My apologies for the outage. Hopefully things are back to normal now and we can go about our business of not discussing the Pro Bowl.

Orioles-related matters coming this week…

I see no reason to doubt this for now. The quotes in the report (from MacPhail and Buck) don’t dispute the claim, they just kind of dance around it with a wink and nod. That and, well, it makes sense. There can be no argument that MacPhail hasn’t accomplished all he set out to do here, despite some successes along the way. Four years is a long time.

I find myself feeling oddly ambivalent. There’s a certain shock to it in the way that all Big News is shocking, but that’s followed by…well, not much. Fatigue, mostly. I have a hunch many of you and much of Birdland might feel the same way.

Regardless, the question now becomes: what next? Or on a more granular level, where are the trend lines headed?

Buck is here and I don’t think there’s any doubt that he’s putting his stamp on this team. I’m sure he’ll not only have a hand in hiring the next GM but also in helping shape the strategic direction. That’s the good news.

Bad news is, instability and uncertainty are almost never good. Every stop and restart on the things MacPhail put in motion means more time spent. Every bit of reevaluation means more potential for things getting worse (again) before they get better.

The optimist in me — the one that gained a reputation around here for being too positive — looks at a fresh start as a good thing. Results are results, after all, and MacPhail hasn’t gotten them.

The realist in me, however — the one that has gained more and more traction in recent months — says that it hardly matters unless folks in the Warehouse have finally and truly recognized the need for a sweeping change in culture.

That’s what is needed, above and beyond a new face or two. Until they say “enough” and revamp their entire approach from top to bottom, things won’t likely change much.

I’d bet Buck gets that. I’m sure the players get it. I’m equally sure that there’s a faction within the organization that likewise gets it. That kind of organizational course-correction, however, is terribly difficult. Unless the new GM is hired with a clear mandate to implement it we’re likely to be underwhelmed.

Cross your fingers, I guess. I wish I had more encouraging words than that.

Related: I wonder how much of this is MacPhail’s decision and how much came from above. Is he worn out, perhaps? Or is this a way to engineer a graceful exit for a loyal soldier who deserves better than being “let go”? We might never know.

Now here we are at the All-Star break, 16 games under .500 (36-52) and riding a seven-game losing streak. Better in record than only one team — the Astros at 30-62. Houston, however, has only lost four in a row. Real talk, the O’s are the worst team in baseball today. Things in Birdland not only aren’t any better than last year, they’re worse.

How is that possible?

We can find reasons. Losing Brian Roberts hurts. Losing (basically) Brian Matusz hurts even more. The young pitchers have largely failed to meet expectations. Vlad Guerrero and Derrek Lee are failed experiments. More broadly, we entered the year depending on a lot of breaks going our way. Few of them have.

Thus, we arrive at the rub. The Orioles are not presently built to absorb, let alone overcome, adversity. Their line is too thin.

They don’t suffer from a lack of top-level talent. They’d be fine if the team we envisioned in March was fully intact and performing at a high level. We saw that much early on. The problem is, well, problems.

That’s a pretty simple thing on its face but it’s actually quite terrible. The takeaway from this dismal first half of 2011 is that the Orioles have a very deep and very serious structural deficiency. They can’t do anything right unless everything goes right.

Success isn’t about having a great Plan A. Everyone has that. It’s about having great plans B and C and D and also having an organization built to pivot when variables dictate change. Plan A is just the roadmap. Other plans are contingencies. All of them are useless without the ability read and react.

Right now, the Orioles don’t have that ability. They don’t appear to have any organizational sense of what it means to win. Indeed, I have doubts as to whether or not they actually understand success. I know they want it — badly — but I’m not convinced they really “get” it.

To be fair, I’m not in the room. I don’t know how the conversations go. I don’t know if the organization is truly dysfunctional or just stuck in a tough spot. To speculate either way would be both unfair and disingenuous.

That said, results are evidence and it’s straight-up unacceptable to be where they are in 2011 as Andy MacPhail nears the end of his contract. I’m OK with not contending this year. I’m not OK with 36-52.

The bitch of this is that there’s really no good solution. Fire MacPhail? OK, then what? Blow it up again and embark on another three, four, five-year plan? Trade everyone with value and hope for a hail-mary infusion of young talent? Get rid of Hardy and Guthrie and hope the prospects arriving in return mature quick (and meet or exceed expectations) while we fill major-league holes with stopgaps?

We’re staring down a deeply uncomfortable truth, which is that winning might not be in the cards for either the short or the mid-term. It might literally take another three or four years, and even that’s an optimistic forecast based on the questionable premise that somebody steps up and starts showing real leadership.

It is, however, fixable. Things can still go right. There’s talent in the system. But for this team to become what we both want and have every right to expect it should be, we’re overdue for bold change in both strategy and tactics.

Until that happens I’m afraid that the glory of the game itself — and the love of the team — might be all we have.

Your move, Peter/Andy/Buck. This is rock bottom. And when you’re reading those words at The Loss Column — a site derided many times in the past for being too positive — it’s time to believe they’re real.

PS — Pain still don’t hurt.

Yeah, Fred. Sometimes it gets difficult.

Any hope of surprise is lost. I can’t yet give up on my prediction of .500 or better but it’s pretty clear that if they get there it’ll only be by a game or two. Even that will take a hell of an effort. I don’t like to write those words yet here we are.

So, then, let’s sigh and take a shot of rye (or whatever you like). Then let us ask: what now? Three things.

1. The trading deadline.

Conventional wisdom suggests that for the next three weeks the O’s will be in “sell” mode. They have pieces, for sure. But assuming that cornerstone guys like Markakis, Jones, Wieters, and the young pitchers are off-limits, what’s realistic?

They have Lee and Guerrero but it’d take a wizard with more power than MacPhail to spin them into a useful return. Hardy and Guthrie have real value at the major league level. Maybe you could make a case for throwing Koji and/or Jim Johnson into that mix. Maybe there’s a minor leaguer or three.

Trades are all about the right fit and I’d be willing to let almost anyone go for a strong deal. That said, trading Hardy would be a mistake.

If I’m MacPhail I’m re-signing Hardy today at an above-market rate and accepting the attendant risk. We need someone to fill the SS hole while we wait for Manny Machado. Hardy has proven himself up to the task. If the question is “spend money and take the chance” versus “trade for potential and try to fill that hole again in the offseason” I’m siding with the former all the way. Now’s the time to step up and lock down something solid for 2012-13. This team needs that, assuming it’s even doable.

2. The rest of the season.

Put yourself in Buck Showalter‘s shoes. Think about what you would do with half a season left at the helm of a team that just spent three weeks cutting down any real shot at meaningful progress. Yeah.

The rest of this season must be given over to development and growth. The only metric that should matter from this point forward is performance. No favorites played.

3. The long-term strategy.

I’ll probably devote several posts to this down the road. For now, though, here’s the thing: it’s highly unlikely that a top-tier free agent like Prince Fielder will arrive in the winter to alleviate our woes. MacPhail and Angelos have proven themselves conservative decision makers. We can debate the wisdom of that approach all we want but we can’t change who they are. This simply isn’t an organization built to improve through long-term, high-dollar commitments to free agent players.

Maybe they should throw eight years and $300 million at Fielder or Pujols because it’s worth it and it’s what we need. That might or might not be true but it doesn’t matter. That’s not how the Orioles work. Not right now.

So, what then? I wish I had a good answer. I don’t. Instead, I offer a very tenuous roadmap, free of pipe dreams and fantasy scenarios:

They spend the rest of this season making targeted, smart trades to build up young talent while simultaneously continuing to evaluate and develop the talent they already have. They figure out who is legit and who isn’t, and make moves accordingly.

Once the offseason hits they take everything they’ve learned and set out to fill holes judiciously. There won’t be a big splash, but there can be more moves like the one that brought Hardy here. Smart and serious.

They learn their lesson — finally — about bringing in guys like Lee and Guerrero.

Then, when spring 2012 arrives, they’re stocked with both useful parts and hard-earned wisdom. They’re in year two of Showalter’s three-year contract with legitimate reasons to think that by the time that contract runs out, they’re contenders. Maybe not for the AL East crown but for a Wild Card at least.

Read that carefully and you’ll see that I’m suggesting yet another two years of waiting. Which I suppose I am. Damn it all anyway.

There’s more to come on why we still shouldn’t give up, why there are still small things to love if you choose to seek them. Truth is, though, that if you choose 2011 as the season you finally give up then I have to admit that I can’t truly and fully condemn the decision.

I wouldn’t agree with it and I’m not going there myself, but these are tough times. Only a fool would claim otherwise.

“This” meaning, of course, The Swoon. That rite to which we as Orioles fans are annually subjected around this time. The stretch of games that breaks our spirit through some combination of losing, listless play, and ever-growing distance between the record as it stands and the record as we all hoped it would (or could) be.

The moment when we’re all but forced to admit that, yes, this year is just like the others.

At press time for this post the Birds stand a season-worst 10 games below .500, having lost seven of their past nine. Worse than that, though, they’re doing that thing they do where they not only lose but they do so in mind-numbing fashion. Not even Matt Wieters‘ first All-Star selection really helps. It’s hot and humid out and the Orioles are no longer within shouting distance of a winning record.

I expected more. To some extent I still do, and I’m not quite ready to retire hope of a .500 or better finish. We are, however, to that point now where we hope for success with no real reason to believe in it. And, well, that’s just sad.

There’s a larger point to draw out from this. There’s a way to explain it away as growing pains and focus on the future. There’s a way to see growth amidst the weeds. Right now, though, I’m not much interested in that. I’ve been doing that with this team for a long time and — for today, for right now — I need a break.

It’s that old, familiar feeling. Alas.