Fangraphs’ Ben Clemens: “C’mon Orioles, Do Something!”

[foxfield]

18 minutes ago, wildcard said:

Sound like a lot of arrogance from Clemens.  Last year Elias added Gibson, Frazier and Irvin and everyone told him he didn't do enough.    And the O's won 101 games.  This offseason Elias adds Kimbrel and left Gibson, Frazier, Hick, Flaherty and Fuji go and Clemens says he has not done enough.

Maybe Clemens should shut up and consider that Elias knows what he is doing or at least praise Elias for opening space of his blue chip prospects.

Wildcard is the unquestionably one of our most optimistic posters. But this is spot on. 

[NCRaven]

44 minutes ago, deward said:

The thing is, it doesn't matter if Montgomery isn't peak Verlander. It only matters if he's a meaningful upgrade from Cole Irvin at the moment. Or Kremer, or Means. If he is, then he's worth the market rate. Clemen's main point here, and he's 100% correct, is that Elias will most likely NEVER have a better nexus of MLB-ready talent and low payroll than he has right now. If he won't, or can't, take advantage of this opportunity, then something will have been lost that he can't get back. Having a group of guys this talented, all arriving at once so that they're this cheap, is in no way a scenario that is guaranteed to repeat again, even if they go through another rebuild.  If he, or Angelos, isn't willing to push for a title under these circumstances, then when will they ever?

I understand both your and Clemens' points.  I'm just saying that Elias may not see 4 years of Montgomery or anyone else that is available as a significant upgrade over the internal options that are available.  I would probably disagree with Elias, but so far, that seems to be the case.

[Sports Guy]

He’s 100% right.

[RZNJ]

3 minutes ago, foxfield said:

No it hasn’t. But it might this year so….

Right.  So the talk about hoarding prospects might make more sense IF and when Norby, Ortiz, Cowser, and Kjerstad start the year in AAA instead of somewhere in the majors.

[Frobby]

 

34 minutes ago, wildcard said:

Sound like a lot of arrogance from Clemens.  Last year Elias added Gibson, Frazier and Irvin and everyone told him he didn't do enough.    And the O's won 101 games.  This offseason Elias adds Kimbrel and left Gibson, Frazier, Hick, Flaherty and Fuji go and Clemens says he has not done enough.

Letting people go isn’t exactly an affirmative act.  He’s added Kimbrel and made a couple of other minor moves like Hilliard.   So he hasn’t done much, and even Elias said at the beginning of the offseason that he wanted to add a starting pitcher, hopefully one that could slot in our top 3.  

The winter isn’t over yet, but if Elias did nothing more I’d be very disappointed   That disappointment may or may not correlate to how the team does in 2024, so I won’t freak out about it.   Elias has earned the benefit of the doubt, and it’s not like we don’t have decent options for our rotation.  But I’d be happy if Elias accomplished his own stated goal for buttressing the rotation.  
 

Edited January 18 by Frobby

[Sports Guy]

I’m glad that because it happened last year, it will definitely happen this year.  Guess we can skip right to October!

[RZNJ]

1 minute ago, Sports Guy said:

I’m glad that because it happened last year, it will definitely happen this year.  Guess we can skip right to October!

Last season was too much fun.  I don’t want to skip to October.

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, Sports Guy said:

I’m glad that because it happened last year, it will definitely happen this year.  Guess we can skip right to October!

I'd like to see more than three games this year.

[interloper]

29 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Pretty sure no one is saying that we should just give the White Sox whatever.

More like, hey, how about you stop hoarding guys that can't get out of AAA?

The guys that are stuck in AAA are the guys these teams don't want, despite their high prospect ranking - guys like Ortiz, Norby, Stowers, etc - because they're obssessed with the higher tier guys.

The guys they want are new to AAA like Holliday or Mayo, or pre-AAA like Basallo. Or they want the guys we have graduated like Cowser and Kjerstad. 

So... look, the other team has to accept the guys we are "hoarding", and they simply are not. That doesn't mean we should inflate our offer. Either teams accept fair value in return or we "hoard" our guys another 6 months and try again. 

Just because we have the pieces does not means we should give up anything less than exactly what we value those pieces at. 

Edited January 18 by interloper

[Roll Tide]

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/cmon-orioles-do-something/

I think a lot of people are basically feeling this way.

[kidrock]

I like Elias, I have faith.  I totally get being annoyed that they haven't done much outside of Kimbrel.  But at the end of the day, even if Elias does absolutely nothing, its just so hard to be really mad.  He turned a dumpster fire of an org into a really respectable org without spending nearly as much money as other.

[Frobby]

1 minute ago, interloper said:

The guys that are stuck in AAA are the guys these teams don't want, despite their high prospect ranking - guys like Ortiz, Norby, Stowers, etc - because they're obssessed with the higher tier guys.

The guys they want are new to AAA like Holliday or Mayo, or pre-AAA like Basallo. Or they want the guys we have graduated like Cowser and Kjerstad. 

So... look, the other team has to accept the guys we are "hoarding", and they simply are not. That doesn't mean we should inflate our offer. Either teams accept fair value in return or we "hoard" our guys another 6 months and try again. 

Just because we have the pieces does not means we should give up anything less than exactly what we value those pieces at. 

I do think we are reaching the point with some of these guys where we should trade them for younger prospects if we aren’t going to play them.  Because their trade value is going to drop if they just sit in AAA all year.   Ortiz and Stowers are two who come to mind.  Of course, I’d prefer that they either get a chance to play here or are traded for major league talent we can use, but if that’s not in the cards, I think trading for younger guys may be the next best choice.  

[Can_of_corn]

6 minutes ago, interloper said:

The guys that are stuck in AAA are the guys these teams don't want, despite their high prospect ranking - guys like Ortiz, Norby, Stowers, etc - because they're obssessed with the higher tier guys.

The guys they want are new to AAA like Holliday or Mayo, or pre-AAA like Basallo. Or they want the guys we have graduated like Cowser and Kjerstad. 

So... look, the other team has to accept the guys we are "hoarding", and they simply are not. That doesn't mean we should inflate our offer. Either teams accept fair value in return or we "hoard" our guys another 6 months and try again. 

Just because we have the pieces does not means we should give up anything less than exactly what we value those pieces at. 

The question I have is are they accurately valuing those pieces?

 

[interloper]

Just now, Frobby said:

I do think we are reaching the point with some of these guys where we should trade them for younger prospects if we aren’t going to play them.  Because their trade value is going to drop if they just sit in AAA all year.   Ortiz and Stowers are two who come to mind.  Of course, I’d prefer that they either get a chance to play here or are traded for major league talent we can use, but if that’s not in the cards, I think trading for younger guys may be the next best choice.  

Yeah, and I think we'll start to see that happen if the logjam really becomes untennable and/or when these guys run out of options. 

[Jim'sKid26]

Is his next blog post going to be directed at the White Sox front office. It takes two to tango...