Seems like MacPhail "gets it"

[RVAbird]

I guess I just long for the day when you can relate to the players, because the good ones are there year after year. And this afternoon I have had time to reflect on this conversation and to tell the truth... Every year I enjoy baseball less. And it is mostly because the players change teams so much. You got to know not only the players for your team but the players on the other teams. And that was just from a casual fans stand point. I am sure the hard core fans know each roster and the all. I use to know several players on just about each team, now I would be lucky to tell you more then one on each team other then the Yanks and Soxs. IMO the game has become so impersonal, and even though I understand the numbers and why most want to see some of these guys traded, it is like taking away a big part of why I enjoyed the game to begin with.

Shine I even said a couple time I was in favor of blowing it up. But it was like when my wife was looking at new cars. I said it was ok to look at Chevys, until we got on the lot and was really looking at them. I told her I just can't do this. So she got a Dodge, it is not a Ford but I can handle a Dodge.

Part of your disillusionment might come from the very system you think you support. If this team stays in the mode of signing mediocre FAs to bloated mid-term contracts, we lose draft picks and the FAs don't stay for long. What better way to get to know your team than to construct it full of young talented players who will be under team control for 5-6 years and start taking advantage of the draft in order to bring up home-grown talent that can become the faces of the organization. If we go with a youth movement and rebuild, I think you will get that opportunity to connect with the players as you watch them grow. Does that make sense?

[Tomkingsize]

If a young guy is already on a major league roster and producing well, it becomes much harder to get him, so I'd rather get more value out of guys who have yet to spend much or anytime in the bigs, but wil be ready to do so next year.

Right and Ian Stewart fits this description to a tee.

[Delduck]

Part of your disillusionment might come from the very system you think you support. If this team stays in the mode of signing mediocre FAs to bloated mid-term contracts, we lose draft picks and the FAs don't stay for long. What better way to get to know your team than to construct it full of young talented players who will be under team control for 5-6 years and start taking advantage of the draft in order to bring up home-grown talent that can become the faces of the organization. If we go with a youth movement and rebuild, I think you will get that opportunity to connect with the players as you watch them grow. Does that make sense?

I am in no way wanting us to sign mediocre FA's, I am having a hard time with trading Erik and BRob. IMO they are still young and will be productive for the next 5-6 years. I don't feel that the drop off they will experience will be much until maybe the last year of their contracts. Even then I feel they will good players. I know stats are aginst me, and I do not have numbers to back how I feel, But sometimes baseball is more then just numbers.

[RVAbird]

I am in no way wanting us to sign mediocre FA's, I am having a hard time with trading Erik and BRob. IMO they are still young and will be productive for the next 5-6 years. I don't feel that the drop off they will experience will be much until maybe the last year of their contracts. Even then I feel they will good players. I know stats are aginst me, and I do not have numbers to back how I feel, But sometimes baseball is more then just numbers.

That's totally understandable, but the thing is even though they may remain productive there is no way we can complement them with adequate talent except through the FA market, which gets us back to the original problem. I know it's going to hurt parting ways with these guys, but it's the only way to create a team that has a direction and can grow and compete together.

[Sports Guy]

I am in no way wanting us to sign mediocre FA's, I am having a hard time with trading Erik and BRob. IMO they are still young and will be productive for the next 5-6 years. I don't feel that the drop off they will experience will be much until maybe the last year of their contracts. Even then I feel they will good players. I know stats are aginst me, and I do not have numbers to back how I feel, But sometimes baseball is more then just numbers.

It seems to me that liking the players and having them grow close to the fans means more to you than winning.

Let's look at the other side of this.....What if those guys just flat out don't want to be here anymore?

What if the losing has gotten to them and they just say, we are tired of it...We want to win.

So then what happens? You watch them leave after 2009 and all you get are some draft picks.

[DrungoHazewood]

I guess I just long for the day when you can relate to the players, because the good ones are there year after year. And this afternoon I have had time to reflect on this conversation and to tell the truth... Every year I enjoy baseball less. And it is mostly because the players change teams so much. You got to know not only the players for your team but the players on the other teams. And that was just from a casual fans stand point. I am sure the hard core fans know each roster and the all. I use to know several players on just about each team, now I would be lucky to tell you more then one on each team other then the Yanks and Soxs. IMO the game has become so impersonal, and even though I understand the numbers and why most want to see some of these guys traded, it is like taking away a big part of why I enjoyed the game to begin with.

Shine I even said a couple time I was in favor of blowing it up. But it was like when my wife was looking at new cars. I said it was ok to look at Chevys, until we got on the lot and was really looking at them. I told her I just can't do this. So she got a Dodge, it is not a Ford but I can handle a Dodge.

Most people who long for the days before free agency when players stuck with their teams forever were fans of the Yankees, Orioles, Cardinals, Dodgers, and maybe a few other teams. I really doubt that fans of the St. Louis Browns or KC A's or Washington Senators weep for a past where they got to keep their 60-win teams for decades on end. It's wonderful when you have Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams locked up for a lifetime. Not so great when the best you can do is Mickey Vernon and George McQuinn.

The O's are the Washington Senators of today, and I regularly get down on my knees and thank the Lord that we could turn over the whole roster in the blink of an eye.

[Delduck]

It seems to me that liking the players and having them grow close to the fans means more to you than winning.

Let's look at the other side of this.....What if those guys just flat out don't want to be here anymore?

What if the losing has gotten to them and they just say, we are tired of it...We want to win.

So then what happens? You watch them leave after 2009 and all you get are some draft picks.

I want my cake and eat it too. As I have said from the beginning I am not opposed to trading some, such as Miggy , DCab and some other harder to trade guys. And I guess I am not completely opposed to trading BRob and Erik as long as everything possibly has been do to keep them in a O's uniform and improve the team. But if Erik say I will not sign an extension under any circumstances, them that bridge it burnt and I would be fine trading him.

[rolliefingers]

I give up. I just dumbfounded. Why do you guys even like this sport and this team inparticular?? What is the point of cheering on a team when the players change year after year? Whats the point when the game has been reduced down to cold hard stats and numbers. I guess we should have traded Cal after the 94 season, in his finnal 7 seasons he only had 2 years above an .800 OPS. And why did we even want Brooks in his whole career he only posted 2 above .800. Now I understand why I never took an intrest in stats in baseball, after a time all that matters is the numbers not the passion or players.

How have you been able to watch baseball since the mid-'70s?

[DrungoHazewood]

How have you been able to watch baseball since the mid-'70s?

There are posters over at the OOTP messageboards who seriously think that baseball peaked in the mid-1950s and has been on a downward slide ever since. To them free agency, expansion, and divisional play were kicks in the nuts. They've pretty much given up on the sport in real life and use OOTP to simulate worlds where 1955 baseball is completely unchanged and the Brooklyn Dodgers and Yankees can fight it out forever and ever.

I've seen 26-page epic threads on how it's objectively provable that baseball of 50 years ago was better than that of today in every way.

There's some weird people in this world.

[Delduck]

How have you been able to watch baseball since the mid-'70s?

To be honest I have not watched, and I mean whole games of baseball, and seriously fallowed the sport since the very early 90's. I kept track of the O's through the papers and Internet. But seriously watched and keep track of baseball as a whole it has only been the past couple years I have tried to get caught up.

The past couple days have really got me thinking about how much I have fell out of love for this sport. I have learned so much from this website in particular I can formulate a semi informed opinion, but the passion about the sport is really not there.

Any way enough of me pouring out my baseball soul, we need to get the discussion back on the topic at hand.

[rolliefingers]

The past couple days have really got me thinking about how much I have fell out of love for this sport.

That's interesting. I can definitely understand the nostalgia for the earlier era of baseball, when the players were "more like us". Hell, early Orioles players used to live in Waverly, a few blocks from the stadium; today, that notion is truly mind-blowing.

But I never experienced that era. I began following baseball just before the HR era started (1989 - I was 7 years old). Free agency is all I know. And as a result, the inner workings of a front office have become in some ways more important than the on-field product.

Personally, I don't think baseball players are "overpaid"; rather, I think they were artificially UNDERPAID until the reserve clause was overturned. The high ticket prices we pay today are recompense for the 80-something years of artifically cheap baseball that our ancestors enjoyed. I'd rather the money go to the players than some do-nothing owner; at least the players create the value of the product.

I still love the game itself. I think it's both a thinking man's sport and one of the most purely athletic sports ever created. I could - hell, I DID, several times - watch a game between the two worst teams in the league and still find something to enjoy.

But in a world where the Yankees are allowed to spend five or six times as much on players as the Devil Rays, I find front office machinations to be incredibly fascinating. The reason Moneyball was so great is that it showed a way for David to beat Goliath. If MLB had a salary cap, there'd be no more David and Goliath; it'd just be 30 Goliaths, separated sometimes by truly great or awful management (e.g. Patriots, Knicks), but more often by something approaching dumb luck.

As frustrating as it is to be an Orioles fan right now, the truth is that we have nobody to blame but ourselves. We spend a ton of money on awful players; we refuse to buy low and sell high on the trade market; we value personal virtue and sentimentality over on-field performance.

To me, it's a cop-out to blame our failures on the Yankees and Red Sox. They'll probably always have more money than us, but if Billy Beane can build a playoff team with 1/3 of their resources, then there's hope for us all.

Sure, some of the personal relationships with players get lost in the mix. But it's been that way for a long time. To me, the real drama is in the boardroom as much as it is on the field.

[RShack]

As frustrating as it is to be an Orioles fan right now, the truth is that we have nobody to blame but ourselves. We spend a ton of money on awful players; we refuse to buy low and sell high on the trade market; we value personal virtue and sentimentality over on-field performance.

Flanny as GM reminds me of Bobby Cox as GM. They both realized that the farm system is important, and they both did things to improve the sucky farm system they inherited. But neither one had a clue about what to do with the ML roster, and neither one could pull the trigger on any important trades. Cox wound up back in the dugout, where he belongs. I hope Flanny winds up in some good role that is good for him and vice versa...

[Witchy_Chick]

Well I had to respond that way because you chose to pick certain parts of my whole post. And I really could not care less how you type it up as long as you respond in a thought out, respectful manner.

I guess we will have to agree to disagree about our young soon to be FAs. I know we can't spend with the Soxs or Yanks, pretty much nobody can. I would say that large 5 year deals to a potential perennial ace and all star 2nd baseman is money well spent. So you hand out a 5 year deal (don't agree with contracts longer then that) to said ace and 2nd baseman they will be what???? 33-35 when the contract expires. Those are not old ages for a ball player in this day and age.

I’m assuming you’re referring to Bedard and Roberts as your “potential perennial ace and all star 2nd baseman.” The problem is – neither one of them (seemingly) want to sign a 5-year deal right now. They’re both under club control thru the 2009 season (Brian via his current extension, and Bedard via arb years 2 and 3). However, at the conclusion of the 2009 season, Brian will be 32 and Bedard 30 (31 on OD 2010). There’s no way you sign either one of them to five-year deals at that juncture.

Basically, it takes two to tango. The club may want to extend Roberts and Bedard to five-year deals right now, but neither one wants to commit. By the time Roberts and Bedard might be ready to commit (post-2009 season), it will not be feasible for the club to do so. We’ve already missed the boat on Roberts and Bedard. What we need to do from this point forward is lock up our good young talent (I’m looking at you, Nick) to 5-year deals. The Twins way of doing business if you will (see: Santana (extended 2/05 for '05-'08 seasons), Mauer (extended 2/07 for '07-'10 seasons), Crain (extended 2/07 for '07-'09)).

As an aside, looking at Morneau’s tenure/contract situation – I bet the Twins attempt to extend him this off-season.

Witchy

[Tx Oriole]

I am just as big a fan of baseball as i have always been. I like the Orioles but they are not the reason i like baseball. Yes it is nice to remember when players stayed with a team through out their career. But that is just not the way it works now for the most part. But just because some players move ffrom one team to another doesn't take away from baseball as a game. I even like to read books about the old stars from 100 or more years ago. I am reading about Cap Anson now. What ever that iis just me having a loveof the game.

[Old#5fan]

I do think that McPhail "gets it." However, what he is "getting" is nothing more than what the average devout and serious Orioles fan has known all along. Its a darn shame that we had to go through several GM's or VPOBO whatever they called Syd Thrift before somebody seems to state a firm grasp of the obvious! The sorry fact that this organization is 28/30 in finding and developing major league talent is the heart or root of the problem. This needed to be changed years ago. It is not something that should have gone un-noticed or not addressed. At least McPhail has publicly aknowledged the problem. Now lets see if he can provide the solution. IMHO that's a big if!