SI.com: O's had one of the worst offseasons of any team

[Old Beta]

As far as Koji, Japanese reporters always flock when they come over. It might be a sep in the right direction but I am not too impressed with the pedigree he brings with him. In the words of Frank Costanza, "How could you give twenty million dollars to Hideki Irabu!"

1. No, they do not always "flock" when they come over. To start with, Iguchi and Taguchi were the first two to play for a WS winner, and they are largely ignored. And Iguchi played for a champion in Japan.

2. Not impressed with eight all-star appearances and two Cy Young equivalents?

3. In the words of former VP Hubert Humphrey, "The right to free speech does not include the right to be taken seriously."

[cjblackbird]

I dont know if my email will end up in his next mail bag but Jon Heyman did respond to my email, very short and sweet:

maybe i did underrate them. sorry, jh

[J.D.]

-Flame Away

Well, since you asked and all...

-Koji (have a real big feeling this isn't going to pan out. A control pitcher who had to be put in the bullpen in japan coming to the AL East where if he catches too much plate balls are going to be blasted into the warehouse quicker than you can say Koji. Color me skeptical And i also dont buy into the fact that this opens up the Pacific Rim Market. This is not a Dice-k, Matsui, Fukudome, Nomo, Irabu or even Kawakami. This is essentially the So Taguchi of Japanese pitchers. Would rather just let Hayden Penn start.)

The guy won two Sawamura awards over there for being their top pitcher. He's one of Japan's most recognizable names as far as pitchers go. He's an absolute star over there. Yes, he's absolutely in that class of star power. He's not at all the So Taguchi of Japanese pitchers. That's actually a pretty weak comparison.

He was sent to the pen in Japan because of injury. Sent back because he had a run of poor starts. He started spotting his fastball and got put right back in the rotation. And once he got put in the rotation, he helped the Giants complete a pretty impressive comeback. So to insinuate that he couldn't hack it as a starter in Japan and had to be sent to the pen isn't at all accurate. He was put there due to injury the first time, and it's speculated that he was put there due to injury a second time.

The irony of you shoveling dirt on him because he's a "control pitcher" when we would've killed for a pitcher last year that threw strikes is not lost on me.

-Mark (Well fart on me and call me smelly if i dont get exited about a journeyman garbage time pitcher.)

I don't really see anyone else getting all antsy in the pantsy about him, either. But all he's here for is to be a mop-up guy. So fine, it's a write off move.

-Rich (Can't throw a strike to save his life. He has some friends named Knoblauch and Ankiel. We are counting on him to be the #3 starter after Koji as the #2 starter. These guys are 4-5's at best. Rich Hill is going to get blown up. I will be amazed if he lasts a month before getting sent out.)

This is so ridiculous I can't even begin to start picking it apart. I pretty much stopped reading it when you stated that Knoblauch couldn't throw a strike (since he played second base and all). I dunno. I guess I'm amused that you'd rather use Hill's 2008 as evidence of him falling apart in a way that only a couple of pitchers have in the past, rather than going with the far more likely "He was injured and it killed his mechanics" explanation.

-Felix (I think he will hit. Just not how you want a corner OF to hit. He is playing out of position in LF. He would be better utilized in CF and probably has better defense and a cannon then Adam. I do like this deal because I did not think Olson was good)

Well, if you like the deal then it counts as a positive, yes? I don't really think he's playing out of position defensively. He may never hit 25 homers in a season, but that doesn't mean that he'll be a poor offensive player, or even a poor offensive corner outfielder.

Wieters- If he starts the year in Baltimore it will be the worst decision the organization could ever make. We need to delay his free agency as long as possible because if he is good as they say he is (and I have no reason to doubt he will be.) then he is going to get a lot of money down the road. And he is not the type to take a Markakis type extension. He will test the waters. We want to delay his service time for as long as possible before he has an opportunity to go play for the Braves, Yankees, Red Sox or someone else.

Thanks for the hyperbole. If he's going to make a lot of money down the line, there's absolutely nothing saying that we won't pay it, and there's nothing saying that he won't sign an extension. You're talking years down the line. I mean, I'm all in favor of starting his service clock later and call him up like Tampa did with Longoria... but if he earns his place on the team this spring then he earns his place on the team. Either way, how does Wieters factor into what we did this off-season? We signed Zaun to bridge the gap till Wieters starts.

Roberts- Glad we are extending him but color me skeptical about how well second basemen age when they aren't juicing. It will be interesting to see with Roberts now that he is off the stuff how he ages.

You say "now" like he just kicked it. The steroid thing with Roberts should be pretty irrelevant at this point. He'll age like a second baseman will age. He'll probably be just okay in the last year of his deal. Right now, he's one of the better second basemen in the game, and one of the better lead-off hitters as well. You gotta pay to keep that talent around, and the trade market wasn't exactly hopping for him.

Izturis- I hate him. His glove is over-rated and bat is atrocious.

I guess we don't give players chances anymore? He's better than Fahey/Castro/Cintron, which would be the textbook definition of an upgrade. It's not like we broke the bank for him. We have, at the very least, some stability there. I'm sure you have something to back up your "his glove is over-rated" claim?

Wiggy- Utility player that mashed into the Crawford boxes. Enough said.

And hit very well in Tampa as well. But let's ignore that to make your point. He's a better player than anyone we had coming off the bench last year. Hell, at the very least, he's an upgrade offensively over Millar. None of these moves are HUGE, but they're each upgrades over what was there last season.

All and all I give the offseason a solid D. We got essentially one thing accomplished and that was locking up Markakis. Too much dead weight all ovr this team. And i shudder to think who is going to pitch 4 spots every rotation turn.

The team upgraded a lot of weak spots, and at least brought in a lot of competition for those last spots. Not sure what all you wanted them to do, but you're going the completely pessimistic route on each of these guys already anyway. Would you rather them have stood pat? Re-signed Millar, not acquired Hill and Uehara and just kinda guessed at what the other 4 spots would be? They made a lot of little moves that, while none amazing, combined should improve the team next year.

And they certainly had a better off-season than a lot of the teams ahead of them. The Blue Jays specifically.

[Lucky Jim]

I agree its not a good way to look at it, but it is a way it can be viewed. I never said I thought it was a rational way to view things, just that this was how he was looking at it.

Heyman is essentially saying:

The offseason is the time when you set up your team to contend for the next season. He's then giving out a grade based on which team is most ready to contend for next season. He's ignoring the distance a team has to climb to be able to contend next season and also how many resources that team has to attempt to climb that mountain. Its a strictly results based system.

Look at it this way. There are 30 guys in November and each of them wants to be able to bench 300 lbs by April. Each of these guys start at different levels, and are differently sized guys. For the 285 lb guy who can already bench 350, even if he doesn't do any work over the offseason, he's set up pretty well to bench 300 lbs come April. For the 165 lb guy who can put up 225, no matter how much work he does, he's not gonna be lifting 300 lbs by April.

Heyman is assigning his grades based on how much each guy can lift in April, not in how much work each did between November and April. He doesn't care how big you are or how much you could lift in November, just what you lift come April.

Its an almost useless analysis, and I'd definitely agree that it is unfair to give "offseason" grades based on how ready you are to compete the next year, baseball is far more complicated than that. But that is how he chose to approach it.

You'll still need to explain how losing Adam Dunn (and not even getting picks for him) and signing Willie Tavares to lead off for you is a productive offseason. In this instance, he's actually rewarding the Reds for getting farther away from contending.

[J.D.]

Here is what I know...If he said we had one of the top 10 offseasons and were moving in the right direction, people would be saying how great this article is.

You can't seriously sit there and tell me that his article is accurate, well-thought out, well-researched, took more than 20 minutes to write, wasn't done after waking up from a nap and realizing he was up against deadline, shows an in-depth knowledge about a subject he's being paid to have an in-depth knowledge about, and a list of other things. That's without responding to the whole sterotyping how you think people would react.

[Tx Oriole]

John Heyman puts the O's at 25th out of the 30 teams with this little number:

John Heyman, while the team won't necessarily be making waves this season, you're a clueless, clueless man. All in all, this has been a pretty darn good offseason in terms of getting pieces in place to make that next step.

Waht do you expect from SI? I really am not surprised when SI or ESPN puts the O's down. I am really not surprised by their attitude towards the O's.

[Lucky Jim]

Here is what I know...If he said we had one of the top 10 offseasons and were moving in the right direction, people would be saying how great this article is.

A bit of a strawman here. He didn't. We didn't.

In fact, if I remember correctly, most of us discount the excessively favorable reviews of our moves.

I think asking folks to do a bit of research, pay attention to what's important, and write an article that marshals both into something informative is fair. Heyman falls well short of the mark.

[Woody Held]

Sporting News ranked the Orioles off season as a B-. They still ranked them at the bottom of the AL east but liked what they did this offseason.

[J.D.]

Sporting News ranked the Orioles off season as a B-. They still ranked them at the bottom of the AL east but liked what they did this offseason.

I'm having a really hard time accepting that the Orioles' off-season was worse than Toronto's.

[millartime15]

I'm having a really hard time accepting that the Orioles' off-season was worse than Toronto's.

Yea seriously.

They did absolutely nothing to improve their team.

They got worse. The Jays lost Burnett to FA and Marcum to an injury this year.

Their big FA signing was Kevin Millar, and their big trade was for Matt Bush.

[Orioles West]

A bit of a strawman here. He didn't. We didn't.

In fact, if I remember correctly, most of us discount the excessively favorable reviews of our moves.

I think asking folks to do a bit of research, pay attention to what's important, and write an article that marshals both into something informative is fair. Heyman falls well short of the mark.

Bingo.

I think most O's fans think our off-season was in the middle of the pack at best. Some nice moves with some nice upside, but the team still has a number of holes.

-Don

[Why Not?]

I don't see why it can't be done in one article. You could say what needs to be said about each team in just a couple paragraphs. You couldn't go into lotsa details, but you could say what's important and give the gist of it. I don't think the problem is how many paragraphs you have, it's whether you say the right stuff in those paragraphs.

Giving the gist of it winds up being pretty worthless. I've never seen this kind of attempt done well.

[Shellax]

I'm having a really hard time accepting that the Orioles' off-season was worse than Toronto's.

I believe they graded Toronto's offseason with an F-. I don't have the mag in front of me but this was by far the worst grade given to any team.

[Slappy]

Wow, I was surprised by how many people took offense to that ranking. While I don't necessarily think we rank that low, I certainly wouldn't have put us above middle of the pack. There is some light for the O's, but it's all potential at this point - there are no guarantees and a real risk for guys like Pie, Jones, and Hill to not pan out. Even Wieters carries no warranty. There is very little proven production on this team outside of RF, 2B, and (maybe) 1B.

Compare this offseason to someone like the Yankees, who got one of the best *proven* hitters in the game (Tex) and one of the best *proven* pitchers (CC). Or Tampa who signed Burrell to an already solid lineup. We didn't really do that much to improve our hitting or our pitching FOR 2009. He's not that far off here, really.

[Mackus]

Wow, I was surprised by how many people took offense to that ranking. While I don't necessarily think we rank that low, I certainly wouldn't have put us above middle of the pack. There is some light for the O's, but it's all potential at this point - there are no guarantees and a real risk for guys like Pie, Jones, and Hill to not pan out. Even Wieters carries no warranty. There is very little proven production on this team outside of RF, 2B, and (maybe) 1B.

Compare this offseason to someone like the Yankees, who got one of the best *proven* hitters in the game (Tex) and one of the best *proven* pitchers (CC). Or Tampa who signed Burrell to an already solid lineup. We didn't really do that much to improve our hitting or our pitching FOR 2009. He's not that far off here, really.

Thats the key to your point. You, and Heyman, are talking about 2009. Obviously the Orioles would rank lowly because nobody in the organization really cares that much about 2009. We signed a few stop gaps to remain respectable, but we didn't sign anybody to long term deals we felt might hurt us down the road, like Looper. The Orioles had a very good offseason for what their plan is. Its just not the same plan that Jon Heyman thinks every team should have.