Orioles 2024 Season

[skinz2winz]

A much needed win today to send the team to break. Nice 1st round pick of Honeycutt today as well. I'm sure they will add more arms through the draft. Hoping for starter and BP help before the deadline.

 

[UVA_Guy81]

Maybe the truth is actually somewhere in the middle, i.e. "this team is probably above average, but is unlikely to go far in the postseason as things currently stand"? After all, while one could blame the strenuous June schedule and pitcher injuries (which is arguably correlated with the former) for the recent slump, the extent of drop-off is quite stark:

• Start of season through 6/20: 49-25 (0.662), 390 RS (5.27 / game), 265 RA (3.58 / game)
• 6/21 through tonight: 8-11 (0.421), 76 RS (4.00 / game), 114 RA (6.00 / game)

With that in mind, let's revisit the "in-season mini-rebuild" idea:

• Previously, my line of reasoning was that "tanking for the 3rd wild card" might make if the Yankees are running away with the AL East, as this would ensure avoiding them until the ALCS. However, this strategy might not work anymore, as it looks like the Guardians may stay ahead of the Yankees, while the Astros may overtake the Mariners. While the Orioles are still favored to win their regular-season tiebreaker against the Twins, Red Sox, Royals, and Mariners, it looks like the 3rd wild card / #6 seed would actually have the hardest path now (imagine ALWC at Astros, then ALDS at Yankees, then ALCS at Guardians).

If we consider recency bias, the "descending order by wOBA since June" default lineup using the current roster would look like the following:

Possible ideas based on this:

• Trade Mountcastle (if Mayo is considered a 1B/3B)
  
  
• Send down Cowser (due to his slump since June) and call up Norby as the backup 2B/LF/RF (since the CF position is still backed up by Hays and Mateo)
  
  
• Call up Holliday again when he's ready? (He also bats left, though, which means that he might not be a direct replacement for one of Urías / Mateo).

I say trade Santander if there's not going to be an effort to resign him. Already have a glut of outfielders waiting to get regular play and that'd clear up the logjam a little bit and get back a decent pitcher in return.

 

[Dead2009]

I don't see Holliday getting called up again until September when the rosters expand.

 

[ThomasTomasz]

This is wild. Hard to believe that we actually have a great development system now.

 

[hattersgonnahate]

[Another bullpen combustion]

Sigh... This is exactly what I meant yesterday by "wasting Webb and Kimbrel with a large lead could cost the next game."

(Read: Imagine deploying Smith yesterday and Webb today instead, and not having Kimbrel pitch on consecutive days when he had already blown one save the previous day.)

 

[dcrising]

offense was disjointed too.

 

[hattersgonnahate]

Can't keep relying on being bailed out by the Yankees' opponents, but we'll take it...