O's were contenders!!

[wildcard]

 

For maybe a week.   Then the injuries hit.    The team is still now deep enough to withstand injuries to important parts of the offense.

[foxfield]

Optimism is great.  But you are literally taunting the gods.

[Moose Milligan]

There he goes again.

[seak05]

19 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I know, I know.  You are going to say there he goes again but  ............ Look at the facts.

O's are 7-4 in May,  3 games behind the Blue Jays for the last Wild Card spot.

The O's play  three with the Tigers this weekend who are  2-10 in May. 

The Blue Jays are 3-7 in May.  They play the Rays who are  7-4 in May and they are playing in Tampa.

Conclusion:  The O's are 3 back in the Wild Card Race.   O's are playing a weaker team.  Blue  Jays are playing a team that is playing better than them at the moment.   O's have a decent chance to pick up ground this weekend.

O's are surging without Adley, Grayson, DL and Gunnar.   Just think about when those guys are added.

I'm all for optimism, but this feels like counting chickens before they've hatched and tempting baseball gods  

[sportsfan8703]

We’re getting close. We need Mountcastle healthy, if not we need to bring up Diaz. AR and GR need to be called up. I would also not mind if Hall came up and threw a 3-4 IP start every two weeks. 
 

It seems like the solutions are there for the things above but that still doesn’t solve 2B and 3B. Hopefully, Urias steps up at one of those spots. 
 

We just gotta hope that our piece meal rotation/bulk reliever set up doesn’t burn out. I think that’s why sprinkling in Hall could help. 

[DrungoHazewood]

18 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I know, I know.  You are going to say there he goes again but  ............ Look at the facts.

O's are 7-4 in May,  3 games behind the Blue Jays for the last Wild Card spot.

The O's play  three with the Tigers this weekend who are  2-10 in May. 

The Blue Jays are 3-7 in May.  They play the Rays who are  7-4 in May and they are playing in Tampa.

Conclusion:  The O's are 3 back in the Wild Card Race.   O's are playing a weaker team.  Blue  Jays are playing a team that is playing better than them at the moment.   O's have a decent chance to pick up ground this weekend.

O's are surging without Adley, Grayson, DL and Gunnar.   Just think about when those guys are added.

Yes, it's somewhat plausible that once they add the kids you mention and they perform very well that this could be as much as a 72-win team.

But you seem to be saying they're legitimate playoff contenders, which takes heavy, heavy doses of hallucinogens to pull off.  This is more-or-less the same team they had last year that went 52-110.  Lower baseline performance than the 1988 Orioles, changed far less than the 1989 Orioles, and play in a tougher division. I'd bet there aren't three teams in history who went from a .320ish winning percentage to true contention in one year.  The only one I can think of aside from the '89 Orioles is the 1889-90 Louisville team, and that's only because a new league stole all their competitors' players.  The Mets and Braves got miracle labels by going from 60-some wins to contention in one year.

[sportsfan8703]

Right now we have too many easy outs at the bottom of the lineup. We need to get healthy and do some maneuvering. 5-9 right now is really ugly on the stat sheet. 

[crowmst3k!]

O's are making progress. Pitching has been much better.  

If the Orioles are markedly improved (record-wise, and individual core players), it should be an offseason to begin supplementing in-house talent with some free agents. 

[interloper]

Let's gooooooooo!!!!!!!!

[wildcard]

Being a contender for a Wild Card spot and the playoffs does not mean the team is leading the race.  Its means they are in the race.  The Blue Jays, White Sox, Guardians, O's and Mariners are all in the race for the final wild card spot in May thanks to the new rules that there are 3 wild card spots per league.

If this was 1970, before the wild card system, the O's would not be in it. If this was last year with two wild card spots per league the O's  would not be in it.  But with the new rules the O's are just 3 back and surging.

[Too Tall]

I like Wildcard and appreciate his contributions to this site, but this is even a bit much for me! Long way to September!!!!!! I'm not that optimistic even for this weekend series. We have rarely hit E Rod and we are really banged up.

[maybenxtyr]

So, it's Gunnar now and a few weeks ago it was Stowers. I say that not to be a jerk, but to just point out that none of them are set in stone for anything. I'll just sit back and enjoy the ride and see where they are at the end of the season.

[Tony-OH]

44 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

There he goes again.

Beat me to it...

Let's just enjoy the run of good baseball of late. Still a lot of holes on this team but it;s nice to see some young guys doing well.

 

[Aristotelian]

O's have won or tied the last four series (wins vs BOS, KC, STL). If I'm not mistaken that is something we have not accomplished since August 2017. With DET struggling this would be on paper seem to be a prime candidate for another series win. This being baseball, DET is also prime candidate for letdown series for the same reason. Even to get to 70-75 wins these are the series we have to win to offset the inevitable losing streaks. 

I know OP is being tongue in cheek but "O's are not a complete doormat" may be a fair statement. This series will be a good test.

[Moose Milligan]

Just now, Tony-OH said:

Beat me to it...

Let's just enjoy the run of good baseball of late. Still a lot of holes on this team but it;s nice to see some young guys doing well.

 

Totally agreed.  It's really good to see some of these guys stepping up.

At the very least I don't think they can be the laughingstock of MLB anymore (partially thanks to the Reds, too).