First Infielder Off the Ship

[Bemorewins]

15 minutes ago, oriole said:

It’s the approach of a team that has signaled every intention that they will stay in the bottom of the league in payroll. Rich men crying poor. 
 

I absolutely am 100% against the whole not spending on anyone thing but that’s the O’s and if they’re going to win and sustain it, then trading prospects and keeping the expensive players is not the move to make. 

They will not win doing that, at least not at a high level. Only ONE team has won a World Series with that approach. The Florida Marlins way back like 20 years ago.

Let's be honest that has only worked for the Rays in terms of sustaining a winning team because of their uncanny ability to develop ELITE pitching. The Orioles and Elias have shown no such evidence that they can even come close to that.

[owknows]

10 hours ago, Bemorewins said:

They will not win doing that, at least not at a high level. Only ONE team has won a World Series with that approach. The Florida Marlins way back like 20 years ago.

Let's be honest that has only worked for the Rays in terms of sustaining a winning team because of their uncanny ability to develop ELITE pitching. The Orioles and Elias have shown no such evidence that they can even come close to that.

The Orioles have not only come close to that... they've surpassed it. They now have the top farm in baseball. But they've done it with position players. Not pitchers.

Elias has chosen to put his draft capital into position players. Particularly infielders..

I believe he has done this for a reason.

The odds of a top pitching draft prospect becoming a regular major league player are considerably lower than the odds of a top draft position player. And the higher a player is drafted, the larger this differential becomes.

So stockpiling position players and trading them later for arms who have some of the risk assumed and vetted by other teams would seem to be a sound strategy.

Particularly if you've created yourself the luxury of stacking the farm with multi-layer position player redundancy. (by tanking for long enough to build the number 1 farm in baseball)

So what's left to learn, is how effective Elias will be at understanding which players to keep, and which players to deal... and how to maximize the return for those players

 

[Bahama O's Fan]

2 hours ago, owknows said:

The Orioles have not only come close to that... they've surpassed it. They now have the top farm in baseball. But they've done it with position players. Not pitchers.

Elias has chosen to put his draft capital into position players. Particularly infielders..

I believe he has done this for a reason.

The odds of a top pitching draft prospect becoming a regular major league player are considerably lower than the odds of a top draft position player. And the higher a player is drafted, the larger this differential becomes.

So stockpiling position players and trading them later for arms who have some of the risk assumed and vetted by other teams would seem to be a sound strategy.

Particularly if you've created yourself the luxury of stacking the farm with multi-layer position player redundancy. (by tanking for long enough to build the number 1 farm in baseball)

So what's left to learn, is how effective Elias will be at understanding which players to keep, and which players to deal... and how to maximize the return for those players

 

Yeah, he hasn't traded for any good pitching yet. Let's see

[Spy Fox]

20 hours ago, wildcard said:

I see these posts that the O's need pitching.    I don't see it that way.

They have Gibson and Wells doing well.  GRod has to be in the rotation and he has great stuff.  Bradish will be in the rotation this week for the Nats series.    

The fifth starter is between Kremer, Watkins, Irvin and Zimmermann.    Hall has a start today in AAA.  Means is on track to be in the rotation in July.

I don't see that the O's need to trade for starting pitching.

I would not trade a top 20 prospect for a reliever.   Elias finds those guys without giving up much.

There will be trades in July and the prime candidate for me are Frazier, Santander,  Gibson,  Givens, McCann, O Hearn, and Coulombe.   Not that all of them will be traded but Elias will be listening on some of them because of their contract status and depending on how the youngsters are doing.

Pushing from the minors are Westburg, Ortiz, Norby, Cowser and Stowers.   Kjerstad may be knocking by August.   Handley, Haskin, Lester, Hall,  Zimermann, Rom,  Krehbiel, Darwinzon Herandez, Vespi and did you see what Denoyer did the other night.

We have enough ok pitching but we don’t have enough very good pitching.

We may have more rotation depth than many teams, as you’re pointing out. But if we reach the playoffs, the opposing SP is likely to be better and more experienced than our SP in nearly every game. That’s where we need a pitching boost IMO. 

[terpoh]

20 hours ago, wildcard said:

I see these posts that the O's need pitching.    I don't see it that way.

They have Gibson and Wells doing well.  GRod has to be in the rotation and he has great stuff.  Bradish will be in the rotation this week for the Nats series.    

The fifth starter is between Kremer, Watkins, Irvin and Zimmermann.    Hall has a start today in AAA.  Means is on track to be in the rotation in July.

I don't see that the O's need to trade for starting pitching.

I would not trade a top 20 prospect for a reliever.   Elias finds those guys without giving up much.

There will be trades in July and the prime candidate for me are Frazier, Santander,  Gibson,  Givens, McCann, O Hearn, and Coulombe.   Not that all of them will be traded but Elias will be listening on some of them because of their contract status and depending on how the youngsters are doing.

Pushing from the minors are Westburg, Ortiz, Norby, Cowser and Stowers.   Kjerstad may be knocking by August.   Handley, Haskin, Lester, Hall,  Zimermann, Rom,  Krehbiel, Darwinzon Herandez, Vespi and did you see what Denoyer did the other night.

You've made several references to Frazier getting traded like its some forgone conclusion and I just dont see it. And if so, definitely not in some impact move for the club. 

If Frazier is traded one of several things would have to be true... He would have to be playing well to get any return and if he was playing well and we were contending why would we trade someone who was contributing? If he was playing well and traded then I would assume we were out of it and selling. 

Or the other option is he is not playing well and we want to get those at bats to Westburg/Ortiz/Norby in which case he wont get a return at all. 

 

 

[Bemorewins]

6 hours ago, owknows said:

The Orioles have not only come close to that... they've surpassed it. They now have the top farm in baseball. But they've done it with position players. Not pitchers.

Elias has chosen to put his draft capital into position players. Particularly infielders..

I believe he has done this for a reason.

The odds of a top pitching draft prospect becoming a regular major league player are considerably lower than the odds of a top draft position player. And the higher a player is drafted, the larger this differential becomes.

So stockpiling position players and trading them later for arms who have some of the risk assumed and vetted by other teams would seem to be a sound strategy.

Particularly if you've created yourself the luxury of stacking the farm with multi-layer position player redundancy. (by tanking for long enough to build the number 1 farm in baseball)

So what's left to learn, is how effective Elias will be at understanding which players to keep, and which players to deal... and how to maximize the return for those players

 

Everything you say I understand and do not dispute. I think my point was that the Rays have churned out elite pitching over the last 16 or so years, despite loosing their front office and on field leadership. That is what keeps them competitive despite their lowered spending.

I don’t think it’s anything wrong with acquiring talent the way Elias has. It actually makes a lot of sense. 
 

And as you stated above, now comes the part where Elias has to figure out how to turn the excess/abundance into starting pitching for the Orioles that will allow us to defeat our competitors (like the Rays) when it counts most. 
 

I’m hopeful but by no means optimistic (given our ownership). This will be the hardest part of Elias’ task.

 

[sportsfan8703]

More infielders at the MLB level.  Our lineup versus LHP,

Mateo R CF

Adley S DH

Santander S RF

Mountcastle R 1B

Hays LF 

Westburg R SS

Urias R 3B

Norby R 2B

McCann R C

Bench: Gunnar, Frazier, Mullins, Mckenna

[Bemorewins]

19 minutes ago, sportsfan8703 said:

More infielders at the MLB level.  Our lineup versus LHP,

Mateo R CF

Adley S DH

Santander S RF

Mountcastle R 1B

Hays LF 

Westburg R SS

Urias R 3B

Norby R 2B

McCann R C

Bench: Gunnar, Frazier, Mullins, Mckenna

Is Gunnar your top prospect and the top prospect in baseball going to be relegated to being a platoon player? While we move our best SS (who is GG caliber) to unfamiliar territory in CF. Why would we do this? To crowd our Major League roster even more? 
 

Brining up more positional prospects to take away ABs from our higher rated prospect is NOT going to solve our pitching issues.