHazewood]

15 hours ago, deward said:

What proof is there that the team was having a hard time attracting FA pitchers due to the park?

The Orioles have mostly had poor teams, they don't much of a budget and they played in a little bandbox of a park.  What pitcher wants to sign with a team featuring that trio of cringe? 

The last one was taken care of.  The first one is very much a work in progress.  They'll probably never have a budget approaching that of the Yanks or Sox.  Yes, if you can routinely offer up 10/300 deals then the pitchers don't care so much if a medium-deep fly lands in the third row.

[DrungoHazewood]

3 hours ago, Ripken said:

I sure hope it helps get good FA pitching here because it may make good RH hitters not want to stay.

Yea, before the dimension change the Orioles routinely extended all their home grown stars.  Like... umm... I'm sure one will come to me eventually.

If a friendly home park is a primary driver of free agents then why don't the Rockies get all the hitters?

[connja]

So after a few weeks of games, my conclusion is that the change was a good idea but implementation is way too extreme.   From both an appearance and an impact perspective.  

The Mets had to move the wall back in after building them too far initially. In fact they moved them in twice.  I suspect we'll need to do something similar in time.