This series was a wakeup call

[Matt Bennett]

I learned nothing from the series. Slumps happen. RISP hitting comes back. Our hitting doesn’t stay down for long. The O’s: 

1. perhaps have the best lineup in baseball. There’s reasons and ways to think it could get better too. Namely Mayo. 

2. have a shaky pitching staff after elbow injuries to Bradish, Means, Wells, Bautista, Coloumbe. Irvin is a SP7/swing man. Suarez is a reliever. Povich is a barely interesting (doesn’t throw strikes, doesn’t throw hard) fringe rotation prospect. 

The Cubs’ series didn’t change any of that.  We know what we need. A few arms. 

Grabbing Eovaldi AND Scherzer from Texas would be cool. 

Jack Flaherty took a few #15-#30 team prospect types. 

[gtman55]

The issue isn't hitting although I think Hyde's lineups need to be tweaked a bit. If the Orioles have real intentions of making a deep playoff run we 100% need a bit of a pitching overhaul. Right now, our three most reliable pitchers are Burnes, Kimbrel and Rodriguez. You have to go into the playoffs with at least 3 top flight starters and several shutdown relievers.

So to me that means we need to go big at the deadline. We need a quality #3 starter and two more quality relievers.

Guys like Hays, Mullins, Urias, Mateo and Mountcastle could be in the mix along with what we have in the minors to make those deals.

 

[Orioles0615]

10 hours ago, RavensNOsGuy said:

McCann seems like a great dude but it’s shocking to me this was the plan this year to play him so much. It makes zero sense. If they wanted to get Adley more days off why the hell didn’t they try to find someone else as a platoon guy. Lenny Webster would be an upgrade over this nonsense.

JD Martinez would be nice right now. I know I wasnt the only one who wanted him

[Hank Scorpio]

Meh it's a pooty tang 3 game stretch. Bad approach up and down the lineup, bad pitching, a bad series.

This crap happens all the time to good teams. It'll get better. 

Guys like Mateo, McCann, Urias, Hays.... meh. They are very replaceable. I think Mullins to a lesser degree because he gets such good reads & jumps in CF. 

Now, the pitching.... we need to address the pitching.

[Safelykept]

11 hours ago, RavensNOsGuy said:

McCann seems like a great dude but it’s shocking to me this was the plan this year to play him so much. It makes zero sense. If they wanted to get Adley more days off why the hell didn’t they try to find someone else as a platoon guy. Lenny Webster would be an upgrade over this nonsense.

I understand the Lenny Webster pun (not bad), but who exactly would be an upgrade over Mcann( who is a backup catcher)  other than grinding Rush into the ground. Mcann is no more this teams problem , than Caleb Joseph a problem for the teams he was backup to Matt Wieters. Historically if your looking for Offense youre not going to find it from a backup catcher. If they play him less which they will eventually do, then they have to grind on Adley. Aint shit for free.

[Sanfran327]

I'm also really getting on the "move Holliday to the OF train" lately. So many good-ish infielders have made very successful transitions to the outfield over the years. Craig Biggio, Alfonso Soriano, Alex Gordon, and Chipper Jones all come to mind, not that their stories matter to J-Ho's situation. But I want to get him and Mayo into the lineup ASAP. I'm okay to drop Urias at this point, I think, and Cowser probably needs to find his stroke again in Norfolk. 

Unfortunately, I don't think there's much pitching relief in the organization. The injuries to Bradish, Wells, and Means have been pretty devastating. Cole Irvin turning into a pumpkin, while predictable, also hurts pretty badly. It's going to be hard to win this division with Burns, Grayson, and Jeckyl/Hyde as our top 3 starters. Plus, now it seems like we can no longer write off Boston.

[Safelykept]

2 minutes ago, Sanfran327 said:

I'm also really getting on the "move Holliday to the OF train" lately. So many good-ish infielders have made very successful transitions to the outfield over the years. Craig Biggio, Alfonso Soriano, Alex Gordon, and Chipper Jones all come to mind, not that their stories matter to J-Ho's situation. But I want to get him and Mayo into the lineup ASAP. I'm okay to drop Urias at this point, I think, and Cowser probably needs to find his stroke again in Norfolk. 

Unfortunately, I don't think there's much pitching relief in the organization. The injuries to Bradish, Wells, and Means have been pretty devastating. Cole Irvin turning into a pumpkin, while predictable, also hurts pretty badly. It's going to be hard to win this division with Burns, Grayson, and Jeckyl/Hyde as our top 3 starters. Plus, now it seems like we can no longer write off Boston.

Not to mention Danny, It's been a tough year for us attrition wise. Felix last year. Think there will be some moves other than blockbuster at the deadline to bandage some of the holes, other than that guys have to step up. Not worry their going to play bettet than the last 3.

[Spakman]

12 hours ago, Three Run Homer said:

The sky is not falling, but this series reinforced some things that should have already been obvious to Elias and Hyde.

(1) We need more quality pitching.  60 percent of our starting rotation and at least half of the bullpen are shaky.  Nothing wrong with taking a couple of fliers on AAA arms, but Elias needs to aim much higher in this year's trade market than he did last year.

(2) We need to call up Coby Mayo and get him regular playing time ASAP.  We look terrible against left handed pitching.  Option Cowser or release Urias or Mateo if you must.  

(3) James McCann is playing too damn much.  He seems to play against every lefty starter, and that's because we don't have a righty bat that can platoon with O'Hearn at DH.  See point (2).  

What else?  

I believe you can blame the player manager Hyde for this. Corbin Burnes is in love with James McCann.  I don’t think it’s hard to get a better backup catcher than James McCann. Hell the catcher we got for Bauman is probably better.

[Orioles1954]

1 hour ago, Hank Scorpio said:

Meh it's a pooty tang 3 game stretch. Bad approach up and down the lineup, bad pitching, a bad series.

This crap happens all the time to good teams. It'll get better. 

Guys like Mateo, McCann, Urias, Hays.... meh. They are very replaceable. I think Mullins to a lesser degree because he gets such good reads & jumps in CF. 

Now, the pitching.... we need to address the pitching.

I don’t know if I agree. Back-to-back shutouts against the last place team in the NL Central? A 19 run outpouring…just in the last week? I see some major cracks in the foundation. If a pitcher can control off-speed pitches on both sides of the plate then they are hopeless. And then we have a bullpen with the exception of Kimbrel doesn’t have a single swing-and-miss guy. Not Chicken Little but certainly not going to dismiss this series as nothing.

[Surhoffan17]

7 hours ago, Safelykept said:

No, the 2005 collapse started with lack of talent. Instead of Burnes and Grod as the 1, 2 punch you had  Bruce Chen and Bedard before he broke out, you think it gets bad after our 1, 2 , how Lopez Cabrera and Sidney Ponson. On offense you had a very respectable top 3 oh Roberts, Tejada and Mora, but after that the rest of lineup was replacement level or worse. So instead of complaining about the bottom third of our line up in 2005 it was the bottom two thirds. I'll let somebody else do the BP.the comparisons to 05 are laughable . Pump the Brakes

 I meant that the losing stretch started with blowouts, but I was wrong about that. Wasn't comparing the talent of the two teams. Only legit pitcher was Bedard as far as talent as some overachievement early on (I think) from the guys you mentioned. 

[SouthRider]

The team just got through a very hectic schedule and are still in first place by 2 games.    I expect this Yankee series to be the wake-up call.   Get back on track.  The all-star break will be a much needed rest.   I expect them to resume their winning ways after the break. 

[Surhoffan17]

10 minutes ago, Orioles1954 said:

I don’t know if I agree. Back-to-back shutouts against the last place team in the NL Central? A 19 run outpouring…just in the last week? I see some major cracks in the foundation. If a pitcher can control off-speed pitches on both sides of the plate then they are hopeless. And then we have a bullpen with the exception of Kimbrel doesn’t have a single swing-and-miss guy. Not Chicken Little but certainly not going to dismiss this series as nothing.

We did run into some good pitching. Looking at their stats, I wondered how they were only 6th in the NL in ERA. All three of those guys have very good ERAs, but certainly we need to adjust the approach at the plate. Soft tossers have always given us problems - though I think only Imanaga would qualify as such out of the three starters we faced. 

To give credit to them, they got the clutch hits throughout the series. Some were cheapies, no doubt. We were putrid in that regard. Things will mellow out a bit, just because that's how things go. 

[Safelykept]

!983 saw 2 major cracks, and then theres that. Texas fans are not going to come over here and Moderate our fears. They spent an entire season navigating Major Cracks. Thats just 2 examples of thousands that it runs hot and cold for everybody

[The Goob]

13 hours ago, Roy Firestone said:

This team simply cant get into hitters counts...far too many first pitch swinging...tonight we had two consecutive 9 pitch innings...we dont work counts...we're too anxious cant move runners and certainly have failed with RISP...Mullins shouldn't be playing...he's a fine defender but he's hitting about .200 in the last 7 games...and has very little power...what did Kjerstad do to not get plate appearances? I mean he's hitting .319...which with enough at bats would lead the team...he's selective and has immense power...Mateo and Urias have done very little, and even Gunnar is off...especially early in the game...he strikes out a ton right off the bat...You know what I've said about Mayo....he may struggle, he's not a great defender, he is serviceable...DH/ maybe... but at least he gives us a potential power RH bat...give him a shot...our bullpen is pretty awful...and save for Burnes and Grod our starters are far too undependable..we better get some pitching at the deadline or this team will be lucky to be a wild card team...

This part in red is just insane to me.  Lucky to be a wild card team???  Just a little perspective:

• Orioles are 57-36 half a game behind the Cleveland team for best record in the AL
• 8 games up on the Royals who are the first team out of the playoffs, The Dodgers by comparison have a 7 game lead for the last wild card sport - anyone think they won't make the playoffs
• Have scored 466 runs, second most in the AL to the Yankee$' 473 in two less games, 5.01 runs per game versus 4.98 for NY
• Run differential of +87 equal to Cleveland, only the Yankee$ better at +99, the other two current wild card teams are +52 and +43
• Fangraphs has the Orioles at 96.9% to make the playoffs, Baseball Reference at 98.7%, sportbooks have them as the favorites to be the AL #1 seed

I hate losing as much as anyone, agree the pitching staff needs at least one upgrade and Mayo and eventually Holliday need to be up and playing but to think that this team is somehow going to miss the playoffs seems to be the sediment of many posters and it is just idiocy.

This team with zero upgrades from outside the organization will easily make the playoffs and more than likely win the division.  I just don't get all the doom and gloom after every small blip in a long season.

Edited July 12 by The Goob

[interloper]

Pathetic series. Not really much more you can say. They looked terrible, they played terrible, they looked like the team that got swept in the playoffs last year.

What in the world happened to Cole Irvin? He's a shell of himself suddenly, again.