Outfield PA the rest of the way

[Malike]

1 minute ago, Sports Guy said:

Yeah, the red is nice, but that doesn't win games and xstats are not predictive, they are descriptive so that means nothing going forward.

[Sports Guy]

Just now, Malike said:

Yeah, the red is nice, but that doesn't win games and xstats are not predictive, they are descriptive so that means nothing going forward.

I get it..you don’t like him. My response is

I believe in the player and the approach and that things will eventually start going in his favor.  You don’t. Great.

[LGOrioles]

12 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

I get it..you don’t like him. My response is

I believe in the player and the approach and that things will eventually start going in his favor.  You don’t. Great.

Even in the last 30 days when Mullins has been hot with a 144 wRC+, he has a 0.8 WAR in 91 PA’s to Cowser’s 0.6 WAR in 77 PA’s.

Cowser still has a 116 wRC+ against RHP’s and is a top 5 defensive OF’er according to Fangraphs. There is no reason he should not be starting against a RHP. His ceiling and floor are both higher than Hays or Mullins. Split the other OF’er/DH AB’s against RHP’s between Mullins/Kjerstad/Mountcastle. 

[sportsfan8703]

5 minutes ago, LGOrioles said:

Even in the last 30 days when Mullins has been hot with a 144 wRC+, he has a 0.8 WAR in 91 PA’s to Cowser’s 0.6 WAR in 77 PA’s.

Cowser still has a 116 wRC+ against RHP’s and is a top 5 defensive OF’er according to Fangraphs. There is no reason he should not be starting against a RHP. His ceiling and floor are both higher than Hays or Mullins. Split the other OF’er/DH AB’s against RHP’s between Mullins/Kjerstad/Mountcastle. 

Vs RHP - Santa RF, Cowser LF, Mullins CF, O'Hearn 1B, Heston DH

Vs LHP - Santa RF, Hays LF, Mullins CF, Mountcastle 1B, Adley DH with McCann catching like usual.  

[LGOrioles]

2 minutes ago, sportsfan8703 said:

Vs RHP - Santa RF, Cowser LF, Mullins CF, O'Hearn 1B, Heston DH

Vs LHP - Santa RF, Hays LF, Mullins CF, Mountcastle 1B, Adley DH with McCann catching like usual.  

I’d say not to play Mullins against LHP’s considering his struggles there but that’s about right.

And Cowser doesn’t have to play every single game against RHP’s. Mullins has been hitting better and Kierstad and Mountcastle are good too. But he should be in there pretty much every day against them. 

[Pickles]

46 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

That chart was posted the other day, and yeah the red looks nice but there's two GIANT blue marks there that nobody acknowledges: whiff % and K%.

When he hits the ball, he does damage.

But he is one of the worst regulars in MLB when it comes to actually hitting the ball.  That matters.

Now, the defense and speed far exceeds anything I thought he was capable of going into the year, so that's great, and he should be getting regular playing time and starting basically every day against righties.

But people who post that image can't just focus on the red and act as if it is some complete vindication of Cowser's performance.

[Sports Guy]

5 minutes ago, Pickles said:

That chart was posted the other day, and yeah the red looks nice but there's two GIANT blue marks there that nobody acknowledges: whiff % and K%.

When he hits the ball, he does damage.

But he is one of the worst regulars in MLB when it comes to actually hitting the ball.  That matters.

Now, the defense and speed far exceeds anything I thought he was capable of going into the year, so that's great, and he should be getting regular playing time and starting basically every day against righties.

But people who post that image can't just focus on the red and act as if it is some complete vindication of Cowser's performance.

He’s not perfect. He has a hole in his swing. He has issues and he’s still one of our best 3 OFers.  
 

All of those things are true.

[LGOrioles]

10 minutes ago, Pickles said:

That chart was posted the other day, and yeah the red looks nice but there's two GIANT blue marks there that nobody acknowledges: whiff % and K%.

When he hits the ball, he does damage.

But he is one of the worst regulars in MLB when it comes to actually hitting the ball.  That matters.

Now, the defense and speed far exceeds anything I thought he was capable of going into the year, so that's great, and he should be getting regular playing time and starting basically every day against righties.

But people who post that image can't just focus on the red and act as if it is some complete vindication of Cowser's performance.

Cowser and Gunnar’s statcast pages look eerily similar in terms of what’s red and what’s blue (besides xBA). That’s not saying Cowser = Gunnar, because Gunnar’s just better and he whiffs and K’s less. But I think Cowser’s lack of chase, how hard he hits the ball, and his speed/defense you mentioned does give him a pretty good combo of a high floor and ceiling if he can make a few adjustments.

Statcast (and bad BABIP luck) aside, Cowser has been worth 2.1 WAR in 278 PA’s. That’s a 4.5 WAR pace per 600 PA’s and a very valuable player.

[Pickles]

14 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

He’s not perfect. He has a hole in his swing. He has issues and he’s still one of our best 3 OFers.  
 

All of those things are true.

Against righties he should be playing every day.

If you believe he's better than Mullins defensively- which the O's don't- then he should be playing most every day against lefties.

Personally, I think Mullins is the better defensive CF and that on days you want McCann to rest Adley against lefties, Cowser becomes the odd man out.

[Pickles]

5 minutes ago, LGOrioles said:

Cowser and Gunnar’s statcast pages look eerily similar in terms of what’s red and what’s blue (besides xBA). That’s not saying Cowser = Gunnar, because Gunnar’s just better and he whiffs and K’s less. But I think Cowser’s lack of chase, how hard he hits the ball, and his speed/defense you mentioned does give him a pretty good combo of a high floor and ceiling if he can make a few adjustments.

Statcast (and bad BABIP luck) aside, Cowser has been worth 2.1 WAR in 278 PA’s. That’s a 4.5 WAR pace per 600 PA’s and a very valuable player.

Henderson is in the 97th percentile for batting run value.

Cowser is in the 16th.

They are not remotely the same hitter.

Now, Cowser's defense does give him quite a high ceiling, but I actually think the swing and miss limits his upside significantly.

[Sports Guy]

3 minutes ago, Pickles said:

Against righties he should be playing every day.

If you believe he's better than Mullins defensively- which the O's don't- then he should be playing most every day against lefties.

Personally, I think Mullins is the better defensive CF and that on days you want McCann to rest Adley against lefties, Cowser becomes the odd man out.

I would play Cowser vs some lefties but would bench him vs the better ones and I don’t have an issue taking him out late inning vs tough lefties either.  He has to earn that.

But he’s one of the 3 best OFers on the team and should get more than 16% if remaining PA.

I don’t get any game that OHearn has an OFer glove unless injuries are an issue.

[LGOrioles]

6 minutes ago, Pickles said:

Henderson is in the 97th percentile for batting run value.

Cowser is in the 16th.

They are not remotely the same hitter.

Now, Cowser's defense does give him quite a high ceiling, but I actually think the swing and miss limits his upside significantly.

I didn’t say they were the same hitter. I said their statcast pages look pretty similar in terms of what they are good at and what they are bad at. Gunnar’s better at their strengths and their weaknesses (he whiffs and K’s less), but their profiles are pretty similar, Gunnar is just way better. 

[Pickles]

16 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

I would play Cowser vs some lefties but would bench him vs the better ones and I don’t have an issue taking him out late inning vs tough lefties either.  He has to earn that.

But he’s one of the 3 best OFers on the team and should get more than 16% if remaining PA.

I don’t get any game that OHearn has an OFer glove unless injuries are an issue.

I think the 16% is a little misleading.

It isn't that Cowser would only play 16% of the time but he'd get 16% of the OF abs, which would equate to about 50% playing time.

I want him playing more like 75% of the time, so I think that's low, but he'll need to start performing better to hold Hays off, if Hays is going to continue to hit as he has since he came back from the DL.

[Malike]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

I get it..you don’t like him. My response is

I believe in the player and the approach and that things will eventually start going in his favor.  You don’t. Great.

I like him fine if they use him properly. You see red on statcast and turn into a robot and say that's all that matters. Results matter.

[Frobby]

2 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

Cowser is one of the 3 best OFers we have. He should play more than Mullins and Hays.

Cowser has a .607 OPS over his last 63 games, hitting .180 in that time.  He’s also been awful in high leverage situations (.385 OPS), with runners in scoring position (.572), with a runner on 3B and less than two out (.568 OPS and has advanced the runner only 6 of 22 times, which is the worst ratio in MLB of 83 players with 18+ opportunities).  He hasn’t played like one of our best three outfitters for quite a long time now.   I’m against flat out benching him but his time should be reduced significantly until he starts hitting better, and learning to do better in important situations.  

Edited July 8 by Frobby