International FAILURES Continue...

[Mike B]

Am I surprised?

Not in the least bit.

Take a look at this exclusive photo taken of the Orioles facility in the Dominican Republic.

<a href="http://s528.photobucket.com/albums/dd329/1blue4u/?action=view&current=Dominica-1stvisit006-1-1.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i528.photobucket.com/albums/dd329/1blue4u/Dominica-1stvisit006-1-1.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

This is unacceptable. AM must have ADD, his head is totally not in the game.

Come on it has a nice shade tree and at points during the year free coconut milk. Let's see the Yankees top that.

[Arthur_Bryant]

I feel you will never get the answer to that question publicly. If he is frustrated, he will quietly move on to a job inside baseball, most likely MLB headquarters and never say a negative word. That is AM style.

I have wondered about this since we sold Bradford, Gathright, and Guzman. None of these guys really matter but there seemed to be a budget that was being worked. You have gone on about resources for a year now, and I have always asked how you know what resources we have. I think it is a valid question especially when you read something like Stotle posted.

It's a business. There is always a budget.

Fact of life.

[treasure07]

It's a business. There is always a budget.

Fact of life.

Not for the Yankees.

[Arthur_Bryant]

Let me apologize to the board and to Orioles fans for causing a "sky is falling" freakout. The organization clearly has earned the benefit of our doubt with its past activities in Latin America, and my overreaction was uncalled for.

Ha, talk about sneaky fast.

I think everybody got caught looking.

[Mike B]

It's a business. There is always a budget.

Fact of life.

Never a doub about that, but my point is the budget is a lot lower than many believe.

[Birds of B'more]

Given that JOHN is capitalized here, can we assume that DAVID may be the problem? He is/was the head of the DR deal according to this-

http://www.orioleshangout.com/ttakeArticle.asp?ID=1322&page=ttake

Well, based on the link to Tony's column, we can infer that someone inside the front office has read this board at some point. It sounds like this thread has gotten the attention of several people with sources or connections in the front office. For now, I will withhold further judgment on this topic and hope for a response from someone knowledgeable with the O's international scouting, and the D.R. in particular. While it is certainly not owed to us, I would hope an honest response is forthcoming. When scouting and developing international talent has been a huge Achilles heel of this organization during the 12 years of losing, and a new GM stated two years ago that it will be of much greater priority...well, to read the quote in that article is very deflating, to say the least.

[JTrea81]

It's a business. There is always a budget.

Fact of life.

But with the Orioles having lowered their payroll and having a 20+ million profit, you would think their budget could be bigger than some teams in the draft and international scouting.

If we aren't going to spend it on FAs, then we need to spend it in scouting and development.

[carolinaoriole]

I have one question about this article.

Based on track record why does anyone believe espn or fox sports.

this is an espn article.

Cmon.

Why would a reporter print something like this.

[Birds of B'more]

Am I surprised?

Not in the least bit.

Take a look at this exclusive photo taken of the Orioles facility in the Dominican Republic.

<a href="http://s528.photobucket.com/albums/dd329/1blue4u/?action=view&current=Dominica-1stvisit006-1-1.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i528.photobucket.com/albums/dd329/1blue4u/Dominica-1stvisit006-1-1.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

This is unacceptable. AM must have ADD, his head is totally not in the game.

I vacationed at a resort in the D. R. a few years ago. When I went to town to do some souvenir shopping some guy led me to a shed that looked exactly like that and wanted me to try his homemade mamajuanna. I have little recollection of leaving there, but I think I was temporarily blind. Boy, was I young and dumb...

...OK, just dumb.

[hoosiers]

Wow...a four page thread hung on this slender reed of second-hand opinion.

Is it possible that this means the Orioles DR organization is a mess? Yes. Is it possible that this means nothing? Yes.

The only conclusion I can draw from that qoute is it's made one hell of a four-page-long mirror...reflecting everyone's prejudices with crystal clarity.

(Now Tony's post worries me greatly. As usual, his information carries much more weight with me than ESPN hearsay.)

I agree there's some over-reaction here.

First, to be clear, the Os appear to have a presence scouting this league - just not a "regular" one. Now, I would prefer the Os have as much participation as everyone else, but we do not know what "regular" means - it could mean 75%, 50%, 25% - who knows? If there are 30+ teams in MLB and half the kids in this league are legit international prospects, it means the Os, by not having a "regular" presence, may or may not be missing out on ONE prospect! On the other hand, we are signing guys out in Guatemala and Australia - so we are clearly expanding our reach from when AM took over.

Second, the Os are clearly expanding their international presence based on the spend from two years ago and the prospects signed. There are plans to add a third scout and to increase the presence of US scouts by almost the equivalent of a FT person. We are also hiring additional part-time scouts and will have enough prospects to field a second DSL team this year. This is all progress - major progress. As Roch noted, building an appropriate international presence takes time. IMO, trying to overbid by $100k for a $3M international talent is not an appropriate way to supplement an attempt to building an international scouting presence - it's likely a huge and visible waste of $.

At the end of the day, we've yet to see the Os be competitive bidders for anyone considered by the scouting community to be an international prospect. We appear to trail by a considerable margin other organizations in the number of full time scouts on the payroll. This is not acceptable in the long run, but it should be acceptable today given where we were 12-24 months ago. As posted over the weekend, international scouting is frought with perils of prospects lying about their ages, scouts inflating signing bonuses to take a cut and generally poor results of the prospects who receive the highest bonuses - especially relative to the US draft.

I expect AM is fully aware of all of this. I believe he had a legit international scouting infrastructure in Chicago and he may have had the same in Minn. As has been mentioned in articles and again by Roch, building a credible international presence takes time. We've made major progress in two years and, despite this progress, there's still so much to be done. For me, finding out that we may or may not be missing out on one or two prospects in a Dominican League is not a reason to have a cow, but instead a reason to realize how far we still have to go in building a credible international scouting presence - despite the recent progress.

[Stotle]

But with the Orioles having lowered their payroll and having a 20+ million profit, you would think their budget could be bigger than some teams in the draft and international scouting.

If we aren't going to spend it on FAs, then we need to spend it in scouting and development.

I don't think "spend" is the big issue. We can all agree that BAL has in fact spent more on international prospects than it has in the past. Measuring improvements simply how much BAL has or has not spent is an incomplete analysis, in my opinion.

What jumped out at me in the article is the fact that a league like this caters to an organization like the Orioles -- not yet established in the area, not looking to spend big (yet) and not a lot of scouts to sprinkle around. This is all low- to mid-tier talent, all in one place and none of it requires a specialized relationship to witness. My worry is that if BAL isn't making a low cost commitment like putting a rep at a good number of these league games (which the article indicates are only on Wednesdays), how realistic is it that they will do the work that requires even more of an effort/financial investment?

I mean, we can all give the FO the benefit of the doubt, and perhaps it's warranted. But the article also mentioned that a good number of Latin American Scouting Directors have made it a point to check out the league, not just low level scouts. There are obviously organizations that really find this endeavor to be at minimal interesting and worth running with for now. Perhaps BAL had senior reps check things out, as well, but I'd find it hard to believe Mejia would then think of BAL as a "non-regular". I guess the article just seems off. The league is a perfect fit for a team in BAL's shoes, and I personally have to at least question any decision to not be an active part of a league that requires so little investment to cover and basically your target low- to mid-tier "value" players to invest in (if the article is accurate in its description of the BAL presence). Improvements in total money spent and an additional full-time scout are nice additions, but there is clearly pushback from somewhere as to investing too much too quickly in this area. When you're chasing the Red Sox and the Yankees, I'm not sure slow, incremental improvements have any chance of closing that gap anytime soon.

[McNulty]

Orioles director of international scouting John Stockstill told me late last night that the club has "evaluators" at the Dominican Prospect League who are "reporting to us on a regular basis."

Stockstill described the league as "basically a showcase" of Dominican teenage players who weren't drafted. It's largely gone unnoticed among fans here until ESPN.com ran a story yesterday with agent Brian Mejia noting how the Orioles and White Sox haven't had a regular presence at games.

Sound the alarms!

"We do have people reporting to us," Stockstill said.

Stockstill also pointed out that many of these players are showcased at other events. "And many of them have probably been at our facility and our camp," he said. "And that's not just Baltimore. That's probably a lot of other clubs, as well."

In other words, the Orioles aren't depending only on this prospect league to evaluate the talent over there. On any given day, you might have 20 workouts taking place at various complexes.

The Oriole are trying to repair the huge deficiencies in their international scouting, and it's a process that won't happen overnight. If you read Dan Connolly's excellent article in The Sun, you know they're shorthanded. They've been at a disadvantage for too long, and that's inexcusable in my book. But it's being corrected - slowly but surely.

And please stop calling me...OK, anyway...

It's probably worth noting that agents who accuse the Orioles of not having a "regular presence" at the prospect league games might not recognize the organization's representatives due to some structural changes that have taken place. It's not the same cast of characters.

http://masnsports.com/2010/01/the-orioles-side-of-the-story.html

[Peace21]

http://masnsports.com/2010/01/the-orioles-side-of-the-story.html

The stop calling me line ruined any credibility the article/blog had.

[ChaosLex]

http://masnsports.com/2010/01/the-orioles-side-of-the-story.html

Hmm.

Not sure how I feel about that.

[Dipper9]

If Roch's info is true, and not CYA by the O's, then I hope you guys who have destroyed them over this "crisis" will back up a tad????