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Lunar's OPS
Career ML: .531 (237 AB)
So what do they do this year? Carry too many catchers. Give Lunar 0 ABs. Then cut him. By the way, their other two catchers? Hitting 143/192/224..
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/scores/20020716/seabal.html
And the O's sweep the mighty Mariners!
They're more likely to deal Ponson, sadly.
Exactly -- and that's why the plaudits over on Clutch Hits about Syd Thrift are inappropriate. Can anything sum up the Orioles' woes over the Thrift era better than the fact that they can't decide whether they should trade Ponson or Erickson?
I think you're a little unfair on your Matthews comments; with Conine and Segui out, there's a lot of playing time out there.
Gibbons should play everday that his wrist isn't bothering him. He's brutal at 1B and adequate in RF. I'd play him everday in LF. He can make fewer mistakes in LF at Camden Yards since it's not a tricky corner and it's relatively shallow with a standard height wall. RF is much tougher to play with multiple wall heights and compositions, along with a tough corner and longer throw.
Richard should play everday that his shoulder allows. Perhaps that means DH, but he's the best RF the team has. Play him there unless he can't physically.
Conine at 1B unless Segui is back. Segui is better defensively so he wins there. But, Segui is made of glass, so he's not around.
That leaves Cordova at DH unless Segui is back, the Conine at DH.
If an overpowering LHP is on the mound pull Gibbons and Richard and let all of the old men play.
More interesting, I guess is Gary Matthews Jr. taking the spot from Chris Singleton and Willie Harris playing almost everday in Chicago, while the Birds have no secondbaseman. Oh, to be Syd. I only wish I live that long.
It might have been bizarre, even pathetic, but the Orioles still swept the 1st place Twins.
That is, maybe it's not DIPS, maybe it is that he's easier to hit and he will have his head handed to him in the majors ... and be sent back down soon enough not to mess with Voros' discovery. :-)
-- MWE
I don't think anyone has made that comparison, though, since he put on three years in the space of an afternoon. At one point, he was the "youngest" guy in the Eastern League, which makes for honesttogod prospect points. Now, he's just the general oxymoron -- Orioles prospect.
There is no consistency is the way O's farm teams teach their players, if they teach anything at all. It's a long way from the days of the Oriole Way. Fortunately, Syd Thrift, Peter Angelos, and the Angelos boys are all mortal. Perhaps my grandchildren will live to see another flag besides the American fly over Baltimore.
Rival executives are snickering at the Orioles' quest to trade CF Chris
I don't think Hentgen would be available as an NRI - someone else would have offered him a guaranteed deal, because if it works out and he becomes a league-average starter again, that's probably worth $5 million. If it's a $1 million deal, and Hentgen has even a 20% chance of being the pitcher he was, it works for me. I think he might have that good a chance once he is fully recovered (there were indications that he was not fully recovered when he came back in September.
If it's for a half-million, I'd do it in a heartbeat, even with the knowledge that he was horrible this year.
The Orioles know better than anyone how Hentgen is actually doing, aside from those four September starts.
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The Orioles expect Hentgen to be part of a starting rotation that also could feature Rodrigo Lopez, Sidney Ponson, Jason Johnson and Scott Erickson. Other candidates include John Stephens, Sean Douglass, Rick Bauer and Travis Driskill.
Of course, lots can change between then and April, but always assume the Orioles are doing the dumbest thing possible.
And what's up with bashing Sidney Ponson? I just don't understand the disrespect he gets from the Oriole organization. It's like his failure to be Mike Mussina means he's useless. Meanwhile, crappy Jason Johnson has a good game once every few months and he's an up-and-coming star.
So, it's not a good move, but it certainly isn't costing them the opportunity to sign anyone else meaningful.
David,
This goes without saying. (or should.) I wasn't trying to say that the Orioles would do that, merely that I thought they should. The point I clearly did not get across is that none of those 4 are going to be confused as a #1 or #2 starter on a decent team. Nor are the Orioles going to be much better for 2003 with any permutation of the four of them than if they just let the minor league pitchers fill out the rotation. At this point Erickson, as a league average pitcher probably has more value to a contending team than he does to the O's. This being the last year of his contract, I think it's time for the Orioles to see what they can get for him. Ponson in five seasons has shown himself to be slightly below average. If he's healthy, maybe a change of scenery does him good. If his shoulder is badly injured, then he probably won't be pitching for anyone for a while. Jason Johnson over the past few years has proven he's not much of a starter and because of his diabetes he needs to be on a regular schedule, he can't relieve either. So the O's should just cut him loose if no one else is willing to take him off their hands. Pat Hentgen is a year younger and much cheaper than Erickson, and if healthy, he's a better pitcher than Ponson or Johnson.
The Orioles finished 2002 right where I expected at the begining of the season. A .500 record on August 23rd was pleasantly surprising. A 4-32 finish was utterly depressing. I realize they have more problems than their weak minor league system could ever hope to fix. Yet they have pitchers that if they're ever going to be ready to pitch in the majors, now is the time to find out. I'm just proposing that they do so.
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Umm... Dan, toto's not in Rochester any more. Try Ottawa!
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Yeah, it is. But it fits in with their historic m.o. for this past season:
? Become only the 9th team since 1901 to go through a 4-32 streak.
IIRC, you're not an Oriole fan so it probably wouldn't matter. While watching them during the 2003 season, keep this thought firmly in mind; For them to get better, first they have to get worse. [No doubt they will. The question is: will it be in the right way or the wrong way?] With Angelos in micro-command, who knows?
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...though I am a member of the UB-FTTS (Universal Brotherhood - Fans of Teams That Suck).
Beattie's a smart guy, though I never observed anything about him that showed off skills a GM needs. BUT he has done the job once, so he at least knows the mechanics, and most smart people who have done a job before learn some to-dos and not-to-dos.
Flanagan is an intelligent guy, too. Steeped in The Oriole Way from the tradition that Paul Richards built, so it's a connection to the (successful) past. At the same time, he's younger, more contemporary. As a fan of those old Os teams, I can see an optimistic possibility where Beattie is the mechanic who knows when to send out contracts and do the right paperwork, do the finances, and Flanagan is "the vision guy", embracing the best of the old Oriole model with an openness to new technologies and analysis.
OTOH, it's always a challenge when two smart guys split a job, because the politics, especially in the pressure-cooker a fellow like Angelos intentionally creates as part of his approach, can turn them into a bad imitation of the last two people on "Survivor".
Hmmm, perhaps Angelos is going to sell the rights to a new unreality show...
You might want to check again. Beattie (Born July 4, 1954) is younger than Flanagan (Born December 16, 1951).
Dan,
Where you so upset that you had to post this twice? ;-) ...
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Bird,
No...! They were 63-63 on August 23rd, when they did the "satellite burning up on reentry" thing, losing 32 of their last 36 games... That was bad enough thank you. Personally, I might not mind 100+ loses this season if it means they'll do something creative. Jayson Stark is saying Hank Blalock may be "available" from the Rangers in the right deal. If Beat-Agan can package one or more of Ponson, Erickson and Johnson to get him, I think they should. Then they can shuffle through the young pitchers on the Ottawa-Baltimore shuttle.
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Olperfesser,
The Minor - Julio deal was done on 12/22/00. Beattie left the Expos after the 2001 season. Technically, yes he was the GM when that went down but you have to consider how much control did he have with Loria and Samson being the conductors on the "crazy train."
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Given St. Rey's skill set and salary, he wasn't going to cost anything in talent -- they were talking about Scott Erickson, after all. So he would have been a better option. Now they're stuck with Erickson and a shortstop worse than Rey.
You're gonna love watching him "move" to his right.
The Orioles are my rooting interest and play where I see baseball games 80% of the time. Deivi Cruz inspires me not at all to increase that % and, in fact, helps to decrease it.
Just sticking Mora in as the shortstop would have given me at least a shred of hope that Beatagan was going to help out the franchise. It show me that at least that the team understood that there was nobody on the market worth pursuing and that the team wanted to improve the wretched offense, which Mora at shortstop would certainly help do.
But they didn't. They signed the first shortstop hanging around, a player who has no business being a major leaguer if he's making more than major league minimum.
They try nothing creative: no moving Mora to short, no moving Batista or Hairston to short, no minor league FA signings that could stop the gap like Jason Maxwell or Mendy Lopez. They couldn't even wait 5 days to see if someone interesting was non-tendered.
They went out and got basically the worst option available and have not made a single move this winter to try to fix a franchise that is, from top-to-bottom, the least talented organization I have ever seen. If MLB suddenly went to a 10-man roster over the winter, it still wouldn't be difficult to whittle down the team.
Frankly, if I were the owner of the Orioles, this would be enough for me to fire Flanagan and Beattie right now. He gave them jobs managing an asset worth hundreds of millions and dollars and, when finally stepping in, their first act is to flush over a million dollars down the toilet.
<a
Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me.
Everyone makes decisions that turn out to be poor in the long run. That's not the problem here. The problem is that what Beatagan has done is to be just plain dumb. There's no cure for dumb and I have no use for dumb.
Compared to the options of paying Bordick twice that much for one year or putting Melvin Mora there on an everyday basis, I think this is making the best out of a bad situation.
Mora is a better option, by far, offensively and defensively.
Better options:
T-file the broom, break out the machete.
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And Jeremy, you're way out of date. The Orioles' payroll has been dropping rapidly in recent years. The Orioles were at 74 million in 2001 and were at 60 million in 2002 -- and those figures include Albert Belle's full salary, despite the fact that he's not on the team and insurance pays most of it.
It's akin to deciding that since insurance can't cover the intangible value your home has to you, it's best not to have a home at all.
The chances of Stephens, Douglass, Bauer, or any of the lower-level pitching prospects getting a real shot requires them go the Rodrigo Lopez route; hope that they're the lucky warm body when one of the Orioles' preferred mediocre-to-crappy veteran option flames out.
What year are the Orioles going to really give some of these players a chance? Hentgen, Erickson and Daal are just the current cast of deadwood in the rotation. 3 years from now, they'll just be known by different names. Maybe a washed-up Jon Leiter and Rick Reed. Or Al Leiter clinging to the remaining scraps of his career. Or Brian Anderson.
The names change, but the Orioles have remained the same and show no hope of bringing anything different to the table. The panhandlers outside the park are more likely to use money spent on gameday wisely than the panhandlers inside the park.
Still, I don't think this move is as bad as most here do. Hentgen & Erickson remind me of this year's Bears quarterbacks Jim Miller & Chris Chandler - two injury prone, past-their-primer guys who are both such large injury risks that the odds of both of them ending up injured & out for the year is much better than the odds neither will. Also, last year Lopez's H% was .256 (not including SH) for a franchise w/ a team H% of .286. So he gave up 18 fewer hits than one would expect. I don't see him repeating that any time soon.
The Orioles have to be the worst franchise in baseball by far now. . . Even the Devil Rays will surpass the O's. Honestly, the O's could lose 110 games this year.
Naw, the D-Rays are still worse. Last year they had the worst ERA in AL at 5.29. From that pitching staff, they've had Alvarez retire, cut Rupe & Kent, and let Wilson, Sturtze, & Yan go. Not only did those guys accounted for 49% of Tampa's innings, but they actually outpitched the guys left behind. Gone ERA: 5.10, Remaining ERA 5.46. I have no problem with a team gutting a lousy pitching staff, but they actually made the staff a little worse. Some franchises may be able to cheaply fill a 700 IP whole with league average talent, but I don't see Tampa being one of them. Added bonus - Jorge Sosa last year had a H% of .229 & a hit deviation of -21 (& he still stank). No way he'll repeat that. It's Joe Kennedy & pray for typhoon.
2) The local papers stressed something we've only touched on briefly: he's a LHP. As if it matters. But this was either (a) very important to the Orioles or (b) the only good thing that could really be said about Daal.
3) Mike Flanagan said, "But four of the last five years, he's been outstanding." Not particularly encouraging if he really believes this.
1. While it may not be of any comfort to a long-suffering fan (read: Dan), there has to be revenue value in winning 75 games games rather than 65. Hanging around .500 until the all-star break has to help TV revenues and sell some tickets in August in September. Winning 75 rather than 65, must make it easier to sell hope and season tickets for the following year.
2. I would agree that whatever revenue boost you might get from being mediocre rather than awful would not be justified if you were really impeding development potential. But between the injury potential of Hengten and Erickson and the perennial trade potential of Ponson there ought to be plenty of innings to tro out the younger guys, none of whom appears to be a budding Curt Schilling anyway.
1. While it may not be of any comfort to a long-suffering fan (read: Dan), there has to be revenue value in winning 75 games games rather than 70 or below. Hanging around .500 until the all-star break has to help TV revenues and sell some tickets in August and September. Winning 75 rather than 65, must make it easier to sell hope and season tickets for the following year.
2. I would agree that whatever revenue boost you might get from being mediocre rather than awful would not be justified if you were really impeding development potential. But between the injury potential of Hengten and Erickson and the perennial trade potential of Ponson there ought to be plenty of innings to trot out the younger guys, none of whom appears to be a budding Curt Schilling anyway.
Now, you can use him in middle relief -- but I don't see that 50 outings of 1 1/3 innings each is particularly useful for developing a pitcher into a starter.
But at this point, Omar Daal and Scott Erickson and Pat Hentgen are certainly not.
I'd rather put my money into a random stock selected by throwing a dart over the next 5 years than put the same money into a slot machine.
Speaking of how many games the O's will lose next year--some sportsbooks offshore and in Vegas have offer over/under bets for total wins for the season. (It seems like something some people here might enjoy trying their hand at, even if not with real money. In fact, it might make a cool contest this spring, to go over or under for all 30 teams....) Anyhow, the O's were at 67 1/2, which to my mind made them prime under candidates. I accordingly placed my little all on them. Fast forward to Aug. 23, when they are 63-63, and there is much despair and nashing of teeth. The rest, of course, is history. A miraculous 4-32 finish, with a dramatic 12 game losing streak to seal the deal. I really wish I could have watched that final game. For some reason, it wasn't televised. (To all Orioles fans who read this, you have my deepest sympathies.
The Daal signing sucks, of course, but it might help them make their over this year.
The Orioles of the Oughts don't have the advantage of a strong, well stocked minor league system like the Indians did. Any position players worth mentioning are either in the low minors or not even in the system yet. The only players even near ready are the handful of pitchers on the previously mentioned Ottawa - Baltimore shuttle. With the window of opportunity not even opening until 2006, it makes just as much sense to try to develop the abilities of these pitchers in Baltimore than it does to do so in Ottawa. Continue playing the younger players on the roster while continuing to look for talent from all available sources until the minor league system is capable of supplying some of the demand. Consider 2003 a development year, 2004 an improvement year and then expect 2005 to be a production year.
The reason I don't like the Cruz and Daal signings (on top of the Segui, Conine, Cordova signings of previous years) is because it looks to be hideously close to the model followed by the last team to have a 4 - 32 streak. And we all know how that's turned out by now. You don't give average players multi millions over 4 years and you sign free agents when you have one or two needs at most, not when you have a half a roster full of needs.
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You might want to take the Orioles on the "over" for 2003. FWIW, the eight teams that accompished 4 - 32 streaks, (as mentioned in my previous post) all improved their record the following year. It's my reckoning that the line will be set lower this year, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if the Orioles became the first team out of the nine not to improved their record. The usual disclaimers apply: small sample size; past performance does not guarantee future results; your mileage may vary... ;-) ...
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Some of the other o/u's I identified as gems last year, IIRC
Tigers under 73 (hindsight is 20/20 and all, but I should have been able to see that this was the best on the board)
Mets under 89 (second best)
Dodgers under 84 (D'oh!)
A's over something in the low 90's.
I also, for some strange reason, decided that the Devil Rays over 70 was a good bet, as well as the (ahem) Angels under 82 1/2. So I needed the Orioles just to break even.
Joe Dimino ran a contest last March on Clutch Hits. I do believe I was the only one (or one of very few) to get all three of the Contraction Triplets right. Based on the numbers there, your surmise appears to be correct. They run from high 60's to low 90's. The squishfishies were low at 66. My guess is that the O's will occupy that spot this year. To be contrary and take the "over" is very appealing based on my investigations. However if the "kids in the ro" scenario I favor plays out (for whatever reason) "under" would be the way to go. The usual disclaimers: blah, blah, blah... ;-) ...
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Gee Dan, if I had known you tolerated gambling I would have offered Vlad an over/under bet on Rey Sanchez's batting average.
I'm not convinced the Ray should be under the O's. They certainly have not helped themselves with roster changes, but many of their players are young and should get better. As a long-time Pinella watcher here in Seattle, I am still not convinced that Pinella is a genius. But I hold out hope that he'll start Huff on a daily basis.
I'd have to do a much more comprehensive analysis to figure out whether my hunch about the Rays projecting a little better than the O's holds up. I'll wait until rosters are a little more solid before I invest much time in such an enterprise.
Of course we shouldn't write off Beatagan just because they've botched their jobs so far; it's early. But we shouldn't deceive ourselves that they haven't made bad moves, either. And we shouldn't make excuses; that they got "late starts" is not one. They knew they wanted the GM job. They -- particularly Flanagan, who has been around the organization for years -- should have been prepared before they interviewed, let alone before they were hired.
And as for "major league moves made this year," not only did they sign Cruz and Daal, but they simply ignored the Rule 5 draft. They should have made several picks in the major league portion -- what do they have to lose? -- and instead they made none.
Frankly, I'm suspicious. Why would he sign with the Orioles if he were healthy? Isn't there one team planning to be within 30 games of first place that wanted him?
Not only here, but the Jays really could have used Valdes too. Halliday / Valdes / Lidle isn't a bad top 3. Put together a bullpen of Ligtenberg along with Escobar and Politte and Creek as a LOOGY, and suddenly the Jays have a pitching staff.
I know JP's being budget-sensitive, but shouldn't he also be value-sensitive?
D[ur]n AOL-Time Warner
Might the Orioles be thinking about trading Jorge Julio? If so, and if they could get a young promising hitter in return, I would be all for it.
Of course, the Orioles, as a general principle, need to keep their young players. But the last kind of good young player they need is a closer. If they could capitalize off Julio's promising rookie season, by packaging him in a deal for a good prospect at a more crucial position, Flanagan and Beattie will have finally signaled that the organization has put the ineptitude and lack of vision of the Thrif era behind it.
The media always travels in the back of the planes or buses with the candidates. Al Gore would never talk to any of the media, and the media types had no reason to be nice to him. Bush would go back and just talk with the media guys, and they liked that he took the time to chat with them [non-interview, just off the record BS, like talking about baseball], and they wrote more favorable things about him because they saw him in a more positive light. This certainly didn't help Gore's pathetic campaign [how in the world the VP of the controlling party with a great economy and no signs of war lost that election is a historical nightmare. Say what you want about the supreme court, Bush never should have been anywhere near Gore if he even ran a decent campaign.]
As for Clinton's cash grab: Those lawyer fees were expensive. He's making a quarter mill per speech, which helps to pay his 12 million dollar lawyer debt and the expensive house, and he gets to sit around and relax for the rest of his life. I'd be envious of him right now, I can't think of a much better life after having the most stressful job on the planet for 8 years. He's earned what he got right now [and that includes the bad things, like being married to Hillary.]
I think I'd rather have an idiot.
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