The writing was on the wall with trading the Vets.

[sportsfan8703]

I think we kind of missed an obvious one here for the most part…

Hays and Mullins each knew that they weren’t getting extended. Mountcastle knows what Mayo is doing in AAA. 

Hyde made the comment after blowing the 6-0 lead in Miami that was the answer to get younger?  So that tells me trading/shopping Hays, Mullins, and Mountcastle, had been talked about. That was Hyde sticking up for his guys he feels. 

Mullins and Mountcastle know that they are lame ducks. We need to just ahead and complete the task of trading them so this team can try and move past whatever is going on in the clubhouse. 

It’s looking like Hyde has lost the team. We all know what that means. 

[Gurgi]

I wanted to move them all this last offseason and let the kids have a totally open field to get past their beginning struggles and be ready to go by the end of the season.  Elias decided to go the other way and force the kids to play minimum time and see what the vets had.  The vets collapsed except Santander and the kids still have not had enough time to get totally past their rookie struggles.   Really not the best way to do things with hindsight.  

I was done with Mountcastle and Hays last year.  Thought Mullins might be worth keeping.  I was also done with Santander and thought they should of moved him in the offseason.  I did not expect him to be hitting this much.  I waa expecting a fall back.  I was thinking 17-19 homeruns.  Santander has been quite a surprise. 

It would of let Norby and Kjerstad and Stowers and Mayo play.  I would of ditched Urias and Mateo in the offseason.  I think this would been the proper way to go.  

[terpoh]

5 hours ago, Gurgi said:

I wanted to move them all this last offseason and let the kids have a totally open field to get past their beginning struggles and be ready to go by the end of the season.  Elias decided to go the other way and force the kids to play minimum time and see what the vets had.  The vets collapsed except Santander and the kids still have not had enough time to get totally past their rookie struggles.   Really not the best way to do things with hindsight.  

I was done with Mountcastle and Hays last year.  Thought Mullins might be worth keeping.  I was also done with Santander and thought they should of moved him in the offseason.  I did not expect him to be hitting this much.  I waa expecting a fall back.  I was thinking 17-19 homeruns.  Santander has been quite a surprise. 

It would of let Norby and Kjerstad and Stowers and Mayo play.  I would of ditched Urias and Mateo in the offseason.  I think this would been the proper way to go.  

You certainly cant trade or get rid of all of them at once.  You're not going to cut loose 5 or 6 position player contributor veterans from a 101 win team all at once. Where I think we probably messed up was not getting rid of ANY of them, and now scrambling to possibly offload several.

One or two of Hays/Mullins/Mounty could have certainly been offloaded during the offseason making it easier to trade another right now. And one of Urias/Mateo should've been gone this offseason. I like having Mateo a little more because of his speed/defense/versatility. Keeping all 5 of them on the roster created an unnecessary log jam, and not because of their production. I have always liked Hays, but I'm glad we traded him, and I hope that we can trade Mounty or Mullins or both as well before the deadline. Urias should be DFA or traded for a lottery ticket at this point, but the Mateo injury complicates things and I dont think we get rid of Urias until Mateo is back.

I have long been of the opinion that we should extend Tony, felt this way last offseason as well. He is a switch hitting slugger- very hard to find, and valuable to a team with all lefty hitting outfielder. He also plays a solid RF in Camden Yards and is a great locker room guy by all accounts we get access to.

 

 

Edited July 28 by terpoh

[bpilktree67]

6 hours ago, Gurgi said:

I wanted to move them all this last offseason and let the kids have a totally open field to get past their beginning struggles and be ready to go by the end of the season.  Elias decided to go the other way and force the kids to play minimum time and see what the vets had.  The vets collapsed except Santander and the kids still have not had enough time to get totally past their rookie struggles.   Really not the best way to do things with hindsight.  

I was done with Mountcastle and Hays last year.  Thought Mullins might be worth keeping.  I was also done with Santander and thought they should of moved him in the offseason.  I did not expect him to be hitting this much.  I waa expecting a fall back.  I was thinking 17-19 homeruns.  Santander has been quite a surprise. 

It would have let Norby and Kjerstad and Stowers and Mayo play.  I would have ditched Urias and Mateo in the offseason.  I think this would been the proper way to go.  

Then what happens if you have a few injuries and you have no depth to replace them if a few guys get injured.  It’s not like Hays, Mullins, and even Mountcastle had great years last season as well so they would not have fetched much.  It was better to keep the depth and then hope for a bounce back from them and then possibly get more in return.  

[interloper]

Just now, bpilktree67 said:

Then what happens if you have a few injuries and you have no depth to replace them if a few guys get injured.  It’s not like Hays, Mullins, and even Mountcastle had great years last season as well so they would not have fetched much.  It was better to keep the depth and then hope for a bounce back from them and then possibly get more in return.  

Yeah I think it was the right move to keep the vets and see how things played out, otherwise the team would have been very thin. 

[Aristotelian]

I strongly disagree with any "lost the locker room" narrative based.on speculation. 

"Getting younger" may have been referring more to the players at AAA than trading off veterans. Hyde has no reason to leak that info, whereas everyone knows what Holliday, Mayo, and Norby are doing.

Yes, trade Mullins and Mountcastle but a "get it over with" mentality will reduce the return. 

[casadeozo]

It’s important to remember not only is it a long season but most teams go through these stretches. We were spoiled last year with never really having a losing stretch. 
 

while certainly the June and July record don’t look great, we forget they ended the first half with a comeback win with a dogpile on second base. Add to that knocked around the rangers for the first 2 of 3 after the break. 
 

I certainly agree these last 2x series have been awful, and the cubs and Yankees series they didn’t look like themselves, but by no means has the clubhouse been lost.

Let’s revisit this thread in 2 weeks and see where we are.

[Moose Milligan]

6 hours ago, sportsfan8703 said:

 

It’s looking like Hyde has lost the team. We all know what that means. 

[bpilktree67]

Just now, casadeozo said:

It’s important to remember not only is it a long season but most teams go through these stretches. We were spoiled last year with never really having a losing stretch. 
 

while certainly the June and July record don’t look great, we forget they ended the first half with a comeback win with a dogpile on second base. Add to that knocked around the rangers for the first 2 of 3 after the break. 
 

I certainly agree these last 2x series have been awful, and the cubs and Yankees series they didn’t look like themselves, but by no means has the clubhouse been lost.

Let’s revisit this thread in 2 weeks and see where we are.

Yeah today if we can win means we are 5-5 in last 10 which though not great won’t kill us either.  Some people here act like we are 2-8 or something like that.  Even as bad as it seems we still just slightly below .500.  The Rangers had a very poor stretch and were able to right the ship.,  

[sportsfan8703]

These players are human. Just like relievers performing better when they know their defined role. Everything has been up in the air with future playing time all year. 

Hays is gone. Mountcastle and Mullins can go to other teams with defined roles. Urias too, if he’s not ok being a reserve IF.  He’s gone in the offseason anyway.

The guys remaining will now have defined roles. 

Cowser - CF vs RHP

Kjerstad - everyday LF

Pache - CF vs LHP

Stowers - Reserve OF

Mayo - DH, some 1B(Mounty’s role with less 1B)

Holliday - 2B vs RHP

Norby - 2B vs LHP

Now everyone will know their role and a new chemistry can form. 

Edited July 28 by sportsfan8703

[Jagwar]

1 hour ago, Moose Milligan said:

Sounds to me it's more like the Orioles have lost @sportsfan8703

[drjohnnyfever1]

8 hours ago, sportsfan8703 said:

I think we kind of missed an obvious one here for the most part…

Hays and Mullins each knew that they weren’t getting extended. Mountcastle knows what Mayo is doing in AAA. 

Hyde made the comment after blowing the 6-0 lead in Miami that was the answer to get younger?  So that tells me trading/shopping Hays, Mullins, and Mountcastle, had been talked about. That was Hyde sticking up for his guys he feels. 

Mullins and Mountcastle know that they are lame ducks. We need to just ahead and complete the task of trading them so this team can try and move past whatever is going on in the clubhouse. 

It’s looking like Hyde has lost the team. We all know what that means. 

Yeah, I came to this line of thinking about two weeks ago and it solidified with the Mateo injury.  I've felt since last year that the younger guys like Cowser, Kierstadt, and Stowers were still in an audition phase coming into this year and that Hays, Mullins, and Mounty, merely because of their contracts, were likely to either not be re-signed or traded.  But when they weren't traded in the off-season, it signaled to me that the club was either hoping they would start of as hot as they were last year and allow them to be spelled by the younger guys again OR that the club was hoping that a hot start would supply more trade capital if the young guys demonstrated growth and meaningful replacement value.  I was also uncertain about Elias dealing vets in a Playoff drive. 

As it stands, Mullins is the odd man out, imo.  I don't see them trading Mounty for just anything.  I don't see his bat, when he's on, being easily replaced, yet our real need is still pitching for either Mullins or Mounty in a trade.  I imagine we have some more prospects in the 15-50 range to trade, but Mullins is the most replaceable and should have more value to other clubs than Hays did.  Trading him for a pitcher, if we can find a partner, seems very likely to me at this point.

[ScGO's]

Good trade of Hays, but we missed peak value on him. He made the All Star Team last year, and although he regressed in the 2nd half, he should have been dealt this past winter. I felt bad for him that he wasn't because you could see the logjam coming

We are at peak value Mountcastle right now (would have been cool if he could have got on a heater before the deadline). It's time to flip him.  The 1B position is down, especially in the AL. He's a top 10 MLB 1B right now according to WAR; GG finalist

We missed peak value on Cedric Mullins after the 2021 season. Its definitely hindsight, but I remember a few folks thinking that with the rebuild in full swing, we were still a couple years out from competition and it was time to flip Mullins for a big haul at the time. Whoops. We can't expect much back for Cedric. Honestly, he's going to be a give away in a trade if not a DFA after the season. Not only did we miss his peak value offensively, we have missed it defensively. Cedric will be a LF by next season. And on the base paths, with bigger bases and new advantageous rules, he's regressing too. I've felt for a while that we missed on trading Mullins. He would have still brought in a haul during or after the 2022 season as well although not as large. But either way, I feel trading him could have brought in some young arms that would probably be in the middle of things for us by now

Missed peak on Ramon Urias after 2022's near 4 WAR season. However, he was controllable and cheap at the time. He still has two more seasons of control after this year. Knowing the LF Wall was being moved back for 2023, Urias probably should have been dealt after the 22 offseason. Analytic miss there.  I actually think he has more value than Mullins at the moment, but he will be more useful as an additional piece to a bigger trade compared to what he would bring back alone. However, at the end of the day, that lottery ticket trade may be useful by removing him from the cluttered roster.

We missed peak value on Jorge Mateo after the 2022 season as well. That was actually his 3rd year of service at the time, not a bad time to swing him, but also in a strange spot where he is cheap, you needed a bridge to Gunnar/Ortiz at the time, and if he was able to improve or replicate, his value could improve. He's hurt now so it doesn't matter, might as well see if you can swing him in the offseason, or bring back as a super utility in 2025 if the price is right.

Some could argue Ohearn or Santander, but I think Elias has played his cards right with those two. Santander could bring back a draft pick and this was his best year of his career so far. I think Ohearn is a sneaky extension candidate

[sportsfan8703]

31 minutes ago, Jagwar said:

Sounds to me it's more like the Orioles have lost @sportsfan8703

Nope. Just be a realist. Hays wasn’t happy being a platoon player. Do you think Mullins and Mountcastle are?

I’m 100% the fan I was last week. I just want to see Elias just rip the band off and stop middling. So do all the players too. 

[Ceciltrav]

I'm going to just throw this out there.  I don't dislike Hyde.  I appreciate what he has done.  I'm not advocating for him to be fired but is this the perfect situation for  Buck Showalter to come back and take over next season if this team continues down this path or has a first round exit from the playoffs?  Bucks a leader.  He holds everyone accountable and is a stickler for fundamentals.  He would command the room and a team of young talented players could potentially use a leader like Buck.  

I know Elias probably wouldn't hire him and would prefer to pick somebody he is familiar with and not hire the last regimes skipper but I can't stop thinking it is what this team might need?  Am I delusional?

Edited July 28 by Ceciltrav