The Ringer: Orioles Losers at Deadline

[Oriole1940]

One of my daughters who has lived in the St Louis metro all her life and knows more baseball than  many  fans,  visited the last few days and said, Flaherty is okay but was not at all upset he has left  the Cards.  And as she says they really need Pitching.  She attends many Cards games and  is very knowledgeable.  Seems to think he is not a needle mover.  Maybe the Orioles coaches can Fix him.          

[DirtyBird]

Weren't we losers at last year's deadline according to the experts? And in the offseason too?

[RZNJ]

Right.  We don’t draft the right guys on draft night and don’t make the right moves at the deadline.  Hoping to watch Fuji dominate tonight and Flaherty pitch well tomorrow.   Maybe even watch DL. Hall pitch well the last 6 weeks out of the bullpen.

[Alasdaire]

These winner/loser pieces are written for the casual fan who is looking for a surface-level overview of something that they haven't paid any attention to until this point. They provide next to no unique insight or evidence for their views and the predictions are literally just idle thoughts. Absolutely nothing to be learned here other than what the zeitgeist/conventional wisdom is.

[Tbone83]

As much as I would love to win it all this season, I feel like we are playing with house money in 2023. I was hoping/expecting a wildcard, but now they are in play for the East and maybe the best record in the AL. I was thinking maybe 24 or 25 would be this. They are going to get even better IMO.

So while I wished they would have done more, I am ok with it if they were going to get fleeced. Obviously, eventually prospects are going to have to be dealt. We have a dearth of arms and not enough room for all the position prospects. Hopefully this offseason they find a favorable deal(s) and pull the trigger. And maybe (gasp) even open the wallet and use free agency too.

[Royle]

Not sure if this is behind a paywall, but it kinda hints at some of the issues in Flaherty’s time in St Louis:

“He has spent nearly a decade with St. Louis. He has grown up through this organization. That growth hasn’t been linear. There have been highs, like his emergence as the club’s top pitching prospect and his spectacular second half of 2019 and what began as an early Cy Young contending season in 2021. There have also been lows: the shortened 2020 COVID-19 season that dampened his spark, an oblique strain that derailed his promising 2021 campaign, subsequent shoulder injuries following the oblique injury, public (and private) spats with the front office.

Yet through it all, Flaherty remained committed to winning for his ballclub. His messaging wasn’t always clear — his direct tone, dry nature and sometimes general smartassery didn’t always land with the fan base. But one thing that Flaherty’s teammates and coaches never questioned was his desire to perform. To Flaherty, winning with the Cardinals was his highest priority. And if he is indeed traded, the fact that he didn’t win will be what he regards as the most disappointing.”

https://theathletic.com/4724402/2023/07/26/cardinals-jack-flaherty-trade-deadline/?amp=1

 

 

[Billy F-Face3]

Tonight's game really illuminated our deficiencies and explains why articles like this one exist. Outside of 1 pitcher right now, we have no reliability in the bullpen and we did nothing to address that.

We beat ourselves tonight. And knowing our bullpen could fall apart, we did nothing to address it at the trade deadline so if we lost in the playoffs, it's fair to say we also beat ourselves by failing to fix the bullpen. That's what bothers me the most.