Orioles Acquire LHP Cole Irvin from the A's for Darrel Hernaiz

[wildcard]

21 minutes ago, oriole said:

I don’t get why some think he will be a swing man yet Gibson is our Opening Day starter. Last year Irvin beat out Gibson in IP, H9, BB9, and HR9…He is an innings eater and the only real left handed option until Means comes back or Hall figures out what a strike zone is. 
 

The home/away splits are a bit concerning, but luckily he’ll play half his games with a wall in left that is only rivaled by the Wall of Westeros. He got lefties out at a respectable rate and the biggest difference in his splits came from righties slugging at a higher rate…which will likely come down playing at Camden Yards. 
 

A more balanced schedule in 2023 means less starts vs the AL East juggernauts. And Wells and Voth are definitely not going to be eating innings like Irvin would. I just think there’s a lot to like (but nothing to love) about the move.

Look at the parks Gibson and Irvin pitched in.  One a bandbox, the other one of the biggest in baseball.

[Moose Milligan]

7 minutes ago, wildcard said:

 

It doesn't matter how many innings Irvin can pitch if he can't pitch them well.

But Holt is a Wizard!  C'mon WC, have some faith.  

I find your loyalty to guys we already have endearing and any newcomers as a threat to them to be adorable.  

[HakunaSakata]

I'm just disappointed this trade didn't happen over the holidays. Then the headline could have read - "The Orioles Get Cole for Christmas". 

[Can_of_corn]

4 minutes ago, wildcard said:

Look at the parks Gibson and Irvin pitched in.  One a bandbox, the other one of the biggest in baseball.

Did you bother to look?

H/9

Philly- .996

Oakland- .982

OPACY- 1.046.

Roh Ruh.

BB rate.

Oakland- 1.066

Philly- .989

 

It's LAZY to just blame the ballpark for the difference in stats.

Do the work before just spouting off.

[Just Regular]

Now that Irvin's aboard, for me it kind of for the first time positions Gibson as the Lyles replacement comparing staffs year to year.     Watkins-Zimmermann got about 20% of the starts last year.

The six Orioles SP in 2022 who cleared 100 IP, among 140 MLB Arms who got to triple digit innings, placed 87-91-97-102-115-133 in K-BB%.

97th place Lyles job now held by 86th place Gibson, and 133rd place Watkins job now held by 93rd place Irvin.

86-87-91-93-102 out of 140 by 2022 results takes the Bottom Quartile of bulk innings guys out of the mix.

We'll see if as it plays out BAL can avoid having "about the weakest SP in all MLB" throw much for them.

Is everyone Five and Dive?    Sure, but that's what baseball is now.    2-pitch Spencer Strider dominates the league - the Clubs are working towards "let's just have a Closer for about twice through the order".

Curious to see how far up the 2022 Jorge Lopez success ladder Tyler Wells can climb now.

[Sports Guy]

Lol..unless he is completely awful in spring training, Irvin has a better shot at being OD starter than being pushed to the pen.

Wells will go to the pen and imo, that’s probably a good thing for so many reasons.

[vab]

Great deal in my opinion. This guy went 6IP or more 18 times last year with an average ERA. May not seem like much but that's fairly rare commodity these days. Will keep us in games and take pressure off the bullpen. That will have an impact and not just on the days he pitches. Very much a fly-ball guy though so he'll probably be much more effective at home with a lot of RHBs against him, good outfield defense and a big left field. Another 24 year old SP prospect as well in the deal - don't see how anybody can complain with just giving up Hernaiz. The biggest thing this deal indicates is how much they'll be able to get for a Westburg, Norby or Ortiz if dealt for a piece at the trade deadline. 

[btdart20]

38 minutes ago, wildcard said:

 The pen has Bautista, Perez, Tate, Baker, Givens, Voth, Akin and a competition between Politi, Krehbiel and Irvin for the last spot.  Wells is probably needed more in the rotation.

I'm rarely absolute about other people's decisions, but I'd put the odds of Irvin in the BP at 0%.  Irvin is an inning-eater.

39 minutes ago, clapdiddy said:

Quite honestly, you should have been saying the same thing about Gibson, yet you included him in your "better pitchers" list.  Despite his splits, he's still a better pitcher than Gibson.  He's thrown over 350 innings over the last 2 years, so he has the ability to go deep into games and keep his team in the game. 

Kremer and Bradish, while promising, are still an unknown quantity.  GRod hasn't thrown 1 inning in the majors.   Voth has thrown over 100 innings in a season exactly once. 

Adding Irvin give them a solid back of the rotation guy that will keep the team in games and give them innings. 

It'll be interesting to see how Gibson/Irvin compare throughout the season.  Irvin did have a lack of competition in Oakland, so I imagine that has to do with his IP count.

 

 

 

Gibson/Irvin/Kremer are as close to 100% rotation locks in that order of security.

Which Bradish shows up for ST?  He's 80+% got the #4 spot.  

I think the #5 spot in the rotation boils down to how they want to manage Grayson's innings.

1. A few options to spread it like peanut butter via a 6-man rotation, piggyback roles and/or occasional shutdowns/skips in starts.  I'd lean toward Grayson being the #5 with Voth in the pen and spot starter to stretch out Grayson's IP.

2. Max out his IP count early/often as he would be used when he's out of his Pinocchio stage.  And phase him out when Means makes his return.  (If FG is correct, Voth doesn't have an option.  I think that means this IP option is least likely to happen.)

3. Delayed ramp up so Grayson is fully available in the playoffs with Voth as the #5.  And OH implodes and Chicken Little hysteria begins!

 

And to completely get ahead of myself, anyone not named Grayson could be traded by the deadline (with varying degrees of likelihood).  

 

 

Heading into 2022, we all liked the quantity of prospect depth, and we were hoping to see quality.  Our rotation is having a similar vibe in that "on paper" in that we have decent depth but need to see quality to take a step forward.  I don't see Gibson or Irvin filling that top shelf quality need, but they provide two spots of (likely/hopefully) league-average stability.  But we need some combo of the rest to tread water or take a significant enough step forward to counter any regression.  

[Aglets]

This has been pointed out before but just to restate things for perspective.

Our top 5 starters last year by WAR:

Kremer - 2.8

Voth - 1.8

Wells - 1.2

Lyles - 1.0

Bradish - 0.4

 

For comparison's sake Irvin last year had 2.1 WAR and also btw threw more innings than any of our guys.   Now you can say that that means guys like Kremer and Voth have a lot more upside if they can push to 180 innings (Voth almost certainly will not; his total of 101.2 last year was a career high) but i would counter that we have no idea how their arms will perform with that kind of workload yet.   Obviously having a workhorse like Irvin (only 23 guys threw more innings than him in all of MLB) should help make our bullpen better too.

I think this is a pretty solid trade.  Not over the moon exciting, but i think our rotation may surprise a lot of people next year, assuming everyone gets / stays healthy.  Which almost certainly won't happen.

[eddie83]

It’s a good trade. I like the depth. Makes pen better as well. We have greater depth all over the roster. 
 

Issue is the quality at the top. I don’t want a repeat of the 12-16 teams. Just felt like we needed an airtight bullpen and a rotation to go as well as possible to get by. Be nice to have a legitimate margin for error. 

[Roll Tide]

3 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

He threw over 80 innings last year. Unless he gets hurt this year, he is easily getting over 100 innings.

If he’s healthy, he gets closer to 150 than 100.

I think they limit him….but maybe your right.

[wildcard]

57 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

But Holt is a Wizard!  C'mon WC, have some faith.  

I find your loyalty to guys we already have endearing and any newcomers as a threat to them to be adorable.  

I think Holt will make Irvin better. But probably  not better than the 6 starters ahead of him.

So far I don't see Irvin as a threat to make the rotation.

[Sports Guy]

4 minutes ago, Roll Tide said:

I think they limit him….but maybe your right.

They will limit him but not to the extent of just 100 IP.

[Sports Guy]

2 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I think Holt will make Irvin better. But probably  not better than the 6 starters ahead of him.

So far I don't see Irvin as a threat to make the rotation.

There aren’t 6 starters ahead of him. You are just wrong.

[interloper]

3 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I think Holt will make Irvin better. But probably  not better than the 6 starters ahead of him.

So far I don't see Irvin as a threat to make the rotation.

This might be one of your worst takes, I'm just gonna be real with you. Not trying to attack you or anything. I enjoy your posts. 

But there is literally 0 chance Irvin does not make the rotation. Literally zero. You do not throw 180 innings with 2 WAR and NOT make this Baltimore Orioles starting pitching rotation. It's just not in the realm of reality to suggest otherwise. 

Edited January 27, 2023 by interloper