Where are the pollyannas?

[Tbone83]

Cowser is really only in the ROY conversation because of the dearth of good rookie seasons. He had a smokin' hot April and then hit a bunch of solo garbage time HRs while striking out a ton. Nothing like Gunnar's 2023 well-deserved ROY. It would be a nice honor but it almost seems like this team needs LESS hype because they let it go to their head. Adley in particular seems to have gotten too comfortable, complacent, and ego-driven.

I'm over the HR derby and the All-Star selections and the power rankings and all that BS. Win a damn playoff game.

[baltfan]

8 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Aren't most hitters mistake hitters?

It's really hard to hit a pitch that a ML pitcher executes properly.

 

Championship clubs have guys that hit good pitches or foul enough off to get a good one. Maybe these guys will develop, but I am not that sure. 

[HowAboutThat]

5 minutes ago, UMDTerrapins said:

I’m pissed. Ready to fight, or at least break something. But this thread should be locked and deleted in the morning. It’s a breeding ground for moronically bad takes. 

 

4 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

It takes time?

He's had:

The 2019 season.

The 2020 season.

The 2021 season.

The 2022 season.

The 2023 season.

The 2024 season.

This team was not as successful this year as it was last year and it appears to be in a weaker position going forward.

I'm not saying fire him but he's had enough time to win a playoff game.

I appreciate your comment. Mike’s first job was to remake the organization, rebuild the infrastructure. That takes time, so you can’t really hold the first three years against him, especially because one of them was the pandemic. No Development.
Then you need time for the draft picks he made to develop and arrive.

That started when Adley was brought up in, what May 2022?

That’s when the clock started ticking on Mike, because the product of his drafting was first playing in the big leagues.

2023 was great.
 

There’s been a tremendous argument all season about what was wrong with the team. The injuries weren’t the root cause of the problem; we saw that in these final two games, where we had everybody, and everybody sucked.

There’s something wrong.

All the players have had success, and all the players don’t now.

The logical conclusion is 1)they aren’t being used to their best ability, which is a lineup/Substitution/bullpen usage/matchup problem, or 2) the coaches are failing in someway. They’re preaching the wrong message, or they are preaching the right message and it is being ignored, or they are not treating the players as individuals who need different messages.

All of those problems need to be solved with different coaches, because the players aren’t going anywhere.

This trade deadline was not a success, and now we have an emptied farm club that has no pitching… And everybody wants pitching.

so Mike has to have another off-season and another trade deadline to see if he has made any modifications to his philosophy/strategy. 
He’s a smart guy, and I’m sure when he got home from the game, his wife pointed to the couch and said, “you got to sleep there until after the winter meetings and then we’ll talk.“

thank you for reading this far…

[Ohfan67]

45 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

So far, only one polyanna was willing to show their face in this thread!

Those guys were trying to stay positive as the ship was sinking. They weren’t positive to irritate you. They were trying to emotionally hang in there. We are all in fan hell today.  

[forphase1]

36 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

4 out of 5 home grown chokers.

Come on Tony,  you know all we've heard the past few months was that the hitting was going to be fine,  it's the pitching that's our issue.   Well we just gave up 3 runs in two games... that's great pitching and more than good enough to expect to win if we don't have an offense full of hackers who do nothing with ducks on the pond. 

[NattyO's]

1 hour ago, Tony-OH said:

Where are you now?

Where are the posters who laughed when we said how boring this team was?
Where are the posters who scoffed at the idea that this team is full of players who can't perfrom under pressure?
Where are the posters that bring up that the Orioles offense scored the second most runs?
Where are the posters that go into the game thread and tell people they are overreacting when it's clear this team is choking time and time again?
Where were the posters who just think it's baseball that this core group choked once again?

Every single coach should be fired. Hyde should be fired. Elias gets one more offseason with an owner that may actually spend.

Santander, Mountcastle and O'Hearn should have played their last games as Orioles.

Rutschman needs to go to fat boy camp and lose about 15 pounds while putting on muscle. Maybe go to a hitting school that teach 2-0 is a great pitch to swing on. 

At the end of the day, this is EXACTLY what this team deserved. They have played like scared little school children since late June. Don't give me injuries, because this team's offense was in tact and they scored one freakin' run in two games. One. 

They were swept by a 85-win team that has struggled down the stretch. They collected two hits off a bullpen in 8 innings of work. They are an absolute and utter embarrassment. This team is more of an embarrassment than the team that lost 110+ games. 

Everyone involved in this season have stained their reputation. EVERYONE. Gunnar hits 37 home runs and craps his pants. Cowser thinks he's rookie of the year and dude swings at ball that hit him with the bases loaded. What kind of ridiculous unprofessional at bat was that? 

Adley? Are you kidding me. If they traded him this offseason I wouldn't shed a tear. 

The only thing good in any of this is now my calendar has been freed up. Never again will I ever trust a Hyde-led, Elias developed team led by his core. He needs to go out and find guys that don't poop their pants the second pressure is involved.

Thank you Burnes for being a professional and doing your job. You deserved better than being in a clubhouse full of choke artists. 

If Elias brings back this coaching staff he gets one more year to win a World Series than he's on the chopping block too. If he wants to ride with these losers, then go down with these losers.

Agree 100 percent.  I'd take a bunch of 290+300 hitters with a third of the homers to these fence swinging guys.  Learn how to play small ball.

[allquixotic]

9 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Aren't most hitters mistake hitters?

It's really hard to hit a pitch that a ML pitcher executes properly.

 

Fair point, but there is a valley of difference between how often Bobby Witt Jr. can hit a properly-executed pitch vs. Jackson Holliday or Adley Rutschman. Gunnar has been somewhere in the middle between those extremes.

I get it that coaching and developing that talent is the secret sauce that makes a team a winner, but that just highlights that who we have are not set up to make us a successful team.

[Teddy OBP]

5 minutes ago, baltfan said:

Burnes was a smart move. Rogers was troubling. 

I still have no idea what that was. It almost seems like they thought they saw a flaw that would turn him into Arrieta - no reason to trade for a project in the middle of THIS season. 

Elias trades are concerning in general other than Burnes.

[Sanity Check]

13 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I predict the O's will win 100 games in 2025.

Yes they need a new hitting approach with RISP.   Who implements that I don't know.

I was pretty impressed with the team prior to July 1st.   Hyde  and Elias  will stay.

Something is wrong is Adley that he can't hit right-hand pitching.  He did in 2023.  Neither Westburg nor Mountcastle were at full strength for the playoffs.

They get their injured players back for ST they will be ready to go. (Not Bradish or Means)

Holliday and Mayo will be worked into the team next year at some point and they will have decent rookie seasons is my guess.   Basallo will be MLB's #1 prospect targeted to be on the team in 2026.

There is a lot more to say and we have all off season to say it.

This team will not win 100 games next year.  It's adorable that you feel that way, but c'mon man, please don't set yourself up for more heartbreak.  There is a lot of "hope" in your reasoning above, and in case you weren't aware, hope is not a strategy.

[turtlebowl]

I have just read this thread and wow, some of you have very short memories. Do you have any idea how many meaningless games all of us have watched from July on, season after season? 
 

I am as upset as anyone with the last couple of months. I know changes need to be made.

One thing to add, from everything we hear Tony Taters is very popular in the clubhouse. Probably the veteran leader in the clubhouse. What is his approach and has been from the beginning.  Guess on every pitch, and if you get something close to what you were guessing swing as hard as you can. Any chance he has had a negative influence on some of the younger guys? 
 

You don’t bring Tony back, you fire the hitting coaches throughout the system and you change the approach that allows the guys with solid bat to ball skills to be who they are. Trying to make them something they aren’t isn’t a recipe for success.

[baltfan]

Just now, Teddy OBP said:

I still have no idea what that was. It almost seems like they thought they saw a flaw that would turn him into Arrieta - no reason to trade for a project in the middle of THIS season. 

Elias trades are concerning in general other than Burnes.

They already had the same guy in Irvin on their roster.  It was a real embarrassment to get rooked by the Marlins. 

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, turtlebowl said:

I have just read this thread and wow, some of you have very short memories. Do you have any idea how many meaningless games all of us have watched from July on, season after season? 
 

I am as upset as anyone with the last couple of months. I know changes need to be made.

One thing to add, from everything we hear Tony Taters is very popular in the clubhouse. Probably the veteran leader in the clubhouse. What is his approach and has been from the beginning.  Guess on every pitch, and if you get something close to what you were guessing swing as hard as you can. Any chance he has had a negative influence on some of the younger guys? 
 

You don’t bring Tony back, you fire the hitting coaches throughout the system and you change the approach that allows the guys with solid bat to ball skills to be who they are. Trying to make them something they aren’t isn’t a recipe for success.

If the other players are ignoring coaching to try and mimic Santander all the more reason to fire the coaches.

 

[dystopia]

38 minutes ago, baltfan said:

We are going the way of the Blue Jays.  Remember what they looked like they were going to become a few years ago.  Changes need to be made.  Hyde needs to be gone. Guys need to spend the offseason working on their weaknesses. They won’t do this if Hyde is the manager and they know they have a spot secured.  

I also saw a lot of similarities between this series and the Blue Jays series with the Twins last year. I could see us having a down year next year with no Bradish, Means, and presumably Burnes. 

[Sanity Check]

This sure doesn't feel like Liftoff to me 

[HowAboutThat]

This isn’t really the place to post this, but the Royals are going to get destroyed by the Yankees, and even now I am confident that the Orioles would’ve beaten the Yankees handily, because the Orioles and the Yankees are the same kind of team, and the Royals are not.