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Mixed feelings about the offseason thus far


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I think it has been a pretty good offseason. But SG i would not mind having Roberts extended for 2 or 3 years. I just the O's wold be better off having him for 2 or 3 more years than what you will get back in a trade. I also hold on to Scott. He has value to the team right now. IMO

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I agree with the assessment.

Nothing they have actually done has been a bad move. In fact every move has been pretty good. However, all the moves have also been small, minor moves.

The judgement really comes from how harshly or nicely you grade them for the non-moves.

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I think it depends on the team.

I actually don't disagree with what you are saying....Will we get enough to justify dealing Scott?

I honestly don't know...In my opening post, I talked about dealing BRob and maybe Scott and Sherrill...that maybe goes back to exactly what you are saying.

I think our best bet was the Cubbies or Phils but they have filled their need, so we may not have a chance to deal him at this point.

But i would be shopping him.

Yeah I really don't think there's a good trade partner out there right now for Scott. Now come June when he's crushing the ball, there will be suitors. However, it's January and there are only a handful of teams with a need like Scott and I seriously doubt they're going to give up one of their top 10 prospects for him now.

As for Roberts...the trade market is limited as well, especially since Hudson is still available. I still think we're going to see some teams calling AM when the things start playing out (i.e. Peavy is traded, Hudson signs, injuries, spring training epiphanies). So the fact that AM is still waiting and not pushing things is the right decision. I honestly don't expect to hear any Roberts talk for another 6 weeks and when we do, I don't expect to get anything more than what was rumored last year, which wasn't that much.

On to Sherrill...you don't trade him until July. No reason to trade him now when teams still think they have lefties options in the minors. Let Sherrill earn that track record, which will make other GMs confident in Sherrill's abilities.

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Sherrill has no value. Why the hell would you even trade him? Home slice was tradeable near the All Star game since he had stellar numbers, then afterwards? Injury, injury, injury. Ends up with a 1.500 WHIP, an ERA near 5, and an ERA+ of 96. And not to mention a BB/9 of 5.57. Last year his ERA+ was 183. If you're going to trade the fella (and he's under club control for awhile), do it when his value is high.

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Extending Huff would be a monsterous mistake.

I am fine with adding another starter but they need to add a good pitcher, not a Tim Redding clone just to say they added someone. I am totally against Garland but I will say this...For a 1-2 year deal at 5-6 million a year, I would sign him. That may be all he ends up with.

I would extend Huff for one year plus a option year right now. Or trade him. Draft choices that are sandwich picks or worse will probably not help this team for at least four years. I can't see that helping with where this team is headed. At least if he is signed the O's have more time to trade him and they have a decent major leaguer in the meantime.

They need a decent pitcher. Trade for him. Sign him. But get it done.

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I agree with the assessment.

Nothing they have actually done has been a bad move. In fact every move has been pretty good. However, all the moves have also been small, minor moves.

The judgement really comes from how harshly or nicely you grade them for the non-moves.

Agreed. I think all of the moves this season have been very solid moves. Much akin to what the Red Sox were/are doing, but on a less grandiose scale obviously.

If he can trade guys like Roberts and Huff, go for it. Otherwise, the signings we've made, the tapping of international markets, as well as not blocking any of our young guys really looks nice. No stupid contract signings a la Baez, Walker, etc. Very solid offseason so far.

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I would extend Huff for one year plus a option year right now. Or trade him. Draft choices that are sandwich picks or worse will probably not help this team for at least four years. I can't see that helping with where this team is headed. At least if he is signed the O's have more time to trade him and they have a decent major leaguer in the meantime.

They need a decent pitcher. Trade for him. Sign him. But get it done.

I'd rather have the draft picks than Huff. Let him walk after this season, and get the picks.

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Did we make an offseason checklist before it began that we can reference? It is interesting (not in a good way) that all of the positional wholes we had coming into the offseason in 2010 are still there. We basically need an entire infield.

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I think there are 2 problems from this offseason that make it just short of a failure:

1. The Orioles have done nothing to get the fans interested again.

2. There are going to be holes all over the infield in a year and nothing has been done to resolve this. There is no surefire long term solution at any of the 4 positions. This is going to be a major problem very soon and the Orioles have not been proactive about it.

And of course, Markakis has not been resigned.

Therefore, my grade for this offseason is a D. Of course, AM still has a month to improve on that. But lets not sugarcoat the stopgap moves that have been made.

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Excellent point Lucky Jim

I think there is only one player that AM could get any value for now in a trade and that is BROB. We can control Scott, Sherril and Guts for a few more season and I think there value will increase.

Its a little surprising there is so little interest in Huff, but when you can get a Burrell for $8m it really limits the prospects you can get. I would be willing to give a 1 year extension to both Huff and Brob but I doubt either would take it.

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Exactly right.

Anybody who goes by the philosophy behind Moneyball, and not just its superficial transient manifestations, will see that good 30-yr-old vets are the current bargain stock.

Trading them for good prospects means paying an all-time-high premium.

Whether it's worth doing it anyway is a different question.

But we should be mindful that, in general, doing deals like that now is a perfect example of "sell low and buy high".

Trading vets for prospects in this market is a very anti-Moneyball thing to do.

Excellent post, and likely worth its own thread.

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I think there are 2 problems from this offseason that make it just short of a failure:

1. The Orioles have done nothing to get the fans interested again.

2. There are going to be holes all over the infield in a year and nothing has been done to resolve this. There is no surefire long term solution at any of the 4 positions. This is going to be a major problem very soon and the Orioles have not been proactive about it.

And of course, Markakis has not been resigned.

Therefore, my grade for this offseason is a D. Of course, AM still has a month to improve on that. But lets not sugarcoat the stopgap moves that have been made.

Not only am I not sugarcoating the moves, I've agreed with just about every one. Stopgap moves, at a low-price, are exactly what needs to be done in the absence of the availability of long-term solutions.

I think as the season moves forward, we need to look at shopping Guthrie, Sherrill (if his value returns) and Scott (especially if he has a rebound year).

I think Guthrie will bring a very good return, and bounceback years from Sherrill and Scott, if we target teams with immediate needs, could bring back much better returns than they will right now.

Roberts is a tough call. I'd touch upon an extension with him. I'm wary of trading him for parts, though. There needs to be some substance to our return, not just marginally useful odds & ends.

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I think there are 2 problems from this offseason that make it just short of a failure:

1. The Orioles have done nothing to get the fans interested again.

2. There are going to be holes all over the infield in a year and nothing has been done to resolve this. There is no surefire long term solution at any of the 4 positions. This is going to be a major problem very soon and the Orioles have not been proactive about it.

And of course, Markakis has not been resigned.

Therefore, my grade for this offseason is a D. Of course, AM still has a month to improve on that. But lets not sugarcoat the stopgap moves that have been made.

My Grade for this off-season is an F.

Are we rebuilding or not? If we are you put stopgaps in and try to put depth behind other positions. I'm not saying Ramon could have netted us something good, but if we were going to dump him, I would have liked to see nothing but minor league IFs and Ps in return. I don't care how under the radar they are.

If we are rebuilding, all of your FA signings shouldn't be over the age of 30 (which the exception of Hennessey). I just though this off-season the O's would at least beef up the minor leagues in positions of need. There's still a month to go, let's see what they can do.

(P.S. The only bright spot is Uehura, but I want to see us reach out to Cuba too for this to make it to a D or C)

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Excellent post, and likely worth its own thread.

To an extent. The fact that prospects might be overvalued and veterans undervalued doesn't mean that we shouldn't make those trades as an absolute. There won't be any steals, but we very well may be able to swap ML-value "now" for a package of ML-value "later".

Moneyball certainly doesn't counsel that you stop making trades when the market isn't in your favor. You just have to have the right expectations, and tailor your deals to the trading partner's needs/undervaluations, rather than overall market patterns.

Which is why I think Scott and Sherrill will have a better market during the season: the contract doesn't expire and team needs will gain more urgency. We don't need to have a general market undervaluation in order to take advantage of a team willing to swap great long-term value for necessary short-term value.

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I agree with the assessment.

Nothing they have actually done has been a bad move. In fact every move has been pretty good. However, all the moves have also been small, minor moves.

The judgement really comes from how harshly or nicely you grade them for the non-moves.

My only real problem with this is how do you determine what is a "non-move." We aren't signing Manny Ramirez. Is that a non-move that you want to judge the Orioles on? If so, I think it's a good non-move. For my money, the major non-moves are the failure to sign Teixeira, the lack of interest in Dunn, and the failure to trade Roberts. Following the Teixeira signing by NY, it has become fairly obvious that Teixeira never intended to play anywhere else, certainly not in Baltimore and I don't blame MacPhail for refusing to bid against himself when the offers by everyone other than NY seemed to top out at $20mil per year. Now that we have a better idea about Dunn's contract demands and his insistence on playing in the outfield, again, I don't blame MacPhail for taking a pass.

The failure to trade Roberts when his value was fairly high last off season is my only real compaint against AM. At this point, I don't think it's possible to get a major prospect for Roberts - if Chicago WS won't trade Floydd or Poreda, what is the point of talking with them? And, I don't think he's inclined to extend, whether we think it's a good idea or not. If Roberts walks for a 1st or 2nd Round and Compensatory pick, that will be MacPhail's single significant failure in my opinion.

As far as Markakis is concerned, I believe it's a non-issue. He is here for 3 years no matter what. And, I fully expect him to be extended at some point.

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