Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Big Changes Coming

The Orioles will close out their season today, possibly robbing Boston of a postseason berth. As sweet as that may be, I'd like to give you a little food for thought of a different nature today, thought for the future. There is a strong chance that tomorrow, it will be announced that Andy Macphail will not return for the 2012 season, so who will replace him?


It will be nice to see Macphail gone, I'm not going to say that his tenure in Baltimore was a complete failure, that would be a lie. If nothing else, he brought us Adam Jones and J.J. Hardy for relatively nothing, his "grow the arms" strategy has not been overly successful, but I think that's more of a player development problem than something he is directly responsible for. I could write on Macphail for days, but I would rather give some insight of where I feel the front office is headed.

Regardless of what is announced Thursday, this much is known: Buck Showalter will player a pivotal part in the front office. He may very well take on Macphail's position and continue managing, which would be a great deal of work, but hey, this is Buck we're talking about here. Another possibly is that he vacates his managerial position and moves to the front office, this seems fairly unlikely to me, Buck seems to want the best of both worlds rather than being isolated in one role.

I have my own idea of how things are going to play out this offseason, it goes something like this..... When Macphail leaves I think Buck will stay planted in his managerial role, he will however have a great deal of influence over who is chosen as the new General Manager. My gut tells me they'll bring in someone who worked with Buck in Texas, or from that organization in general, as it's no secret Buck still loves Texas. I've heard former Ranger's GM John Hart's name floated around, but I think it will most likely be someone with a little less experience than Hart.

I simply hope whoever is in the Front Office in 2012 has a clear sense of direction and comes in with a realistic blueprint to build a winning team.

Friday, September 23, 2011

Picking Up the Pieces

The 2011 Baltimore Orioles have been a disappointment in so many ways, I'm not saying that I came into the season expecting a playoff contender. I am saying that I expected to see a team that could play competitive .500 baseball, alas, we find ourselves at the end of a fourteenth straight losing season.

However, as miserable as this season was in many facets, there were some positive takeaways and things to look forward to for next year. For example, the offensive blossoming of Matt Weiters and Adam Jones, who both set career highs in home runs; and let's not forget the comeback kid, J.J. Hardy, who missed almost a month and still has put up incredible offensive numbers.

Sadly, there was not as much to be optimistic about from the pitching department this year. The train wreck that was 2011 Brian Matusz is a different topic for a different day. The 2011 rotation in itself should really be another topic for another day, but if there is anything to salvage from this season's pitching woes, it's that Zach Britton will be a key rotation piece in the coming years, and believe it or not I feel similarly about Brian Matusz. In a very cliched way, I would like to point out that Roy Halladay had a similarly awful season at a similar age; we can only hope that Brain can work out his issues, add some velocity, and come back ready to win this spring. When all is said and done, this season's starting pitching left much to be desired, but there are also a fair amount of talent to work with for next season, with the unexpected emergence of guys like Alfredo Simon and additions like Tommy Hunter.

The relief pitching was up and down all season, and of late has been incredible, with the exception of Captain Chaos of course. Pedro Strop, acquired in the trade for Michael Gonzalez has pitched superbly thus far, along with Jim Johnson; who seems to have lined himself up for the closer's position in 2012.

I won't go on and on recaping the 2011 season... no-one wants those memories of blown games and 18 run losses. If you take away anything, know that the Orioles have four key pieces for the 2012 season that won't be going anywhere, Matt Weiters, Adam Jones, J.J. Hardy, and Zach Britton.