Ohtani Rental?

[Number5]

55 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:

Maybe there is something I’m not considering?

The blister.

[waroriole]

1 minute ago, Number5 said:

I'd probably agree with this had Ohtani not recently come out and say that he regrets not having done his homework to find out just how bad the Angels were before signing with them.  That certainly gives off a negative vibe as to whether he re-signs with them IMO.

I must have missed that. 

[Number5]

3 minutes ago, Orioles0615 said:

Nail on the head. A) top 100 guys fail all the time B) With how this team is developing any top 100 guys we lose can be replaced. Fabian, Beavers, Bradley could all be in there one day. 

This idea of trading away good prospects at less than their value because we have a lot of good prospects is a recipe for failure.  

[Bemorewins]

19 minutes ago, Number5 said:

The blister.

Is the blister going to prevent him for pitching the rest of the season? If we were to bring in Ohtani, we can afford to skip him for a start or 2 and just put him at DH while the blister heals.

He is SO MUCH BETTER of a hitter than anybody that we currently have and ANYBODY available on the market.

[Number5]

12 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:

Is the blister going to prevent him for pitching the rest of the season?

I don't know.  Do you?

[waroriole]

6 minutes ago, Number5 said:

I don't know.  Do you?

I would assume the Angels aren’t handing out a prorated discount based on the number of games he may miss due to a blister. 

Edited July 25, 2023 by waroriole

[Orioles0615]

35 minutes ago, Number5 said:

This idea of trading away good prospects at less than their value because we have a lot of good prospects is a recipe for failure.  

And so is the idea of every prospect is going to work out and hoarding them in the minors forever. No one is asking to tarde Holiday, Kjerstad, Cowser, Or Westburg (unless the Braves feel like dumping Acuna) 

 

But moving Ortiz, Norby, Hall, Basallo or lesser guys for players who can help us win the world series will not hurt us

[Number5]

1 minute ago, Orioles0615 said:

And so is the idea of every prospect is going to work out and hoarding them in the minors forever. No one is asking to tarde Holiday, Kjerstad, Cowser, Or Westburg (unless the Braves feel like dumping Acuna) 

 

But moving Ortiz, Norby, Hall, Basallo or lesser guys for players who can help us win the world series will not hurt us

But not 5 of them for 2 months of one guy.  Posters that are against giving away half of our top ten prospects for one guy are NOT against trading prospects -- they are against being taken to the cleaners.  Of course the Angels and other sellers want to extract as big a price as possible for their rental players.  That doesn't mean other teams will be stupid.  Bottom line is the Angels will receive a comp pick when he walks if they can't work out a deal for Ohtani.  If they're happy with that, just keep him through the season and turn down legitimate trade offers of greater than that.

[Number5]

10 minutes ago, Orioles0615 said:

And so is the idea of every prospect is going to work out and hoarding them in the minors forever. No one is asking to tarde Holiday, Kjerstad, Cowser, Or Westburg (unless the Braves feel like dumping Acuna) 

 

But moving Ortiz, Norby, Hall, Basallo or lesser guys for players who can help us win the world series will not hurt us

Downvoting a poster because you disagree with him is petty.  Convversation over.

[Bemorewins]

I heard on MLB network radio on the drive in to work this morning that the Angels said they do not want to trade him to a direct competitor (which means no Dodgers and no AL West). Their preference is to trade him to a team who will not be able to sign him in the offseason, thus they will still have a good chance at resigning him.

It looks like things are lining up for us with him nicely.

I know some of you do not want to trade ANY prospects with good value. And I get it some of you are VERY attached to these guys who you have invested a lot of hope in (especially while the O's were terrible.) But there comes a time when decisive action is required if you want to be great. The Astros did this time again AND the Dodgers as well.

I am not saying that we should go after Ohtani (at any costs). Heck I go back and forth about the proposition in my mind daily.

But there are some things that are influencing me to now lean in that direction.

1) We are the best team in the AL with a legit shot at making a World Series run with a few roster improvements. IMO we need another starter (a very good one - which Ohtani is) and we need a reliable bullpen arm to be able to give us the ability to hold down the 7- 9th innings (that is almost a requirement in order to advance in the postseason).

2) I now do not believe that the cost to acquire Ohtani will be as expensive/prohibitive as some fear (I did as well). There's no way the Angels are getting a Holliday/Kjerstad/Cowser guy. In order for this to occur that would have to be similar bids/offers out there. I do not think that is the case, especially if the Dodgers are eliminated from the buyer's list. LAD are the only team in the game who have a farm system better than ours (higher rated - more top 100 prospects). Even if the Angels were entertain them as bidders under Friedman that is not how the Dodgers operate. They value their prospects especially their top level ones, as high as anyone. I can't see them being willing to trade 3-5 top 100 guys for 2 months of Ohtani. They are not facing a window that is closing. They have A+ stars in their prime and are likely to be in similar form for the next few years. Plus their future is extremely bright with all the young talent that they posses. Also, if they want Ohtani, they can simply wait until the offseason and then get him as an FA without surrendering any of their valuable org assets/prospects. Now I know some of you believe because you have been told the Yankees are players for Ohtani. While historically they have been able to make such moves, in 2023 they simply do not have the organizational talent to pull off such a thing. They are an old/expensive roster of stars and scrubs with as I count them only 3 attractive tradable organizational assets (Volpe and 2 top 100 propsects). That's right they only have TWO top 100 prospects. Now some might say they would just give them all away, but the problem with that is they would be in essence nuking their future for 2 months of Ohtani and then they would surrender ALL of the leverage to him to have to resign him as they would have nothing left. Even in that scenario in 2023 the Mets have a much bigger financial war chest than the Yankees could ever dream of (check out Cohen's worth compared to Steinbrenner's). That leaves teams like the D-backs, Reds, and Rays as our major competitors for Ohtani's services. The Reds have the prospects to do this but I'm not sure that they have the desire, given that they would not be a favorite to come out of the NL even with Ohtani (because of the Dodgers and Braves). I didn't list the Braves because they do not have the farm system with only 1 current top 100 prospect).

3) Ohtani changes our team in so many positive ways. Even if the blister is an issue and we have to skip him for a start or two, when he does get on the mound he becomes our best starting pitcher. Plus, if we retain all of our current 5 starters with him, we have the flexibility to go with a 6 man rotation for a while thus lightening the innings load on guys like Grayson and Wells (even Bradish to a degree) who have never logged these kind of innings before. As a hitter, Ohtani instantly becomes our best by far! He has more home runs than double our best guy and could very well hit 60 this year. Imagine a lineup of Gunnar, Adley, and Ohtani hitting 1-3. We instantly catapult to one of the ELITE offenses in the game. (We are good now top 8ish, but with Ohtani we would be top 3ish).

4) Think about the increase revenue he would generate. There would be a buzz and juice in this city/community as we would be the center of the baseball universe after making such a trade. I can almost guarantee that ticket sales would go way up. Plus if we were to advance to the World Series think of all the extra revenue that would generate. We would more than make up for the 10 million that we would owe for the rest of his contract this season.

These are some things that I believe are worth considering.

[Bemorewins]

19 minutes ago, Number5 said:

I don't know.  Do you?

I'm very tempted to find out. Especially if the price is right, which I believe it will be especially if the Angels are eliminating the Dodgers from the list as has been reported.

If he can't pitch for a few starts, he still hits WAY BETTER than anyone on our team currently.

[Bemorewins]

54 minutes ago, Number5 said:

This idea of trading away good prospects at less than their value because we have a lot of good prospects is a recipe for failure.  

This may have some truth to it. But when you have duplicate prospects but holes in the Big League roster, I do not think it is unsound reasoning to consider trading some of the good (not great) duplicate prospects for a rental.

I know some people want to retain players like Ortiz and Norby for just in case scenarios in order to continue to hedge our bets and hold even longer for the unknown future. (I'm not accusing you of this, but I have heard this logic consistently from some on this site.) But I disagree with this use of valuable assets.

Ortiz and the Orioles are mutually better served by him being valued as an everyday starting INF as opposed to a back-up/super utility (when none of the other guys need to regularly be replaced as they are all higher rated/more talented players than him), or whatever ancillary role we want to come up with. The same applies to Norby, Prieto, and possiblly Westburg (if the Orioles would rather keep Ortiz than him). IMO there is only ONE place for one of them to start and get regular ABs. (No the Orioles are not and should not platoon guys like Holliday and Henderson or Westburg/Ortiz, IMO that would be a gross underutilization of a prime asset.) So why not consider moving some of those pieces players, who while not good enough to start here could be sent elsewhere to do well and in return retrieve us a player who can make a difference for us as we make a legit run to the World Series?

These windows are not guarantee or promised in the future and shouldn't be taken lightly.

[Number5]

Just now, Bemorewins said:

I'm very tempted to find out. Especially if the price is right, which I believe it will be especially if the Angels are eliminating the Dodgers from the list as has been reported.

If he can't pitch for a few starts, he still hits WAY BETTER than anyone on our team currently.

Ohtani is certainly a star player.  I just think we need to attempt to measure what adding him would bring us vs. the cost.  If he can pitch in 10 games, how much would that likely change our win total?  Please remember, we aren't likely to lose all 10 of those games as things stand now, are we?  It is also doubtful that we would win all 10 of those games if we were able to acquire him.  I'm guessing he might give us 2 additional wins in those games, if we're lucky.  His bat would also certainly help us, but, again, how many more wins would that translate to versus trading a more reasonable package for other rentals?  I'm not against trading for Ohtani, or anyone that can help us, but I'm against massively overpaying.  I trust Elias and his team to make these assessments and  pull the trigger on the deal(s) that make sense.

[Bemorewins]

3 minutes ago, Number5 said:

Ohtani is certainly a star player.  I just think we need to attempt to measure what adding him would bring us vs. the cost.  If he can pitch in 10 games, how much would that likely change our win total?  Please remember, we aren't likely to lose all 10 of those games as things stand now, are we?  It is also doubtful that we would win all 10 of those games if we were able to acquire him.  I'm guessing he might give us 2 additional wins in those games, if we're lucky.  His bat would also certainly help us, but, again, how many more wins would that translate to versus trading a more reasonable package for other rentals?  I'm not against trading for Ohtani, or anyone that can help us, but I'm against massively overpaying.  I trust Elias and his team to make these assessments and  pull the trigger on the deal(s) that make sense.

I'm against overpaying as well, but it looks like now in all likelihood we will not have to.

When you look at expected wins there are stats like WAR that can give you some relative predicative value about "how many wins a player would be worth" as opposed to another. The ting with WAR though, I think it downgrades Ohtani because he is a primarily DH and doesn't play the field often (because of the need to protect him so that he can pitch).

But to you larger point, we would not be acquiring him for the regular season wins solely. But it would be for his potential tremendous impact in the postseason. That's where he would make the greatest difference, when we are facing the best of the best and yet his talent outshines them all. In other words, we are fine for the regular season running out Gibson or Kremer or whatever league average player against the competition because there is a variance in the skill/talent of our opponents over the course of the season. But when you get to October all opponents are elite and thus the more elite talent that you have the better chances that you give yourself to succeed. 

[Billy F-Face3]

4 hours ago, Bemorewins said:

When you look at players like Norby and Ortiz, though very good prospects and potentially fine Major Leaguers one day, they really have no place on the Orioles long term. At best they would be back ups most likely or utility players. Though an argument can be made that the O’s could keep one and trade Westburg instead.

Either way they are excess. Maybe you don’t trade them for Ohtani. But you should be strongly considering moving them for somebody. In the case of Ortiz, he is already 25 and likely into his prime years, but will never be better than Holliday (even though he is 5 1/2 years older). 

IMO it makes little sense to hold on to ever single “top 100” just for the sake of holding on to them. 

It’s time for us to discontinue with hedging and we need to begin making some decisions. The Orioles have a legitimate shot at going to the World Series this season. You don’t play around, pass, or punt on that because you are afraid that someone who won’t be able to find a place here might go on to be good elsewhere. 

IMO all of the lower top 100 guys (not named Holliday, Kjerstad, Cowser, and probably Mayo) are replaceable. With the way we have drafted and developed over the last 4/5 years and with the emphasis on international development, we will be able to replace all of them. 

IMO, you cannot replace “special” but you can replace good. 

Well said!