TT: It's time to bring up Colton Cowser

[owknows]

Actually, Santander's most interesting deficiency is that he doesn't seem to be able to hit at Camden Yards.

His road stats are pretty amazing.

[Spy Fox]

5 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

No I’m not. I’m saying he doesn’t deserve everyday at bats and we can afford to take a few games a week from him.

He’s not good enough to play everyday.  Been saying this for a while. This isn’t new. 

We now have highly ranked prospects putting up video game numbers who can not only come up to raise the ceiling of the offense but also the defense.

AS isn’t a guy that should stop that.

SG, I'm down with some of what you're saying about bringing up Cowser and spreading the playing time around a bit more, but claims like this are just nonsensical. 

Santander is good enough to play everyday on every team in the league. Every team in MLB would be playing him 5+ times a week. 

[Sports Guy]

13 minutes ago, Spy Fox said:

SG, I'm down with some of what you're saying about bringing up Cowser and spreading the playing time around a bit more, but claims like this are just nonsensical. 

Santander is good enough to play everyday on every team in the league. Every team in MLB would be playing him 5+ times a week. 

Sure..4-5 times a week, that’s what I’m saying. I said he would get most of the DH playing time. But im not playing him 6-7 times a week. That’s all I’m saying.

The at bats have to come from somewhere. Mullins has earned the everyday, so he’s not going anywhere. 
 

So, we either continue to play fringe everyday players everyday or we bring up stud prospects who are putting up stupid numbers and have those guys take at bats away from those fringe everyday players and raise the ceiling of the team.

I will say, the huge issue with this is that AS apparently can’t play first. I do admit that screw’s things up because RM is another guy who has no business getting 600+ at bats.

Edited May 15, 2023 by Sports Guy

[Aristotelian]

I'd like to see Stowers get a bit more run, including vs some LHP's, especially now that McKenna is banged up. If Stowers continues what he's doing, time to see Cowser. 

Something like a rotation of:

Adley C, Santander DH, Hays RF, Cowser LF

Adley DH, Santander/Hays RF, Cowser/Hays LF

Santander, Cowser, and Hays each rest about once a week until somebody stops hitting. McKenna goes to traditional sub role, with an occasional start to spell Mullins or Cowser. Basically Cowser would take over the role we thought Stowers would have coming in this year. 

 

[Pickles]

24 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

Funny how defensive stats and Baseball Savant are only relevant to certain players. “Crappy” Santander is in the 86th percentile in jumps and 60th percentile in OAA this year.

Claiming his defense has been crappy, when he just made the catch of the year to save Wells the other night, had another nice running catch in the game, and made a big play in the gap to hold the runner to first on the single allowed by Cano in the 8th, is likewise, not in touch with reality.

[Bahama O's Fan]

27 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

I'd like to see Stowers get a bit more run, including vs some LHP's, especially now that McKenna is banged up. If Stowers continues what he's doing, time to see Cowser. 

Something like a rotation of:

Adley C, Santander DH, Hays RF, Cowser LF

Adley DH, Santander/Hays RF, Cowser/Hays LF

Santander, Cowser, and Hays each rest about once a week until somebody stops hitting. McKenna goes to traditional sub role, with an occasional start to spell Mullins or Cowser. Basically Cowser would take over the role we thought Stowers would have coming in this year. 

 

This is kinda what I was thinking. Right now, when Santander DH's, we are going to be stuck with either McKenna, Vavra or Frazier in RF-Yuck! Those starts could go to Cowser and that's 3 or more a week. When Santander is resting (once a week), that start can go to Cowser. When Santander plays RF and someone other than Adley is DH'ing (O'hearn, Frazier, Vavra), that start or two could go to Cowser. 

[Sports Guy]

27 minutes ago, Pickles said:

Claiming his defense has been crappy, when he just made the catch of the year to save Wells the other night, had another nice running catch in the game, and made a big play in the gap to hold the runner to first on the single allowed by Cano in the 8th, is likewise, not in touch with reality.

You mean the catch that he made look harder than it was?

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

Well yea, those saying we should send down Stowers for Cowser are being over the top.  Cowser should be up to take PT from other vets and we just keep evaluating Stowers.

Let’s assume that you can’t have your way, and the O’s are only willing to have one of Stowers or Cowser on the team right now.  In that scenario, would you prefer to stick with Stowers for now, or switch to Cowser?   And if the former, how much more run would you give Stowers before switching them out?

[Pickles]

2 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

You mean the catch that he made look harder than it was?

You mean the Stowser Special?  LOL.

That was a fine catch Santader made.  He's not graceful, and so it wasn't pretty, but that was not a case of him running around in a circle and diving into the wall at the last second.

He also made two other nice plays that evening.  As RZNJ pointed out, by your own preferred defensive metrics, he's considered above average.

So how do you square that with calling his defense "crappy?"

[Tony-OH]

1 hour ago, RZNJ said:

Funny how defensive stats and Baseball Savant are only relevant to certain players. “Crappy” Santander is in the 86th percentile in jumps and 60th percentile in OAA this year.

Santander has really improved his defense this year in right field and that improvement suggests he may not have been fully healthy last year. The improvements in jumps and OAA in RF has been impressive. His poor play in Boston hurt him early on but that was playing LF. Outside of 2021, Santander has always been pretty good in RF. It's LF that he has the most problems. Not everyone can jump back and forth and as someone who played all three outfield positions well into adult baseball life, I can tell you, the angles are definitely different and not everyone can handle moving back and forth. And that's not with guys hitting 100 mph + line drives all over the place.

[Aristotelian]

3 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

You mean the catch that he made look harder than it was?

The xBA on that one was .560. Wasn't the most fluid route but that was a good play at a key moment. 

[Sports Guy]

Just now, Frobby said:

Let’s assume that you can’t have your way, and the O’s are only willing to have one of Stowers or Cowser on the team right now.  In that scenario, would you prefer to stick with Stowers for now, or switch to Cowser?   And if the former, how much more run would you give Stowers before switching them out?

I would take Cowser right now if I could only have 1.

Part of the appeal of Cowser is that he raises the bar on defense, whether it’s RF or LF.

Stowers defense, I feel, is fine but it’s probably not an upgrade over Hays. It’s probably better than Santander over a real sample size.

But, at least according to the reports, I feel Cowser is a definitive upgrade out there.  Our OF defense, all of them, cost us in April. The hot start could have been better with better OF defense and some of the pitching numbers would look better.

Even if those guys have looked better this month (believe the numbers say they have), I still don’t believe in their defense over a full season.

 

 

 

[Sports Guy]

4 minutes ago, Pickles said:

You mean the Stowser Special?  LOL.

That was a fine catch Santader made.  He's not graceful, and so it wasn't pretty, but that was not a case of him running around in a circle and diving into the wall at the last second.

He also made two other nice plays that evening.  As RZNJ pointed out, by your own preferred defensive metrics, he's considered above average.

So how do you square that with calling his defense "crappy?"

I’ll give that he has looked better lately. I still don’t believe in him long term out there.  
 

As for that catch, he took a bad route, got all twisted and mistimed his jump. He made it look harder than it was. End of the day, he caught it and that’s all that matters but that was not as difficult of a play as he turned it into. 

 

[Bemorewins]

1 hour ago, Pickles said:

I'm not concerned about rushing him.

I want to know if he's better than Hays or Santander right now.

Everyone was very confident Stowers would be an upgrade.

(Narrator: He wasn't.)

Now after ten games he's to be jettisoned for the next prospect.

This is not how you develop players.

There is VERY LITTLE chance that Cowser comes up and is better than either Hays or Santander right now as they are experience Major League hitters. He like most young guys will have his struggles. However, the bar is pretty low regarding what we have gotten out of that LH DH/sub outfielder spot with the likes of Stowers, Varva, and O'Hearn. I think he can give you more quality ABs than what those 3 have given (which is right next to zilch).

Cowser is the far superior prospect/talent/player compared to Stowers. And his Major League development should be considered much more of a priority to the org.

[Sports Guy]

4 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

The xBA on that one was .560. Wasn't the most fluid route but that was a good play at a key moment. 

That stat is kind of bs. Mounty had one earlier in that game that had an xBA of like 720. 
 

The ball was hit 100MPh..that’s hard but not crazy hard like Stanton for example.

The xBA doesn’t give credence to where the ball is hit I don’t believe. It’s just the exit velo. 

You can smash a ball at 120 MPh but if it’s right to a defender, they should make the play. 

That ball wasn’t one where AS needed it to be that hard. 
 

I’m not saying it was some easy, lazy flyball play but he made it look harder than it was.