Not an April Fools Joke - Lewin Diaz Back, O'Hearn DFA

[RarityFlaherty]

17 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

Well, I'm not so much a contrarian as that I think Elias is pretty smart and try to follow his thinking.   I'm not entirely sure what he's up to all of the time but I think he has his reasons.   Just because we don't understand them, doesn't mean they were stupid.   I don't get a lot of this stuff but I think there is a lot of overreaction on here and things tend to make more sense over time.   People overreacted about O'Hearn and now, we don't know if he'll even be in the organization (he probably will), or if he's AAA insurance or a ML player.

This is pretty much how I feel too. There’s just a lot of strong language being thrown around here; calling all of these moves dumb, saying we are tanking another season, that they don’t care to improve the team, etc. It feels silly to get so bent out of shape because of free agency. I actually find a lot of joy in seeing that we aren’t playing the losing game of overpaying free agents. We aren’t going to win that way. We’ve seen them try and it wasn’t fun for a long time. Now that we finally have a GM that wants to do things the right way, I’m willing to be patient and see what happens. 

[Frobby]

7 minutes ago, sportsfan8703 said:

Doesn’t it cost like $500k for a rule 5 draftee?  I didn’t see up in arms about Politi. 
 

700k to bring Diaz and O’Hearn to ST. Seems worth it to me. 
 

Elias may not have don’t the big FA signings, but we can’t hold the necessary little moves against him. 

No, a Rule 5 draftee costs $100 k and if he’s offered back his original team has to pay $50 k to reacquire him.  https://www.mlb.com/glossary/transactions/rule-5-draft

[Can_of_corn]

Just now, RarityFlaherty said:

This is pretty much how I feel too. There’s just a lot of strong language being thrown around here; calling all of these moves dumb, saying we are tanking another season, that they don’t care to improve the team, etc. It feels silly to get so bent out of shape because of free agency. I actually find a lot of joy in seeing that we aren’t playing the losing game of overpaying free agents. We aren’t going to win that way. We’ve seen them try and it wasn’t fun for a long time. Now that we finally have a GM that wants to do things the right way, I’m willing to be patient and see what happens. 

I don't think anyone is of the mind that they are tanking.  This clearly isn't a team put together with the goal of picking early in the draft.

[waroriole]

2 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

I don't think anyone is of the mind that they are tanking.  This clearly isn't a team put together with the goal of picking early in the draft.

It’s a team that looks like it’s trying to convince fans that Jay Payton is a big acquisition. 

[Tony-OH]

9 minutes ago, eddie83 said:

I still think he will be the 26th man but yes they are on the hook for all of it. 
 

I didn’t get it when it first happened but I just think Mike saw an opportunity to add back Diaz and it cost him nothing. 

At this point, who knows? He won't be the first bad player to make the Orioles opening day roster. I thought we were past this in the rebuild, yet here we are discussing O'Hearn and Diaz and before that Bemboom and the cast AAAA catchers the Orioles were fiddling around with off the waiver wire.

Oh, mixed in we get an $8 million a year second baseman who is two years older than the guy we got rid of and was worth about .8 WAR (basically the same for both) more than the guy who most agree was terrible last year. 

We replaced Lyles with Gibson (even), and Chirinos with McCann (upgrade if healthy). 

Best move has been to add Givens, but he's not the Givens we knew from 2019, so really we're talking 6t/7th inning Givens now. 

So yeah, O'Hearn very well may be the new Nevin, only left-handed and stuck on 1B.

[RZNJ]

15 minutes ago, waroriole said:

I mean we’re fans on an Orioles message board. Of course we’re gonna overreact. I think there have been a lot of questionable additions to the ML roster since he took over and I think it’s fair to pint them out when they occur. There was no reason for Owings to have been signed last year and then continue to be on the team after showing how terrible he is. Same with Bemboom last year and again this year. I’m concerned because I haven’t seen Elias show the willingness or ability to make this a contending roster, regardless of the budget he has for the ML team 

I think there are large numbers of Oriole fans here who both question moves and who do not overreact.    There's room for everyone.   It's funny though.   It's okay to label one group as Kool-Aid drinkers and such but as soon as you say something against the other side, people get super sensitive.   

[eddie83]

14 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Let's remember, this is an organization that started Kelvin Gutierrez at 3B on opening day last year and had a bench of Odor (2b), Chris Owings (UTL), McKenna (OF) and Bemboom (C) on the opening day roster.

They gave Nevin (184) more PAs than McKenna, Vavra, Henderson and Stowers (yes I know most of those were when Urias went on the IL) and yes, decided when they needed help against left-handers, benched Stowers (who has torn up LHP in the minors despite being left-handed) for a washed up 32-year old who was just released by the Marlins because he couldn't hit right or left handers. 

But remember, Elias has a master plan that we can't understand and has information we don't, so we should always just defend his choices.

So no, being good is apparently not something a player needs to be to be signed and played by the Orioles.

Benboom was here because Adley wasn’t up yet. I can’t see using him as an example of anything. 
 

Clearly they were not trying to nor did they expect to contend last year. Odor was a classic cheap way to get thru the season move. That said you can’t ignore Mateo and Urias who he added. 
 

This isn’t directed at you but you have made a point I have been making with the players they added and how much better it is this year. 

[Can_of_corn]

3 minutes ago, eddie83 said:

Benboom was here because Adley wasn’t up yet. I can’t see using him as an example of anything. 
 

Clearly they were not trying to nor did they expect to contend last year. Odor was a classic cheap way to get thru the season move. That said you can’t ignore Mateo and Urias who he added. 
 

This isn’t directed at you but you have made a point I have been making with the players they added and how much better it is this year. 

Adley was left in the minors after his rehab was over.

Why?

[eddie83]

9 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

At this point, who knows? He won't be the first bad player to make the Orioles opening day roster. I thought we were past this in the rebuild, yet here we are discussing O'Hearn and Diaz and before that Bemboom and the cast AAAA catchers the Orioles were fiddling around with off the waiver wire.

Oh, mixed in we get an $8 million a year second baseman who is two years older than the guy we got rid of and was worth about .8 WAR (basically the same for both) more than the guy who most agree was terrible last year. 

We replaced Lyles with Gibson (even), and Chirinos with McCann (upgrade if healthy). 

Best move has been to add Givens, but he's not the Givens we knew from 2019, so really we're talking 6t/7th inning Givens now. 

So yeah, O'Hearn very well may be the new Nevin, only left-handed and stuck on 1B.

Who would you have as the 26th man assuming we make no trades of position players? 
 

I’m not nearly as down as you are on Frazier. Worst case he is backup if he doesn’t hit. 
 

I have no defense at all of the SP. It has and continues to concern me. 

[eddie83]

1 minute ago, Can_of_corn said:

Adley was left in the minors after his rehab was over.

Why?

He was on rehab at the start of the season. The team had 2 catchers. Somebody had to be there. If it wasn’t Benboom it’s someone else. 
 

You think they should have signed a significant catcher with Adley here? 
 

I really don’t feel like debating the whole Adley could he have been up here earlier story. 

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, eddie83 said:

He was on rehab at the start of the season. The team had 2 catchers. Somebody had to be there. If it wasn’t Benboom it’s someone else. 
 

You think they should have signed a significant catcher with Adley here? 
 

I really don’t feel like debating the whole Adley could he have been up here earlier story. 

Right, he was on rehab at the start of the season.

Then he finished his minor league rehab and was assigned to Norfolk where he played games as a fully rehabed minor league player.

Why?

Why was a healthy AR in the minors at any point last season?

 

[sportsfan8703]

We singed Cave and Benboom to 800k and then DFAd both of them. So we basically signed O’Hearn for 600k more. We gambled and lost on Cave. We’re doing the same with O’Hearn. 
 

People are upset over the lack of FA SP signings and the Frazier deal, but that doesn’t mean we just stop shop and don’t incrementally incrementally improve the 40 man. 
 

I like these moves. Diaz is cut from the same cloth as Urias and Mateo. Great defender. Can he put the offense together?  
 

Bottomline… we just added two guys at 1B for depth, and it cost us 700k. 

[RZNJ]

1 minute ago, Can_of_corn said:

Right, he was on rehab at the start of the season.

Then he finished his minor league rehab and was assigned to Norfolk where he played games as a fully rehabed minor league player.

Why?

Why was a healthy AR in the minors at any point last season?

 

I could come up with reasons but I'd much rather hear why you think he got 84 PA's in the minors last year.

[SteveA]

32 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Thank you, that’s directly on point.   So, the O’s are on the hook to O’Hearn for the $1.4 mm, unless some other team claims or trades for him now.  

Personally, I think that CBA change was an important one for the protection of the players.  
 

Or if he clears waivers and refuses the assignment to AAA and becomes a free agent.   But there's 1,400,000 reasons for him not to do that.

[Can_of_corn]

Just now, RZNJ said:

I could come up with reasons but I'd much rather hear why you think he got 84 PA's in the minors last year.

Keep him from earning a full year of service time by finishing high in the RoY voting...oops.

Possibly to keep him away from Super 2 status...well that at least isn't going to be an issue...

If he was healthy he should have been in the majors.

If he wasn't healthy he should have been on the IL or doing rehab.