MacPhail to Orioles Fans: Not So Fast
Yes, I’m guilty of a little bit of artistic license with that headline. AndyMac hasn’t precisely tamped down expectations, at least not yet. But today’s Sun article would have us believe that the O’s will almost certainly look to sell as the trade deadline approaches. And if the O’s are looking to sell, that means Andy sees little value in keeping this band of overachievers together through the end of the year.
To which I say: be careful. Be real careful.
I’m on board with the rebuilding, of course, and I realize it’s a 3-4 year process. No problem there. But it’s a delicate balance to strike. It sends a terrible message to Jones and Markakis and Wieters and Tillman — you get the idea — to just blow up a good thing because that’s “the plan”. Every deal MacPhail makes had damn well better be the right one — a “we couldn’t refuse this offer” type of deal — or he’s going to have a lot of explaining to do.
Also! Don’t forget to vote on Jim Hunter in the latest edition of the Baltimore Sports Media Approval Ratings. The vote totals are going down (which is natural enough) but this is the closest poll yet. And if you’ve already voted, please consider spreading the word to someone who might not have.
Because our options are limited in the minors, I can’t see a whole lot of major trades being pushed through before the deadline. The most expendable players I can see are Payton, Millar, Bradford, Sarfate and Hernandez. I guess it really comes down to what we get in return also.
The only thing I take exception to, Neal, is saying that MacPhail wants to blow up a “good thing” because that’s “the plan”. The Orioles are, as best as we can tell, a .500 team, which is certainly not bad, but that’s not great, not even close.
It reminds me of, and I heard this from someone else recently, when the D-Rays were playing better than they ever had and so they traded Aubrey Huff to the Astros, saying something to the effect of “If we are satisfied with .500, there’s something very wrong here. This is not the goal, and we aren’t going to meet the goal this year, so we’re blowing it up as best we can”.
We have a good team, but not a great team, and we don’t have a good thing here, not yet. I’d be careful not to confuse a good thing with a better thing.
It’s a fair point, of course. I definitely don’t see this team as representative of the heights to which we ultimately aspire. My biggest concern is that we don’t trade just because we feel like we have to, because to stand pat for now would violate The Rebuilding Plan.
I see a lot of chatter out there about how we have to trade Sherrill and we have to trade Huff and…etc. Well, actually, no we don’t. What we have to do is make only the right deal at the right time, because a bad trade can cause serious, long-term problems. If this team was utterly terrible then I’d say, yeah, what have we got to lose? But the fact is that we’re about a year ahead of schedule (give or take) and to ignore that would be foolish.
I think Andy will look to make some minor deals. Chad Bradford-type deals. Things that go under the radar. Payton or Ramon being the biggest names to go. I don’t see Andy going beyond trading those three guys. Any actual blockbusters (Roberts, Sherrill, Huff I guess) I don’t really see happening.
I know I’m kind of late on it, but I just wanted to get this out there because I have been kinda busy of late to respond on them.
re: Scott Van Pelt
I’m still glad I brought that up because without doing so I wouldn’t of known about that awesome Miami story. So hard to hate on a guy with a last name that Dutch. Glad I can like him without reservations now.
re: Red Sox rivalry/Os fans invading National Park
I was one of the Os fans that cheered on the invasion in DC, but I don’t really see it as contradictory. The way the Bawlmer fans have failed to show up at OPACY who can blame the Boston/NYers coming down in droves, my problem is how they have acted towards the few and the proud Orioles fans that did show up. If I were at the park in DC I would act respectful of the home team’s fans, but still cheer (and be proud of drowning out the home team’s) at the appropriate times.
Whoever mentioned the discrepancy between Fans of the Game and Fans of the Team was spot on, I love talking to/being around any Fan of the Game, even if they’re from north of the George Washington Memorial Bridge.
re: All-Star game
I only watched up until the 10th inning, I loves me my sleep. But has anyone thought that the ASG might be a better representation of the game/exhibition of that year’s best crop of players, if the game was NOT in a “baseball city”? Baseball needs to revive itself in the States let alone abroad so why not have the game in large markets without a team like Portland, Omaha, and even the land of the Midnight Summer Sun – Alaska? Why not shore up international markets – like Japan and Latin America – or even emerging ones like Australia, Curaçao, Holland, Sweden, South Africa, China/Taiwan? I wouldn’t mind the most “popular” (fan-wise) players getting in at that point so non-baseball fans have a better chance of recognizing names via teams AND the distance acts as a good balance against the crazy kool-aid fans voting in their entire favorite team because who would want half of their team having to readjust from jetlag after the ASG instead of just a couple?
Sorry for the long post.
WTB
I love that non-traditional site idea. Logistics would obviously be a problem but I think you could solve that by making the break last one extra day. Great stuff, man.