Where are the pollyannas?

[MDK02]

1 minute ago, accinfo said:

  My Pollyanna hand is right here.  No one should be fired.  A group of young players had a disappointing end of the season.  Sorry but to call 23 year old Gunnar Henderson a choke artist at this stage in his career is not a fair statement.  If so there are plenty of Hall of Famers who had disappointing early career disappointments.  This team has won 192 games in the last two years much because of Gunnar Henderson.   Winning those 192 games is nothing to write off because of these post season failures.  That is what Yankee fans do.  You have to win those regular season games to reach these games that have become big disappointments.  That is better than most of the last 17 seasons.  John Angelos owned this team up until opening day.  Let's see what this management team can do with a bigger pocket book and this base of young talent who is still young and still talented.  I will also add I think John Harbaugh shouldn’t be fired either.   This has been a disappointing end to the season but you know life is good.  There are people out there with way worse problems than the people here at the Hangout.  

Jackson Churios(20 yrs old), Jackson Meril(21), Bobby Witt Jr(23) all have no problem producing in big moments. Gunnar has a problem, maybe he’ll get better in those big moments but he’s not good now, he’s actually terrible. It’s unfortunate but it’s reality. 

[Bemorewins]

1 minute ago, MDK02 said:

Jackson Churios(20 yrs old), Jackson Meril(21), Bobby Witt Jr(23) all have no problem producing in big moments. Gunnar has a problem, maybe he’ll get better in those big moments but he’s not good now, he’s actually terrible. It’s unfortunate but it’s reality. 

To be fair, Gunnar absolutely raked in the postseason last season. Didn't he hit like close to .500?

[1fingerwillie]

I watched the 88 Os. You people are nuts.

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

2 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

If Matt Borgschulte, Ryan Fuller, and Cody Asche have jobs in the morning, Elias should be called on the carpet by Rubenstein. At the very least they need to go. 

Add to that there needs to be a serious examination of how they are coaching hitting prospects in the minors seeing prospect after prospect struggle adjusting to MLB pitching. I think it's more than just bad luck and it needs to be addressed so we're not waiting months or even a year for a prospect to start hitting.

[EddeeEddee]

3 minutes ago, Barnaby Graves said:

It seems like the first place to go when a very young team with obvious latent talent just busts like this.  Coaches are supposed to get what they can out of their talent pool, and I think we got much less than we should have.  That extends to the FO which IMO was less than impressive this year.

But then there is the point Rbiggs252 brings up above where he points out he thinks analytics could be part of the problem in that it discounts old school baseball virtues of singles, walks, bunts and hit and runs. 

Even if this is a real issue -- especially as something that distinguishes the O's from other successful teams at a similar budget level -- I think it would start in the front office (though maybe extend to coaching too).  Even if the front office doesn't pursue players with these strengths, the coaching staff could try to adopt and train these qualities as in game tactics in certain situations -- but I'm thinking only with the front office's blessing.

[EddeeEddee]

10 minutes ago, accinfo said:

  My Pollyanna hand is right here.  No one should be fired.  A group of young players had a disappointing end of the season.  Sorry but to call 23 year old Gunnar Henderson a choke artist at this stage in his career is not a fair statement.  If so there are plenty of Hall of Famers who had disappointing early career disappointments.  This team has won 192 games in the last two years much because of Gunnar Henderson.   Winning those 192 games is nothing to write off because of these post season failures.  That is what Yankee fans do.  You have to win those regular season games to reach these games that have become big disappointments.  That is better than most of the last 17 seasons.  John Angelos owned this team up until opening day.  Let's see what this management team can do with a bigger pocket book and this base of young talent who is still young and still talented.  I will also add I think John Harbaugh shouldn’t be fired either.   This has been a disappointing end to the season but you know life is good.  There are people out there with way worse problems than the people here at the Hangout.  

I mostly agree with you but I'm not prepared to say no one should be fired.  I think we really don't know enough to say that.  

[24fps]

9 minutes ago, accinfo said:

  My Pollyanna hand is right here.  No one should be fired.  A group of young players had a disappointing end of the season.  Sorry but to call 23 year old Gunnar Henderson a choke artist at this stage in his career is not a fair statement.  If so there are plenty of Hall of Famers who had disappointing early career disappointments.  This team has won 192 games in the last two years much because of Gunnar Henderson.   Winning those 192 games is nothing to write off because of these post season failures.  That is what Yankee fans do.  You have to win those regular season games to reach these games that have become big disappointments.  That is better than most of the last 17 seasons.  John Angelos owned this team up until opening day.  Let's see what this management team can do with a bigger pocket book and this base of young talent who is still young and still talented.  I will also add I think John Harbaugh shouldn’t be fired either.   This has been a disappointing end to the season but you know life is good.  There are people out there with way worse problems than the people here at the Hangout.  

Dues paying member of the Pollyanna Guild here as well.  That said, the O's underperforming young core could do with listening to a few new voices IMO.  Still undecided about Hyde.

[DirtyBird]

F’ dem Pollyannas

[Hallas]

11 minutes ago, Bemorewins said:

For 700 million. Really??

I'm all for advocating that the O's need to spend in aa much more significant way. But I have lived in this community for 30+ years of my life and when you compare even the best areas here to what So Cal has to offer in terms of wealth and opulence, there is simply no comparison. There is no world where we are outbidding the Dodgers for a player like Ohtani, especially when the player wanted to be in southern California. 

I mean, he wasn't signing that deal with us, but the MLBPA says it's a 46 million a year deal, so that's what I'm going with.

 

It was a tongue in cheek comment.

[Pat Kelly]

9 minutes ago, MDK02 said:

Jackson Churios(20 yrs old), Jackson Meril(21), Bobby Witt Jr(23) all have no problem producing in big moments. Gunnar has a problem, maybe he’ll get better in those big moments but he’s not good now, he’s actually terrible. It’s unfortunate but it’s reality. 

This is correct.  Just wish the Os had one of those guys. 

[Aristotelian]

13 minutes ago, MDK02 said:

Jackson Churios(20 yrs old), Jackson Meril(21), Bobby Witt Jr(23) all have no problem producing in big moments. Gunnar has a problem, maybe he’ll get better in those big moments but he’s not good now, he’s actually terrible. It’s unfortunate but it’s reality. 

Gunnar hit 1.288 OPS in the playoffs last year. 

[Barnaby Graves]

13 minutes ago, EddeeEddee said:

But then there is the point Rbiggs252 brings up above where he points out he thinks analytics could be part of the problem in that it discounts old school baseball virtues of singles, walks, bunts and hit and runs. 

Even if this is a real issue -- especially as something that distinguishes the O's from other successful teams at a similar budget level -- I think it would start in the front office (though maybe extend to coaching too).  Even if the front office doesn't pursue players with these strengths, the coaching staff could try to adopt and train these qualities as in game tactics in certain situations -- but I'm thinking only with the front office's blessing.

I’m not up on the latest analytical thinking—I am really not that kind of sports fan anymore—but walks?  I can’t imagine that organizationally they are discounting walks.  Our marquee young players seemed to distinguish themselves in the maturity of their approaches on their scouting reports and in their earlier play even at the major league level.  Contrast that with the last two days where we had like seven or eight Javy Baez’s (or whoever, feel like I’ve seen a lot of clips of that guy hacking at air).  How many high fastballs did they swing through or pop up?  And nobody adjusted.  The Royals had them completely lost and the council of hitting coaches obviously couldn’t fix it.  I don’t know man, everyone’s just regressed.  How many freaking times do you hear how it’s a “game of adjustments” and who really did that well in the second half, let alone the last two games?  They failed at that both macro and micro.

[EddeeEddee]

1 minute ago, Aristotelian said:

Gunnar hit 1.288 OPS in the playoffs last year. 

Exactly.  I'm not convinced the hitting woes are here to stay because of the personnel involved -- at least not the young personnel.  The hitting fell off for many guys this season who are clearly talented.  We don't know why, but we have to trust the team will get to the bottom of it.  What choice do we have?

[RavensNOsGuy]

24 minutes ago, MDK02 said:

Jackson Churios(20 yrs old), Jackson Meril(21), Bobby Witt Jr(23) all have no problem producing in big moments. Gunnar has a problem, maybe he’ll get better in those big moments but he’s not good now, he’s actually terrible. It’s unfortunate but it’s reality. 

You’re right. John Harbaugh should have been fired about 6 years ago. But he has a lifetime contract and the owner has checked out on caring about the team. Lots of the empty seats are the norm now at both stadiums.

[Hallas]

24 minutes ago, DirtyBird said:

F’ dem Pollyannas

Stunt on dem pollyannas.