My biggest question entering the season

[RZNJ]

31 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

That would be hilarious, but it resolved to Denver, CO.

Funny.  The profile said Alaska.

[Hallas]

4 hours ago, Phil Beckett said:

I’m sure there’s some. Are you saying there were none? And I guess you’re defending the fact that we have one of the leagues lowest payrolls.
 

But no one has told me why we have one of the leagues lowest payrolls.

 

This is on top of the fact that I don’t like the fact that we’re keeping some of these prospects down in the minors and playing some of the scrubs we have.

Bring up the young kids and let them play! They couldn’t do any worse than Joey ortiz, right?

Why?  Because we had 5 high-level contributing players graduate in the past 2-3 years, and all of them are still making the league minimum.  Westburg - playing like an all-star.  Cowser - slumping and running into bad luck but playing like a ROY candidate.  Gunnar - playing like an MVP.  Adley - playing like an all-star at a position that's hard to fill.  Grayson - playing like a solid #2 starter.  What scrubs are we playing?  Mullins?  He's here for defense and he's had more days off.  Hays?  He's been buried in the bench with Cowser playing well.  Urias?  He's buried deeper than Hays is.  Mateo is playing well to make up for Holliday flopping early.  Oh, and lets not forget that Adley made more than his payroll number last year, and will again this year alongside Gunnar, because of the MLB pre-arb bonus pool, which doesn't appear to be calculated in the team's salary.

 

The only scrubs we have  are in the bullpen.  We can trade for bullpen help because it's always available at the deadline.  (and we better.)

 

Your entire line of thinking here is completely off the rails.

 

edit: damn, i guess i missed him getting sent to the corner.

Edited May 29 by Hallas

[Bemorewins]

13 minutes ago, Philip said:

Yes, I think we’re on the same page. I wouldn’t mind at all extending Henderson and Westburg. I think it’s too early for some guys, and way too late for others.  But Gunny & Westy should remain on stage for the foreseeable future.

And Burnes is going to be too expensive, so make the offer, take the pick, and move on.

For me, though, and I said this more than once, the issue isn’t spending money in free agency it’s making wise and meaningful trades, and utilizing the assets we have.

IMO spending money in FA and making meaningful trades is something that is going to be required to sustain excellence.

By the way, I'm not sure that it's not too late to extend Gunnar. I can't see Boras sitting at the table after he has a 50+ homer year at age 22/23.

[OriolesMagic83]

34 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:

Boy I hope that’s not the case. That would be beyond petty. To walk away with almost 2 billion dollars for doing next to nothing and still be bitter. That’s actually sad to think about.

Somehow I think we're going to hear from John Angelos for doing something stupid, mean or petty or likely all 3 at the same time.  Public intoxication while arguing a $20 parking ticket or something.

[OriolesMagic83]

2 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:

IMO spending money in FA and making meaningful trades is something that is going to be required to sustain excellence.

By the way, I'm not sure that it's not too late to extend Gunnar. I can't see Boras sitting at the table after he has a 50+ homer year at age 22/23.

Oh yeah, he'll sit at the table, he'll just have a bunch of charts and stuff that explain how Gunnar is worth 1/2 of what the franchise is worth.

[Bemorewins]

2 minutes ago, OriolesMagic83 said:

Somehow I think we're going to hear from John Angelos for doing something stupid, mean or petty or likely all 3 at the same time.  Public intoxication while arguing a $20 parking ticket or something.

The best thing that he and his family ever did for this franchise was sell it to someone who had its best interest at heart.

[Bemorewins]

Just now, OriolesMagic83 said:

Oh yeah, he'll sit at the table, he'll just have a bunch of charts and stuff that explain how Gunnar is worth 1/2 of what the franchise is worth.

I doubt he get's a billion dollar contract. But 500+ million is a realistic possibility.

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:

The best thing that he and his family ever did for this franchise was sell it to someone who had its best interest at heart.

As far as we know.

He hasn't made any missteps so far but I think everyone was pretty pleased with Peter two months in.

We'll have a better idea by opening day 2025.

[Hallas]

I was advocating trading Hays in the offseason, and that never materialized.  I'm guessing no one really wanted to offer more than a bag of baseballs for him.  I don't think we can really be upset if we have to non-tender him.

 

I'm willing to give Mullins some more time.  I don't think he's as much of a lost cause as Hays is.  He's still making contact at least.  I don't really think Santander looks that lost at the plate, so I think he can make it back part of the way.

 

In general I think a lot of this stuff is going to work itself out by next offseason.  We're probably going to trade one of Mayo/Kjerstad/Stowers/Norby, maybe 2, at the deadline for bullpen help.  The remaining players will be needed to backfill Santander and Hays.  We still could use 1 more player as well.

 

This is entirely wishful thinking, but if we lose Santander and Hays, and trade 2 of the above prospects this deadline, we pencil in Holliday for 2B, we could sign someone like Soto in the offseason, extend Gunnar and Adley, and our payroll would still be outside the top-10.  That offense would be scary.

 

We could even sign someone like Burnes to something like 6/245 and I think the payroll would barely crack the top-10 in that case.

 

 

Edited May 29 by Hallas

[OriolesMagic83]

3 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:

I doubt he get's a billion dollar contract. But 500+ million is a realistic possibility.

Probably not, but I don't doubt the first billion dollar contract is coming in a few years probably with lots of deferrals.

[Bemorewins]

Just now, Can_of_corn said:

As far as we know.

He hasn't made any missteps so far but I think everyone was pretty pleased with Peter two months in.

We'll have a better idea by opening day 2025.

Lightning does not strike the same place. I refuse to believe that we would have another owner who is anywhere as close to as horrible as Angelos and his awful son were for 30 years. There's no way that would happen twice back-to-back. 

There is literally nothing in Rubenstein's public behavior that says, "I need to milk this team for everything that it's worth. I need to pinch pennies and bargain basement shop while spending as little as I can. I can people terribly and berate the media for asking legit questions". (Like the son) OR "I think I am smarter than the smartest baseball people. I need to take weird political stances like alienating my own talent pool by refusing to participate in international signings, etc" (Like the father.)

I know some may be skeptical of Rubenstein which may be fair because a lot has yet to be seen. But it literally could not get much worse (in all of North American professional sports) than the awfulness of the Angelos regime.

And please everyone spare me with the "Well he wasn't as bad as Synder or Davis or whoever owns the A's". [John Fisher] So what! That's like bragging about being second to last. Who cares?? (Not accusing you of defending them @Can_of_corn) 

That is a dreadful list of despicableness that we deserve better than as fans and as a community to be associated with.

I would argue that the Orioles couldn't have been run any worse than they were under the Angelos tenure. This is one of the great reasons that the Red Sox and Yankees won what 8/9 championships between them combined while someone named Angelos was owner and while we made ZERO WS appearances in the same time (and weren't particularly close but save ONE SINGLE SEASON in 1997).

[RZNJ]

29 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:

IMO spending money in FA and making meaningful trades is something that is going to be required to sustain excellence.

By the way, I'm not sure that it's not too late to extend Gunnar. I can't see Boras sitting at the table after he has a 50+ homer year at age 22/23.

If you sit at the table now Boras will act like the 50 homer season has already been accomplished.

[Malike]

2 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

If you guys report these posts they will be reviewed quicker. We're not on here 24/7. I did end up giving him a day off for trolling. I doubt it will change him and I'll probably have to remove him from the community.

It's like someone hijacked the account lol. Been a member for 13 years, no posts, 300 troll posts in 2 days.

[Brooks The Great]

1 hour ago, Tony-OH said:

I don't think the Orioles want to do this. Now could they potentially do that, sure, but I think they would bring up Maton or Vavra and go with a platoon with them and Urias if Westburg went down. 

Why wouldn't they? Gunnar played excellent defense at 3B last season as well. Mookie Betts, a lock future Hall of Famer, plays anywhere the Dodgers need him to. Absolutely no reason Gunnar can't do the same. Both Gunnar and Mookie are winning players who will do what the team needs of them in terms of their defensive position. If Westburg goes down, keeping Gunnar at SS and refusing to move him to 3B for some kind of preferential reason is not winning, team-first baseball. 

If Norby gets called up to begin with, Urias is the guy to release to make room for him on the roster. So Urias wouldn't be an option in the event of a Westburg injury.

If Norby gets called up and Stowers gets sent down, that's a different scenario obviously. But I think Urias should be the next guy on the chopping block. And if Urias is indeed released, Gunnar should be moved to 3B with Mateo at SS and Maton at 2B on a short-term basis in the event of a Westburg injury.

Edited May 29 by Brooks The Great

[Malike]

29 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

As far as we know.

He hasn't made any missteps so far but I think everyone was pretty pleased with Peter two months in.

We'll have a better idea by opening day 2025.

If they don't offer half a billion dollars to Gunnar there will be pitchforks. Soto was offered a very nice deal for 440M a couple of years ago and they said no thanks.