Jordan Westburg 2023

[Pickles]

1 minute ago, Frobby said:

That’s what I meant.  Of course, some players adjust faster than others, so it’s not a science.  And some never do adjust.  

Exactly.  I mean not to derail the thread but that's why they signed Frazier imo.  They didn't want two rookies as essentially everyday players in the IF at the same time.  At least not at the beginning of the year.

 

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, Pickles said:

Exactly.  I mean not to derail the thread but that's why they signed Frazier imo.  They didn't want two rookies as essentially everyday players in the IF at the same time.  At least not at the beginning of the year.

 

They signed Frazier because he was a left handed hitter.

Elias was clear about his desire for a left handed bat at that position.

[Pickles]

1 minute ago, Can_of_corn said:

They signed Frazier because he was a left handed hitter.

Elias was clear about his desire for a left handed bat at that position.

That was part of it sure.  

[Frobby]

5 minutes ago, Pickles said:

Exactly.  I mean not to derail the thread but that's why they signed Frazier imo.  They didn't want two rookies as essentially everyday players in the IF at the same time.  At least not at the beginning of the year.

 

That really wouldn’t have been an issue, since they had both Urias and Mateo. 

[Pickles]

5 minutes ago, Frobby said:

That really wouldn’t have been an issue, since they had both Urias and Mateo. 

I used the word essentially, because without Frazier there's a rookie- either Ortiz or Westburg- getting basically every day at bats somewhere between the IF and DH.  Part of that IF mix.  So Urias may have been the "starting second baseman" but two rookies would have been in the lineup  in the IF the majority of the time.

And of course they had no idea that Mateo would have played so well that he basically needs to play every day.

Edited May 17, 2023 by Pickles

[Sports Guy]

12 minutes ago, Pickles said:

Eh.  The thing about the slumps of established big leaguers, and the adjustments that rookies make to the big leagues, is that slumps end.  Not everyone successfully transitions to the major leagues.

When Stowers goes 2-30 with 12 Ks we don't know when that is going to end; when the light is going to turn on.

When Santander goes 2-30 with 12 Ks you can feel confident that he's going to start raking real soon.

That’s fair. My only point is that we need to stop pretending that we have some stud lineup going out there.

The lineup is full of lower average, low OBP guys and the bench has a lot of weakness too.

I don’t see these upper echelon guys as being players that will really hurt us any worse than what we are trotting out there on a regular or semi regular basis.

[Sports Guy]

3 minutes ago, Pickles said:

I used the word essentially, because without Frazier there's a rookie- either Ortiz or Westburg- getting basically every day at bats somewhere between the IF and DH.  Part of that IF mix.  So Urias may have been the "starting second baseman" but two rookies would have been in the lineup  in the IF the majority of the time.

And of course they had no idea that Mateo would have played so well that he basically needs to play every day.

 

8 minutes ago, Frobby said:

That really wouldn’t have been an issue, since they had both Urias and Mateo. 

Right..the idea that we needed vet depth to cover up for the rookies is just wrong and again, if you felt the need to have some insurance, you sign someone for 2-3 million, not 8.

Edited May 17, 2023 by Sports Guy

[Pickles]

Just now, Sports Guy said:

That’s fair. My only point is that we need to stop pretending that we have some stud lineup going out there.

The lineup is full of lower average, low OBP guys and the bench has a lot of weakness too.

I don’t see these upper echelon guys as being players that will really hurt us any worse than what we are trotting out there on a regular or semi regular basis.

Well, I think you consistently undervalue our young major leaguers like Mateo, Hays, Santander, etc.  

They're the reason we're winning.  Other than Adley, the fruits of the farm system have not been responsible for the franchise's turnaround.

I'm not so eager to toss those guys aside for every bright new prospect.

That said, they're going to have to get value from Westburg and Ortiz and others, and to do that they either need to trade them or find roles for them on the major league roster.

[Sports Guy]

2 minutes ago, Pickles said:

Well, I think you consistently undervalue our young major leaguers like Mateo, Hays, Santander, etc.  

They're the reason we're winning.  Other than Adley, the fruits of the farm system have not been responsible for the franchise's turnaround.

I'm not so eager to toss those guys aside for every bright new prospect.

That said, they're going to have to get value from Westburg and Ortiz and others, and to do that they either need to trade them or find roles for them on the major league roster.

You can’t pat Elias on the back and praise him for what he has done for the farm system and then say they aren’t good enough to be better than 1.5-2.5 WAR players that have had consistency and durability issues throughout their careers.

And besides, no one is saying to bench or DFA those guys..just take some at bats away and there is nothing in their career profiles that says that is the wrong thing to do.

[Sports Guy]

This is what Tampa does. Hell, this is what Houston does.

Get rid of those more expensive vets, especially the middling guys and replace them with your youth that you work so hard to build up.  That’s how you sustain winning.

You don’t sustain winning by blocking those guys and playing 2 WAR players that are nothing more than solid role players on championship teams.

[Pickles]

1 minute ago, Sports Guy said:

You can’t pat Elias on the back and praise him for what he has done for the farm system and then say they aren’t good enough to be better than 1.5-2.5 WAR players that have had consistency and durability issues throughout their careers.

And besides, no one is saying to bench or DFA those guys..just take some at bats away and there is nothing in their career profiles that says that is the wrong thing to do.

These guys for the most part are 26, 27, 28 years old and were guys who did not have traditional exposure to the big leagues.  Hays was rushed; Santander was a Rule 5, Mateo DFA, Urias was DFA.  Their track records are not as spotty as you consistently try to paint them to be because they simply don't have these long track records.

Take Santander as an example.  Over the last four years he's played about 85% of the games and put up a 115 OPS+.  Has he missed time?  Yes, but that's not a "spotty" track record imo.

So yeah, I hope Cowser is a better player than that.  But there's no guarantee that he is; most importantly, immediately.

[Pickles]

5 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

This is what Tampa does. Hell, this is what Houston does.

Get rid of those more expensive vets, especially the middling guys and replace them with your youth that you work so hard to build up.  That’s how you sustain winning.

You don’t sustain winning by blocking those guys and playing 2 WAR players that are nothing more than solid role players on championship teams.

Mateo, Urias were worth significantly more than 2 WAR last year.

[Frobby]

1 minute ago, Sports Guy said:

You can’t pat Elias on the back and praise him for what he has done for the farm system and then say they aren’t good enough to be better than 1.5-2.5 WAR players that have had consistency and durability issues throughout their careers.

I wouldn’t necessarily say that.  I think you are overestimating how many prospects attain that level of success.  I’d be disappointed if Cowser didn’t.  I’d be pleasantly surprised if Stowers did.  

In the last 23 years, the O’s have drafted 8 players who reached 10 rWAR.  We should be getting a better yield rate than that going forward, but it’s not typical to spit out 1-2 of those every year.  I’m not expecting all our top 10 guys to do it.  
 

[Sports Guy]

4 minutes ago, Pickles said:

Mateo, Urias were worth significantly more than 2 WAR last year.

And neither have a future with the team.

I like Urias. I touted him on here before anyone but his future is not with this team and btw, there would still be at bats there for him.

One of these guys should have been dealt in the offseason. 

[Sports Guy]

2 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I wouldn’t necessarily say that.  I think you are overestimating how many prospects attain that level of success.  I’d be disappointed if Cowser didn’t.  I’d be pleasantly surprised if Stowers did.  

In the last 23 years, the O’s have drafted 8 players who reached 10 rWAR.  We should be getting a better yield rate than that going forward, but it’s not typical to spit out 1-2 of those every year.  I’m not expecting all our top 10 guys to do it.  
 

You can say what you want but Elias isn’t going to keep these guys around for much longer. He comes from an organization that essentially home grows its whole team or at least many of the key members.

They don’t do much in FA and they make trades.

That is what he will do here.  He loves his prospects and his prospect rankings. He’s going to show them off.

He’s not doing what he is doing to turn around and spend a lot of money on these guys.