Thursday Bird Droppings
by Camden Chat on Oct 15, 2009 7:00 AM EDT
in Open Threads
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PrintAnd we really mean it this time.
Moscow News - Columnists - Be a sport, save our franchise
A name that should be familiar to us makes the argument that the Baltimore Orioles, not the New Jersey Nets, need a Russian billionaire to save them. -duck
Mike Griffin likes what he sees- MASNsports.com
Minor league pitching coach Mike Griffin has good things to say about the young pitchers. -Stacey
Nick Markakis’s Down Season | FanGraphs Baseball
FanGraphs takes a statistical look at Nick Markakis' year. I'm not worried about him, though. -Stacey
Ex-Orioles executive Tony DeMacio becomes Braves' director of scouting
"Former Orioles executive Tony DeMacio has been promoted to the Atlanta Braves ' director of scouting." -duck
O's on Deck: O's minor leaguers in '09 -- Third basemen
The Sun's Dean Jones, Jr. takes a look at the hot corner among O's prospects. Aside from Josh Bell, the pickings are slim... -duck
O's on Deck: Arizona Fall League recap
Brandon Waring hits his first AFL homerun, and the Desert Dogs won 4-2. -duck
Yankees could go with 3-man rotation against Angels
"The Yankees might go with a three-man rotation against the Los Angeles Angels in the AL championship series." -duck
We've joined the masses on Twitter, so if you're a Twitter-er, follow us! -Stacey & duck & zk
Ecclesiastes assures us... that there is a time for every purpose under heaven. A time to laugh... and a time to weep. A time to mourn... and there is a time to dance. And there was a time for this law, but not anymore. See, this is our time to dance. It is our way of celebrating Open Thread.
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Thanks
Thanks for assembling the best articles about the Os and putting them in one easy to find spot. For two reasons I was interested in reading the article about Nick Markakis. First, I realize that I am an illiterate when it comes to understanding the new metrics. During this offseason, it would be a help to have a “stat of the week” feature that discusses the value of the new statistics.
Second, the article about Tony DeMacio reminded me of the dismal drafting record he achieved while he was with the Orioles from 1999-2004. During that time, his first round picks mostly cratered. The list includes Keith Reed, Beau Hale, Chris Smith, Mike Fontenot, Adam Loewen, Nick Markakis, and Wade Townsend. The only success has been Markakis. The book, Moneyball features the 2002 draft, during which the Orioles took Loewen. The author described the Orioles as a dysfunctional franchise for taking a high risk high school pitcher in the first round. Think how much better the Orioles would now be if half of DeMacio’s first rounders had contributed at the big league level. Fontenot made it to the bigs, but we gave him up to the Cubs in the trade for Sammy Sosa.
Stat of the week
sounds like a terrific idea, actually. But it would probably just as helpful to check out any number of sabermetrically inclined blogs to get a good feel for it (I myself was weaned on FJM of all places, but I can recommend beyond the box score, sweetspot, sabernomics, the hardball times, joeblog, camdencrazies, and fangraphs)…but I would think that around here it’s pretty even in terms of conventional thinking versus SABR thinking, and I’ve learned that its is a wasteful and dumb argument to get into.
If I recall correctly, the Orioles mistake was not necessarily in taking a high school pitcher in the first round (though given the other available, it certainly was a big mistake) but rather moreso in giving Loewen a major league contract out of high school. Who knows how Loewen might have developed if he hadn’t have needed to be rushed like he was? At any rate, you can’t really make a good argument that the Orioles were anything but a stupid, dysfunctional franchise.
Sigh.
"I like baseball, movies, good clothes, whiskey, fast cars ... and you. What else you need to know?"
he still would have been a punk ass bitch.
And the major league contract was necessary to sign him. Negotiations were at an impasse. Flanagan suggested a major league contract to Loewen’s agent. That closed the deal.
"Well, I believe in the soul, the cock, the pussy, the small of a woman's back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap."
Agreed
The best way to learn about those kinds of stats is to read, read, read. That’s the approach I take although I still fall short a lot and don’t feel I can speak with most of those stats with any confidence.
I love the idea of stat of the day, though, layman’s terms with links to appropriate places to find out more in depth information.
If there was some consensus on what sort of stats people are interested in I think it’d be a great offseason endeavor.
Some Day, Matt Wieters Will Make The Cooperstown Crowd Laugh By Talking About The Time He Batted Behind Melvin Mora And Luke Scott. -Keith Law via Matt Wieters Facts
Dayn Perry used to do a stat of the day type of column. Not sure if he still does it. And the New York Times runs a “Keeping Score” column which is another SABER-stats for masses type of column.
"Well, I believe in the soul, the cock, the pussy, the small of a woman's back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap."
Thanks for the suggestion
I will check out the sites you mentioned.
It is clear that teams without unlimited funds must be smart when it comes to drafting and trading players. Billy Beane recently remarked that, unfortunately, the big market clubs are now well managed and intelligently run, which makes it even harder to compete against them.
My problem with both the Loewen and Hobgood picks is that a bad team like the Orioles should select amateurs with the highest likelihood of success in the majors. Bad teams like the Os need a lot of players in order to compete. Good teams like the Yanks can afford the luxury of a high risk pick on a potential superstar. We can’t.
Damn, you gotta get up *really* early in the morning to sneak one past duck...
Thx, and please patronize our advertisers!
"Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning." Churchill,1942-- a rebuilding year.
I take no credit for finding it
Stacey emailed it to me.
"I would approve signing a pitcher that ate kitten tacos if he won 20 games a year." -BPinOK
I found it on Orioles Hangout of all places!
Some Day, Matt Wieters Will Make The Cooperstown Crowd Laugh By Talking About The Time He Batted Behind Melvin Mora And Luke Scott. -Keith Law via Matt Wieters Facts
Yeah, I see it turned up there somehow, all right. Having never looked at them before...
it seems the tongue-in-cheekness meter isn’t too finely calibrated among some of the OH folks, but hey, all in good fun. The piece was better as submitted (of course), but waddayagonnado. And in truth, I’m actually much less Petey-apoplectic than I was a couple yrs ago— but the Nets deal was just too good a set-up not to use to drop a long-deserved house on him, the troll.
"Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning." Churchill,1942-- a rebuilding year.
Is that you in the picture? You look like a super secret agent spy!
"Well, I believe in the soul, the cock, the pussy, the small of a woman's back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap."
It was the editor's idea, going along with the column title. My parents like it [!], so go figure. Now if it just worked with 2632...
"Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning." Churchill,1942-- a rebuilding year.
2002 Draft
Here are a few players selected in the 2002 first round after we wasted a number 4 pick on Adam Loewen: Zack Grienke, Prince Fielder, Nick Swisher, Cole Hamels, Scott Kazmir.
siiiiiiiiiiigh
But – we got Brian Matusz and Matt Wieters, so we’re not totally stupid anymore!
"I like baseball, movies, good clothes, whiskey, fast cars ... and you. What else you need to know?"
I believe all of those guys were high school players. We just happened to pick the guy who would get injured beyond repair. Bummer. At the time, it was a good pick. Obviously, hindsight is 20/20.
"Well, I believe in the soul, the cock, the pussy, the small of a woman's back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap."
you can keep your nick swisher
"you know what the orioles could use right now? a day off." - joe angel
by swilhelmross on Oct 15, 2009 1:21 PM EDT up reply actions
Maybe not an "in exchange" deal
but I’m not Swisher apologist. I can’ t stand that guy. He’s easily in my top five of most disliked players. Right next Pat Burrell, David Ortiz, JonJon Papelbons, JD “DL” Drew, and Karim Garcia. I’m just kidding about Garcia. I mean, who is Karim Garcia?
Don't let the sunshine fool ya. - Townes Van Zandt
Well I don't like him either
But he’s a gazillion times better than Adam Loewen and I would kill a homeless man in order for the O’s to be able to go back in time and draft him instead.
For the open thread quotes
Can we get a field of dreams reference sometime soon..or any other baseball movie
Ray Rice is so agile. He's a whole new breed for agile you need a new word to describe his agility... UBER-AGILITY!
by BaltimoreSportsFan on Oct 15, 2009 2:59 PM EDT reply actions
There are only so many baseball movies
and we have a looooooooong way to go until Opening Day. Patience, my friend.
"I would approve signing a pitcher that ate kitten tacos if he won 20 games a year." -BPinOK
Hindsight
Hindsight is 20/20, I appreciate. My main point regarding DeMacio was that out of 7 chances (7 first round picks), he managed to choose only one (Markakis) who has developed into a first line major leaguer. Mike Fontenot, whom we gave away in the disastrous Sammy Sosa trade, has had a so-so career with the Cubs. Wade Townsend did not sign with us. He signed the next year with the Rays, but he will never make it to majors because he retired due to injuries. Loewen you know about. Reed, Hale, and Smith were complete flame outs.
It now appears that DeMacio’s record is even worse. Looking over the MLB draft history, it seems that in 1999 we also drafted in the first round Larry Bigbie, Richard Stahl and Mike Paradis. So, DeMacio is one for ten. I am glad that he is gone.
totally agree. DeMacio sucked. We consistently had one of the worst farm systems until a few years ago.
"Well, I believe in the soul, the cock, the pussy, the small of a woman's back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap."
Can anyone around here help me out?
I need a strict definition of the word “core” when you talk about a baseball roster. You always hear it: “They’ve got a solid core over there” or “The core is still there”, etc. etc. Well, tell me exactly what that means. Examples:
The best 4 positional players and 2 starting pitchers
Every player with a WAR over 4
The players that make up the top 10% of the roster’s talent
Be specific!
"I like baseball, movies, good clothes, whiskey, fast cars ... and you. What else you need to know?"
I doubt there’s any widely shared, strict definition of the word core that agreed by upon by any sub-community (e.g., SABER types, baseball executives) in the larger baseball world.
"Well, I believe in the soul, the cock, the pussy, the small of a woman's back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap."
I've never heard there's a strict definition
To me, the core is made of of every player that the team considers vital to their future success.
Some Day, Matt Wieters Will Make The Cooperstown Crowd Laugh By Talking About The Time He Batted Behind Melvin Mora And Luke Scott. -Keith Law via Matt Wieters Facts
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