It feels like the Orioles are not quite sure what to do with themselves

[interloper]

This is almost certainly an overreaction to a couple of tough series to start the year, but I have to get it off my chest. I can't help but feel like the Orioles are bumbling around and not quite sure what to do with this team. It's lacking something that's hard to pinpoint, and the baseball operations errors in the early going have only magnified the lack of direction. 

Bullet points incoming.

• The bullpen is a bit of a mess. Without Tate and Givens, the bullpen is stretched and roles are uncertain. Gillaspie has, for some reason, been thrust into a high leverage role with mixed success. Baker is still kind of searching for it. Voth does not look like he will be the same guy as last year. Coulombe has been a welcome addition, at least. But this crew is basically only treading water right now. There's not a lot of confidence no matter who is out there. 
• Keeping Stowers over Cordero only to immediately option Stowers and watch Cordero clobber you as a Yankee. Now, would I have been pissed if at the end of ST they optioned Stowers to keep Cordero? Of course, we all would. But now the team has neither, and it reads as a botch.
• Signing Frazier to be an OF option, but playing Vavra there instead. Now, I love Vavra, but he's already responsible for one miscommunication in LF. He had a nice play in RF. But starting Vavra in the outfield? Over Stowers and Frazier? I dunno, man. I say if you want to get cute with the OF, start Frazier out there and let Vavra play his best position, which is 2B. 
• Starting Henderson against tough lefties, despite his lack of success against lefties, but not Stowers, who does have a track record of success. I do want Gunnar to get experience against lefties, but ya know... we're also trying to win games, and the kid was obviously not going to have success against the likes of Cortes. 
• A weak start from the trio of outfield veterans Mullins, Hays, and Santander. Pretty disappointing all around. These guys need to do a good amount of the heavy lifting and they just haven't showed up. Adley can't do it alone. 
• Grayson is up, but what happens next? Bradish comes back. Wells is off to a better start than Irvin. But I think given the state of the bullpen the team has to think hard about bolstering it with Wells. That would be a pretty raw deal for the guy though, so it's yet another messy scenario. 
• Mountcastle is already visibly frustrated with the Wall. He even cranked one deep to CF that died out there and looked like he was ready to pack it up and go home. Like, "even when I go to CF, the park is killing me".  
• Two series losses against AL East opponents is just a bummer of a start for a team that we hoped would be evening the playing field. Instead, the Yankees looked how they always do against us: the better team comes into Camden with their fans and takes a series rather easily. Judge goes off, we get killed by some bench guy (Cordero), we look like we've never seen a baseball against Nestor Cortes (again), etc. Same old, same old. Adley came to play, but no one else really did. 

Edited April 10, 2023 by interloper

[baltfan]

Agree with much of this except Gunnar. Dude is the #1 prospect in baseball.  You hit him against everyone and hope that he makes the adjustment.  You surely don't bench him for anyone.  Adley didn't exactly light up the world batting right-handed last year, but I am sure no one wants to sit him.  

As for the right field wall, it is obvious that they moved it too far back.  Makes me a little nervous that a data driven team like the Orioles somehow seems to have screwed this up.  It clearly affects Hays and Mountcastle, and every IF prospect of any note in the minors hits right-handed.  

[interloper]

3 minutes ago, baltfan said:

Agree with much of this except Gunnar. Dude is the #1 prospect in baseball.  You hit him against everyone and hope that he makes the adjustment.  You surely don't bench him for anyone.  Adley didn't exactly light up the world batting right-handed last year, but I am sure no one wants to sit him.  

As for the right field wall, it is obvious that they moved it too far back.  Makes me a little nervous that a data driven team like the Orioles somehow seems to have screwed this up.  It clearly affects Hays and Mountcastle, and every IF prospect of any note in the minors hits right-handed.  

Honestly, the wall doesn't seem so bad if your lefties are doing some damage at home, but they didn't in that series. Mullins, Santander, Henderson, etc - none of them went yard. Mostly I just feel bad for Mountcastle, and it's concerning that he's already this clearly frustrated. 

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

2 minutes ago, baltfan said:

Agree with much of this except Gunnar. Dude is the #1 prospect in baseball.  You hit him against everyone and hope that he makes the adjustment.  You surely don't bench him for anyone.  Adley didn't exactly light up the world batting right-handed last year, but I am sure no one wants to sit him.  

As for the right field wall, it is obvious that they moved it too far back.  Makes me a little nervous that a data driven team like the Orioles somehow seems to have screwed this up.  It clearly affects Hays and Mountcastle, and every IF prospect of any note in the minors hits right-handed.  

I agree on Gunnar right now he is drawing one walk per game and is showing at least some degree of patience at the plate. If he was hacking away and making outs that would be more concerning. Despite Gunnar's .148 batting average he has a .343 OBP one week into the season. 

If this slump was in June it wouldn't be as glaring, but at the beginning of the season everything is going to be more pronounced. One thing, I 'd like to see is Gunnar not playing at DH except sparingly.

[Frobby]

6 minutes ago, baltfan said:

Agree with much of this except Gunnar. Dude is the #1 prospect in baseball.  You hit him against everyone and hope that he makes the adjustment.  You surely don't bench him for anyone.  Adley didn't exactly light up the world batting right-handed last year, but I am sure no one wants to sit him.  

Just to nitpick, other than last year, Adley has a long track record of hitting extremely well righthanded, whereas Gunnar frequently struggled with LHP in the minors.  I agree with you that Gunnar should continue to play vs. LHP, but his case isn’t as good as Adley’s.   

[interloper]

2 minutes ago, OsFanSinceThe80s said:

I agree on Gunnar right now he is drawing one walk per game and is showing at least some degree of patience at the plate. If he was hacking away and making outs that would be more concerning. Despite Gunnar's .148 batting average he has a .343 OBP one week into the season. 

If this slump was in June it wouldn't be as glaring, but at the beginning of the season everything is going to be more pronounced. One thing, I 'd like to see is Gunnar not playing at DH except sparingly.

I do agree with both of you guys about Gunnar overall. I just think, rubber game against one of the best lefties on the planet, Yankees in Camden Yards, I might have sat him in that one specifically because I desperately want the series win. But it's a minor quibble compared to the other points, and of course he should be playing as much as possible. 

Edited April 10, 2023 by interloper

[interloper]

It just feels to me like the FO is struggling with figuring out what the ideal roster looks like. They kept everybody so their depth is great. But something feels off to me. I like Hyde but his lineups are increasingly weird. The bench is in flux. Three catchers is weird. Vavra the utility player is getting starts over top prospects. Westburg remains blocked until someone gets injured. Hays remains an ugly AB most of the time unless he gets hot. Mullins is just popping stuff up and he abandoned his bunt game. I dunno man. Urghhh

[Ohfan67]

The Orioles are 4-5 after road trips to Boston and Texas and a home opener series against the Yankees. What did you expect? Maybe one more win? Two? Two of their best starting pitchers are on the injured list as well as two important bullpen pitchers. I mean I hate losing to the MF Yankees  and Red Sox, but what realistically did y’all expect to happen in the first three series? If McKenna doesn’t drop the ball, then the Orioles are 5-4 with two series wins and fans feel a lot better. A lot better. 

[interloper]

1 minute ago, Ohfan67 said:

The Orioles are 4-5 after road trips to Boston and Texas and a home opener series against the Yankees. What did you expect? Maybe one more win? Two? Two of their best starting pitchers are on the injured list as well as two important bullpen pitchers. I mean I hate losing to the MF Yankees  and Red Sox, but what realistically did y’all expect to happen in the first three series? If McKenna doesn’t drop the ball, then the Orioles are 5-4 with two series wins and fans feel a lot better. A lot better. 

It's honestly less about the record for me. It's optics and vibe. It's the lack of production from your top veteran core and from your #1 prospect. It's really, for me, about the roster construction and general sense that the FO isn't sure of itself based on its various moves: reverse coursing on Grayson, reverse coursing on Stowers, etc. Bemboom is on a 26-man roster that also includes Adley and McCann, which is WILD. I mean hey good for him, but really? Etc. 

[DirtyBird]

24 minutes ago, baltfan said:

Agree with much of this except Gunnar. Dude is the #1 prospect in baseball.  You hit him against everyone and hope that he makes the adjustment. 

Not if we are trying to be a contending team this year. You start him vs RH pitchers and let him learn vs LH relievers that day.

Starting infield vs LHP should be Urias, Mateo, Westburg

[Frobby]

11 minutes ago, interloper said:

It's honestly less about the record for me. It's optics and vibe. 

Eh, I’m basically fine with it, except the defense has given teams way too many extra outs.   If that tightens up, everything looks much better.   It should tighten up, but we will have to wait and see about that.  

[backdoorslider]

Need to trade some position players for pitching. We have too many hitters and not enough pitching. 

[Can_of_corn]

43 minutes ago, baltfan said:

Agree with much of this except Gunnar. Dude is the #1 prospect in baseball.  You hit him against everyone and hope that he makes the adjustment.  You surely don't bench him for anyone.  Adley didn't exactly light up the world batting right-handed last year, but I am sure no one wants to sit him.  

As for the right field wall, it is obvious that they moved it too far back.  Makes me a little nervous that a data driven team like the Orioles somehow seems to have screwed this up.  It clearly affects Hays and Mountcastle, and every IF prospect of any note in the minors hits right-handed.  

You had folks suggesting Adley give up switch hitting.

[eddie83]

Question for me is how much better will the SP have to be for this team to contend for playoffs? 
 

I still think some patience will be required with how they handle the position players. Ultimately I think season is about how much they get out of rotation. 

[Ohfan67]

17 minutes ago, interloper said:

It's honestly less about the record for me. It's optics and vibe. It's the lack of production from your top veteran core and from your #1 prospect. It's really, for me, about the roster construction and general sense that the FO isn't sure of itself based on its various moves: reverse coursing on Grayson, reverse coursing on Stowers, etc. Bemboom is on a 26-man roster that also includes Adley and McCann, which is WILD. I mean hey good for him, but really? Etc. 

So optics + vibe > results? In nine games, four of which the O's won and one of which they should have won if not for a weird error? Against the Sox and Yankees? With FOUR of their best 13 pitchers out with injuries?

 

The 26th player on the roster is incredibly irrelevant. Bemboom can rot on the bench for a few days, which is basically what the 26th player is going to do until someone gets banged up.