Two moves I hope Elias makes for the 2nd Half

[Frobby]

23 minutes ago, ChuckS said:

That’s crazy. I think half a win would be generous.

Of course there is no way to quantify it. Winning brings positivity. Not vice versa.

 

6 minutes ago, Chelsea_Phil said:

You are nuts.  Positivity definitely breeds winning.  What planet are you on?

Winning brings positivity.   I don't think that can be disputed.

Positivity breeds winning is a bit more ephemeral.   I believe it helps.   Can I assign a number of wins to it?   No.

As Drungo has pointed out, Odor has been on some lousy teams at times.   Did his positivity lead to those teams winning?  No.   Gerardo Parra's positivity was a great boon to the 2019 Nats.   Did it help the 2015 Orioles?   Not one iota.   

There are things that happen with a team that you can't completely pin down.  I do know that it makes me nervous to mess with team chemistry when the team is playing well.   

[OriolesMagic83]

36 minutes ago, ChuckS said:

That’s crazy. I think half a win would be generous.

Of course there is no way to quantify it. Winning brings positivity. Not vice versa.

There's no way a team with Gausman, Bundy, Cobb, Machado, Jones, Mancini, Schoop, Castro, Brach and Givens should have lost 115 games.  Were they a winning team?  No  There had to have been a toxic clubhouse and they played like they were half dead.  Whatever negative vibes that team had must have killed any sense of team they had.  There's no way that team should have lost over 100 games.  For people that would say most of those players were only there 2/3 of the year or less, the O's actually started playing better after most of the veterans were traded.

[Can_of_corn]

9 minutes ago, OriolesMagic83 said:

There's no way a team with Gausman, Bundy, Cobb, Machado, Jones, Mancini, Schoop, Castro, Brach and Givens should have lost 115 games.  Were they a winning team?  No  There had to have been a toxic clubhouse and they played like they were half dead.  Whatever negative vibes that team had must have killed any sense of team they had.  There's no way that team should have lost over 100 games.  For people that would say most of those players were only there 2/3 of the year or less, the O's actually started playing better after most of the veterans were traded.

Most of those guys were on playoff teams for the O's.

Maybe Mancini was the problem? 

[ChuckS]

44 minutes ago, Frobby said:

 

Winning brings positivity.   I don't think that can be disputed.

Positivity breeds winning is a bit more ephemeral.   I believe it helps.   Can I assign a number of wins to it?   No.

As Drungo has pointed out, Odor has been on some lousy teams at times.   Did his positivity lead to those teams winning?  No.   Gerardo Parra's positivity was a great boon to the 2019 Nats.   Did it help the 2015 Orioles?   Not one iota.   

There are things that happen with a team that you can't completely pin down.  I do know that it makes me nervous to mess with team chemistry when the team is playing well.   

The thing I find nuts is that for some people removing a .200 hitter from the team or even the everyday lineup, would somehow sabotage the potential of a .500 club.

We should always be trying to improve our weaknesses regardless of our record or recent hot streak, and Odor is an obvious place to start not to mention we have a second baseman hitting .320 in Triple A. 

[baltfan]

3 hours ago, ChuckS said:

What WAR value would you assign to Odor’s energy and leadership?

 

I am not sure. I am not advocating that the guy start every game, only that he stay on a 26 man roster.  The coaches and players rave about the guy.  There is value to that especially in mentoring a young team.  This team will not fall because Odor is the 26th man, but he might help it to continue to rise.  Similarly, I love when Adley hugs and cheers on his pitchers.  Guys that have won say this makes a difference.  SABR people for years said it didn’t, but  the data guys that go to work for teams seem to generally walk away believing the contrary. It’s simplistic to believe that we can use only the imperfect stats that we have to judge what is best for a team.  Of course stats are very important, but they aren’t perfect and often we aren’t sure of the errors associated with them. 

[connja]

12 hours ago, LookinUp said:

I honestly don't think he needs more time. If I had my druthers, I'd have an infield with Henderson, Westburg, Urias and Mountcastle.

Vavra would play 2B, OF and maybe DH some.

I'd like to see Vavra get a few weeks of full time action at 2nd before they bring up Henderson and/or Westburg.  

[foxfield]

4 hours ago, Ohfan67 said:

A lot of studies have shows that stolen bases have a limited impact on runs scored. I think stolen base attempts are incredibly fun plays, but they don't move the needle as much as many fans think or hope. 

I think it may be splitting hairs, but I think this misconstrues the findings....I think the findings show that the success rate of SB requires a very high success rate to pay off.  I also think this is because of the 3 true outcomes.  Much less station to station play today.  Obviously a runner scores from 1st just as easy as he does from 3rd when the ball is hit out of the park.  But the runner thrown out does not score on a single, double or HR.

2 hours ago, ChuckS said:

The thing I find nuts is that for some people removing a .200 hitter from the team or even the everyday lineup, would somehow sabotage the potential of a .500 club.

We should always be trying to improve our weaknesses regardless of our record or recent hot streak, and Odor is an obvious place to start not to mention we have a second baseman hitting .320 in Triple A. 

I get what you are saying...but the same is true of the tremendous leadership being provided by Trey Mancini.  If it is so valuable to the winning.....why did the winning not come last year?  There are things that enable a team to come together. There are many folks who believe that Odor has been a big part of that for Baltimore.  I don't get the rush to move Odor.  His performance is certainly not the reason the Orioles are competitive, but his presence in the dugout and on the field may well be.  But whether you agree with that or not, I do not think he will be here next year.    And frankly, the longer the Orioles are "in the hunt" this year, the less likely he is to step aside.  The one thing he does very well is turn double plays.  And that is valuable to helping Mateo, the pitching staff and maintaining a lower era.  Stop fretting the offensive (pun intended) results and enjoy this foundational season.  His time here will be gone soon enough.

[jamalshw]

13 hours ago, foxfield said:

I get what you are saying...but the same is true of the tremendous leadership being provided by Trey Mancini.  If it is so valuable to the winning.....why did the winning not come last year?  There are things that enable a team to come together. There are many folks who believe that Odor has been a big part of that for Baltimore.  I don't get the rush to move Odor.  His performance is certainly not the reason the Orioles are competitive, but his presence in the dugout and on the field may well be.  But whether you agree with that or not, I do not think he will be here next year.    And frankly, the longer the Orioles are "in the hunt" this year, the less likely he is to step aside.  The one thing he does very well is turn double plays.  And that is valuable to helping Mateo, the pitching staff and maintaining a lower era.  Stop fretting the offensive (pun intended) results and enjoy this foundational season.  His time here will be gone soon enough.

I think bringing up Vavra to get a large chunk of the 2B at bats doesn't necessarily meant moving Odor. And on the leadership front, if we are going to trade Mancini (and I still believe we will), it may make Odor's spot on the team all the more important as a leader. I'd like to see Vavra up for Arauz or Nevin now and getting a look at 2B now before we see Henderson and Westburg break onto the scene. I'd like to see if Vavra is an everyday option for us at 2B next year or if he's more of a super utility guy that will get 3 starts per week between 2B and the OF. Infield ABs will get a lot harder to come by once Henderson and Westburg are brought up, particularly if Mateo continues to hit as he has of late, and OF ABs are already hard to come by and while a Santander trade may open that a bit, a Stowers promotion is likely to accompany that, if that happens. 

So, I get there may be some intangibles there for Odor, but I'm not sure if we lose the positive if he goes from playing most days to playing just once a week or so while Vavra gets a bigger look. 

[spiritof66]

17 hours ago, Frobby said:

 

Winning brings positivity.   I don't think that can be disputed.

Positivity breeds winning is a bit more ephemeral.   I believe it helps.   Can I assign a number of wins to it?   No.

As Drungo has pointed out, Odor has been on some lousy teams at times.   Did his positivity lead to those teams winning?  No.   Gerardo Parra's positivity was a great boon to the 2019 Nats.   Did it help the 2015 Orioles?   Not one iota.   

There are things that happen with a team that you can't completely pin down.  I do know that it makes me nervous to mess with team chemistry when the team is playing well.   

What's a winning team? We're talking about, and some of us take seriously the proposition, that Odor brings value that we can't identify to a team that's likely to finish under .500. Maybe he does bring and will continue to bring such value, in the form of additional wins this season, even if the team that benefits from that value is not a "winning" team. And maybe he brought some value, in the form of wins that can't be quantified, to earlier teams that likewise didn't do that well. 

To me, the argument that Odor brings intangible "clubhouse" value doesn't mean it's at all likely that with Odor the Orioles land a WC spot and without him they don't. That's possible. But the real value that might make me decide to keep him on the ML roster is that Odor will, in some hard to identify and for now, much less quantify, help in the development and approach to the game of younger players. That value, if it exists, might translate into some small number of wins or a fraction of wins this year but also into improved performance and additional wins during the career of the younger Oriole players whom Odor affects in a positive way.

When you hear Jim Palmer talk about his rookie season rooming with and learning from the veteran pitcher Robin Roberts, it's clear that he learned a lot from Robbie that he believes helped his career. Maybe today you would get that sort of help from a pitching coach or instructor, but it's certainly possible that some veterans help a young team in ways that add wins or fractions of wins. Certainly a lot of "baseball people" think that's the case. Then you have the question whether Odor, apparently as a cheerleader, friend and all-around optimist provides that kind of help.

[foxfield]

These two posts above are fantastic.  Thanks @jamalshwand @spiritof66!

[SilverRocket]

20 hours ago, Frobby said:

Mateo, -11 Rbat in 303 PA, .610 OPS

Andrus, -2 Rbat in 312 PA, .651 OPS

That suggests to me that 3-4 baserunning runs is not worth 50 OPS points, more like 15-20 (over a 300 PA span).

 

I was trying to translate exactly what happens on the field. A single and a steal is the same game result as a double, and a single and a CS is the same game result as an out. We're just counting total bases (for SLG) and total outs (for OBP), so I don't see why they should be treated differently for the purposes of OPS. I can buy that OPS is a flawed metric for this though.

I didn't check how many times he's stolen third, so it's possible that makes a big difference in baserunning runs. Stealing third probably nets way fewer runs than stealing second.

[Ohfan67]

15 hours ago, foxfield said:

I think it may be splitting hairs, but I think this misconstrues the findings....I think the findings show that the success rate of SB requires a very high success rate to pay off.  I also think this is because of the 3 true outcomes.  Much less station to station play today.  Obviously a runner scores from 1st just as easy as he does from 3rd when the ball is hit out of the park.  But the runner thrown out does not score on a single, double or HR.

 

I’m not misconstruing anything. Stolen bases are not positively correlated with runs scored. The idea that you are talking about was developed to explain why number of stolen bases are often slightly negatively correlated with runs scored. You have to steal at a very high success rate for it not to hurt your team. But even then it does very little or even nothing at all to actually increase runs scored. I actually read a lot of studies because waybback in the days when Brian Roberts was leading the American League in stolen bases I argued that it was valuable. And then My opinion was challenged and I read the studies and found out what Earl weaver knew fifty years ago. I personally find stolen base attempts very entertaining. I certainly want a team of players who are good runners. It’s fun and those runners do occasionally score runs that slower plays won’t. But in the end the overall effect on runs scored is very tiny. OBP, power, etc, are infinitely more important. 

[Ohfan67]

21 minutes ago, SilverRocket said:

I was trying to translate exactly what happens on the field. A single and a steal is the same game result as a double, and a single and a CS is the same game result as an out. We're just counting total bases (for SLG) and total outs (for OBP), so I don't see why they should be treated differently for the purposes of OPS. I can buy that OPS is a flawed metric for this though.

I didn't check how many times he's stolen third, so it's possible that makes a big difference in baserunning runs. Stealing third probably nets way fewer runs than stealing second.

A single and a stolen base are NOT the same as a double when it comes to generating runs. I know you guys are talking OPS but runs scored is the important variable. Including stolen bases in OPS would reduce the correlation of OPS with runs scored. You would actually lose important  information that is critical to evaluating your players, your team’s offensive potential, etc. 
 

This has all been analyzed to death. A quick google search will produce tons of analyses including peer reviewed publications. 

[Moose Milligan]

lol you guys 

[Gentile4]

I am in no way comparing Mateo to Belanger, but they both present a similar dilemma. Can a team that wants to win afford to have a good field, no hit player at shortstop? We saw it was possible w/Belanger. Obviously, Mateo isn't in Belanger's class defensively, but he's still above league average, and he can do things Belanger couldn't. It appears he'll hit 10-12 home runs, and while the value of stolen bases appears to be less important than many think, his speed on the bases does provide offensive value. All of that said, the problem isn't Mateo; it's the black holes at 2B and 3B. The team could absorb a .200 hitting SS w/moderate production at the other two positions. 

Nevin is worthless. Once Mancini or Santander is traded, Mountcastle should play everyday at first. We only need a backup if he gets hurt, otherwise, given his usage in the minors, Adley can play there once every two weeks if we insist Mounty needs a rest.