Maybe Frazier can play

[wildcard]

I don't know how much of this Frazier has left but here are some of his defensive plays.   Also might be the kind of enthusiastic  guy that Odor was for the O's last year.

 

Edited January 20, 2023 by wildcard

[Orange]

He's a left-handed hitter who gets on base and plays above-average defense at three positions. People get upset about him blocking some prospect, but I think there's always a role for a guy like Frazier. $8m is a little more than I'd like to have spent, but it's not my money and it's a one-year deal. I don't get the hate.

[Sports Guy]

5 minutes ago, Orange said:

He's a left-handed hitter who gets on base and plays above-average defense at three positions. People get upset about him blocking some prospect, but I think there's always a role for a guy like Frazier. $8m is a little more than I'd like to have spent, but it's not my money and it's a one-year deal. I don't get the hate.

Well you got the left handed hitter part right.

[Yardball85]

36 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I don't know how much of this Frazier has left but here are some of his defensive plays.   Almost might be the kind of enthusiastic  guy that Odor was for the O's last year.

 

Maybe he can, and I hope he does well.  But the "maybe he can play" does not mean they should have signed him. 

[Sanfran327]

2 minutes ago, Yardball85 said:

Maybe he can, and I hope he does well.  But the "maybe he can play" does not mean they should have signed him. 

I don't think it was defending the signing as much as, "well, we have him, and there's not much we can do about it. maybe he can play (silver lining)"

You know we're not just going to cut him when the ink on his contract is barely dry. If we were in the business of cutting veterans that we've overpaid, Odor wouldn't have lasted the whole year last year. Or countless other examples. 

I guess folks can either complain or see if he can have a bit of a revival. 

[Moose Milligan]

I'm betting on his skills eroding, not leveling off or getting any better.

The stiffy that Elias had for getting a lefthanded bat this offseason was inexplicable.  Now maybe Frazier has a one-year, prove it, contract year and puts up good numbers, 3+ WAR, wins us over, helps us win games and the Orioles get to the playoffs.  Fine, that's good.  

Still would have preferred to see the prospects.  

[LTO's]

18 minutes ago, Orange said:

He's a left-handed hitter who gets on base and plays above-average defense at three positions. People get upset about him blocking some prospect, but I think there's always a role for a guy like Frazier. $8m is a little more than I'd like to have spent, but it's not my money and it's a one-year deal. I don't get the hate.

We're at the part of the offseason where people need to just admit that the Frazier irrationality was because they thought the O's would be more aggressive in FA. Looking at it objectively, it makes total sense and the contract is fine. The idea that this team would roll into the season with a guy like Westburg as a starter with no established vet behind him in the event that he struggles is frankly very dumb. Career OBP is higher than any O's starter besides Adley and has positional flexibility to get you through rough points in the season.

[Aristotelian]

The thing is his value is in the infield where we already have a full group plus a pipeline of prospects. He is versatile and gives more flexibility to make in season trades without skipping a beat. Maybe, maybe Urias and Hays are packaged with Hall to get us a Woodruff level starter and it will be worth it to have Frazier on hand to fill those holes.

Even if he has a good bounce back year I'm not sure he really helps the organization absent some trades. 

[oriole]

Watching that made me miss baseball. 
 

Still not particularly looking forward to Frazier playing. I think I’d have preferred to watch one of our many middle infield prospects play 2B in a sink-or-swim situation. But hey, Frazier is the guy. At least he can move around a bit so if someone like Westburg or Ortiz really forces themselves on the roster then Frazier can go to a corner OF spot. 

[Sports Guy]

6 minutes ago, LTO's said:

We're at the part of the offseason where people need to just admit that the Frazier irrationality was because they thought the O's would be more aggressive in FA. Looking at it objectively, it makes total sense and the contract is fine. The idea that this team would roll into the season with a guy like Westburg as a starter with no established vet behind him in the event that he struggles is frankly very dumb. Career OBP is higher than any O's starter besides Adley and has positional flexibility to get you through rough points in the season.

I didn’t realize we had already traded Mateo and Urias.

Saying this move makes total sense, and then listing false reasons as to why it makes sense, is absurd.

Edited January 20, 2023 by Sports Guy

[LTO's]

4 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

I didn’t realize we had already traded Mateo and Urias.

Saying this move makes total sense, and then listing false reasons as to why it makes sense, is absurd.

What doesn't make sense about it? Mateo and Urias are RH. They wanted a veteran swiss-army knife LH bat that they can move around the INF and OF. They are making the smart bet that Frazier will be better than Vavra in 2023 while also making sure they acquired depth early in the offseason to be able to maneuver around whatever trades they end up making. 

[oriole]

14 minutes ago, LTO's said:

We're at the part of the offseason where people need to just admit that the Frazier irrationality was because they thought the O's would be more aggressive in FA. Looking at it objectively, it makes total sense and the contract is fine. The idea that this team would roll into the season with a guy like Westburg as a starter with no established vet behind him in the event that he struggles is frankly very dumb. Career OBP is higher than any O's starter besides Adley and has positional flexibility to get you through rough points in the season.

With Frazier the infield looks like Frazier 2B, Mateo SS, Henderson 3B OR Frazier 2B, Henderson SS, Urias 3B

 

Without Frazier it’d have likely been Urias 2B, Mateo SS, Henderson 3B

 

So they wouldn’t be depending on any of the prospects. Mateo as a regular is debatable of course, but his WAR was better than anyone else in the infield so not quite as easy to discount his entire skill set just because he can’t get on base. 

[LTO's]

2 minutes ago, oriole said:

With Frazier the infield looks like Frazier 2B, Mateo SS, Henderson 3B OR Frazier 2B, Henderson SS, Urias 3B

 

Without Frazier it’d have likely been Urias 2B, Mateo SS, Henderson 3B

 

So they wouldn’t be depending on any of the prospects. Mateo as a regular is debatable of course, but his WAR was better than anyone else in the infield so not quite as easy to discount his entire skill set just because he can’t get on base. 

The INF is expected to be 3B Gunnar, SS Mateo, 2B Frazier, 1B Mountcastle with Urias as the utility guy. The reality is besides Means and Adley to a certain extent, the O's were remarkably healthy last year. This year someone will get hurt or traded. They are really in a position of strength here to do whatever they want with the infield options at bout the ML and MiL level. If you believe the Frazier signing significantly impacted their ability to sign a better pitcher that's fine but I think there are a host of other reasons why that's the case. 

[Sports Guy]

25 minutes ago, LTO's said:

What doesn't make sense about it? Mateo and Urias are RH. They wanted a veteran swiss-army knife LH bat that they can move around the INF and OF. They are making the smart bet that Frazier will be better than Vavra in 2023 while also making sure they acquired depth early in the offseason to be able to maneuver around whatever trades they end up making. 

Ok, so now it’s because he is left handed. Thats you moving the goal posts from what you said.

That being said, who cares?

They have vet players to play. They also have other high upside rookies who could/should factor in soon.

The “versatility” angle is poor because he’s an average at best OFer who has seen his sprint speed really fall off recently, so that versatility is likely to not be good versatility very soon.

All this signing was about is Elias feeling he needs a lefty bat for the new wall (which is a myth) and the thought that they have to get a new second baseman for whatever reason.  It’s not that logical.

You have up to 4 second base options that are or very close to ML ready. You have multiple OF options and quite frankly, if you were going to add to the OF, you needed to do it with a real bat.

And lastly, he has a 600ish OPS over his last 800ish at bats. People want to reference 2021. His OBP dropped 70ish points between the first and second half. It was still an ok 321 but he hasn’t been that great at getting on base for 2.5 of the last 3 seasons and now, he is entering an age bracket where historically speaking, MIers tend to fall of a cliff and all the signs are pointing to him doing just that.

I have said this several times..if he has a 2 WAR this year, that wouldn’t surprise me. He should still be a good fielder at second and perhaps he can hit enough to keep his WAR respectable but I don’t care. I think our MiLers could have done the same thing (or better) while also gaining valuable experience and using that 8M (which will be 10-15% of the payroll) in a better way.

Urias and Mateo are your vet back ups. You had options. The last thing this team had to add this offseason was a MIer. I would say that about Trea turner or Adam Frazier but at least Turner would put you in position to contend for the division this year. Frazier just blocks players and doesn’t really help you.

Edited January 20, 2023 by Sports Guy

[sportsfan8703]

It’s real hard to win when you won’t give out a multi year FA deal to a pitcher. Our ownership hates hurt money, especially after CD, and Cobb. So I think Elias spent his allowance on the best 1 year deal out there. 

Elias and our FO have been great at the draft, good at bringing back international signings, good at hiring coaches, great at working the waiver wire, why would Elias then be so non participating in FA?

This was ownership baby!!!