Tejada traded to San Diego

by Luke Jackson on July 30, 2010

Former Baltimore Orioles’ third baseman Miguel Tejada was traded to the San Diego Padres on Thursday afternoon for 24-year-old Double-A prospect Wynn Pelzer.

My first thoughts on the deal were, “the Orioles actually got something for Tejada?” Color me impressed. Tejada has an uninspiring .269/.308/.362 line with a .296 wOBA, while Tejada’s defense at third base — his range looked fine to me, but he made a lot of bad errors – weighed his WAR down to its current 0.1 mark. So, almost by definition, getting something of value in return for essentially a replacement-level player is impressive. The Padres must be banking on Tejada’s production improving in the midst of a pennant race for them to even bother making this deal, and I bet it will.

Further, I’m sure every Orioles’ fan got sick of Tejada always hacking away at the first pitch of a plate appearance. How many times did we see Tejada swing at the first pitch and make an out right after the Orioles’ pitcher labored in the previous half-inning?

I don’t know where the Padres plan on playing Tejada with Chase Headley entrenched at third base. The Padres will apparently use Tejada at shortstop a little bit, but I don’t think that experiment will last very long. I think Tejada may very well just end up being a right-handed bat on the bench.

Orioles’ general manager Andy MacPhail was on ESPN’s Baseball Tonight just after midnight on Friday morning and said that the Tejada trade is primarily about giving Josh Bell an extended look at third base at the big league level so the team can evaluate whether he is capable of being the everyday third baseman next year. Bell’s held his own during his first year at Triple-A, posting a .275/.326/.478 line. He was overmatched by big league pitching in his brief time with the Orioles this season, striking out eight times in 19 at-bats. The goal for Bell during the final two months of the season should be to hold his own at the plate and show defensive competence at third. I’d love to see a lot of range from Bell — he can grow out of errors on routine plays, but range is something that really can’t be taught.

The return on Tejada from San Diego is the 24-year-old Pelzer, who ranked as Baseball America’s seventh-best prospect in the Padres’ organization coming into this year. Here are the basics on Pelzer, per Dan Connolly of The Baltimore Sun:

“Pelzer, 24, was the seventh-rated prospect in the Padres system by Baseball America. He was the former closer at the University of South Carolina and was taken in the ninth round in 2007, getting an above-slot bonus of $190,000.

The right-hander was 6-9 with a 4.20 ERA in 22 games (18 starts) for San Antonio, the Padres’ Double-A affiliate. He’s 6-foot-1 and 205 pounds and can throw in the mid 90s, though his velocity dropped some this year.

He is mainly a starter but was switched back to relief recently. One scout that has seen him calls him raw and said he needs work on his delivery and command. But he has a strong live arm and closer’s mentality. There’s definitely an upside there.”

Baseball America also noted that Pelzer rated as having the best fastball and slider in the San Diego system, while projecting that he would be the Padres’ closer in 2013. Pelzer has made 18 starts for Double-A San Antonio this season, but the Orioles already view him as a reliever, so I’d assume that he’ll immediately become a part of Bowie’s bullpen. Here is a take on Pelzer from Keith Law, a talent evaluator for ESPN.com and Scouts Inc. (link only for ESPN Insiders):

“Wynn Pelzer is a good inventory arm, a future reliever who has trouble repeating his delivery and thus has struggled with command and control. He’ll touch 94 mph but has never quite recovered the velocity he showed as a college freshman, when he was touching 96 and above and looked like he’d be a first-rounder after his junior year. He’s a good arm for Baltimore to add given what they gave up, but not so good that the Padres are likely to regret giving him up down the road.”

Sounds like the Orioles have some work to do in cleaning up Pelzer’s delivery to get him back to the velocity at which he’s capable of throwing, and the control that he’s shown in the past. In 105.2 innings in 2009, Pelzer walked 3.5 batters per nine innings and struck out 8.8 batters per nine. In 94.1 innings this year, Pelzer has walked 5.3 batters per nine and has struck out 7.9 batters per nine. His strikeout-to-walk ratio ratio has gone from 2.49 in 2009 to 1.48 this year.

But I’ll take a potential power arm out of the big league bullpen any day of the week in exchange for a player with as little value as Tejada.

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Showalter hired by Orioles

by Luke Jackson on July 29, 2010

Weeks of speculation came to a surprising halt on Thursday, as Buck Showalter was hired by the Baltimore Orioles and will begin his reign in Baltimore on Monday, when he’s officially announced as manager. Showalter will be in the dugout on Tuesday, as Juan Samuel may or may not return to being the third base coach.

Showalter’s contract includes three years after the final two months of this season.

It was widely speculated that Orioles’ general manager Andy MacPhail would hold off on naming Showalter as manager until after the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline because the team’s focus would be solely on the trade deadline. That obviously didn’t turn out to be the case, as not only did MacPhail hire Showalter on Thursday, but he also traded third baseman Miguel Tejada to the San Diego Padres for 24-year-old right-handed pitcher Wynn Pelzer (more on that trade in a future post.)

I’d be surprised if Samuel remains with the team past Tuesday. The last thing the Orioles need is Samuel, the former manager and a man the players really respect, looking over Showalter’s shoulder and the players possibly respecting Samuel more than Showalter. Two figures of power can’t be good. I expect owner Peter Angelos to send Samuel on an extended paid vacation and Samuel to get a good job around the league by next year.

Anyway, on a superficial level, Showalter automatically gives the Orioles — even though they’re 31-70 coming into action on Thursday — a shot in the arm and a sense of respectability. Of course, a sense of respectability won’t translate to the win/loss record over the last two months of the season, but the Orioles now have a highly respected baseball man who is running the big league club. Such stability is something the Orioles haven’t had all year — once the Orioles started 2-16, the Dave Trembley Watch was on, and ever since Samuel was instituted as the interim manager, speculation had been abound about a possible replacement.

As far as managers are concerned, I’ve written before that I don’t think managers matter much during a game. The decisions that an educated baseball fan would make during a major league game wouldn’t differ much from what an everyday manager does. Concerning the most controversial of managerial decisions (pitching changes), fans are going to be upset at certain pitching changes no matter who the manager is. It’s ultimately about the players on the field. Managers can’t hold Adam Jones’ hand at the plate and make him not swing at the low and away junk pitch. Managers can’t walk around the basepaths with players to avoid the usual Orioles’ baserunning blunders. It comes down to the players. And right now, the Orioles don’t have enough good ones.

But there was a glaring failure among Trembley’s coaching staff, especially this year — a lack of player development at the big league level. Sure, a lot of productive veterans were not and are not surrounding the young players to take pressure off of them, but alas, the biggest part of the job that Trembley and his coaches were assigned to perform was to develop very talented players at the big league level — players like Matt Wieters, Brian Matusz, Nolan Reimold, Chris Tillman and Jones. It happened last year, but these young players have regressed this year. Why have such talented players regressed? Why do these players have such great success in the minor leagues, only to not progress, and in some cases, regress, in the major leagues?

Something’s wrong, and it’s not particularly off-base to think that Trembley’s coaching staff could be a large part of the reason why. The Orioles’ improvement in the win-loss column over the next couple of years hinges significantly on the development of the young players, and Showalter and the staff he assembles next offseason will be ultimately be judged on wins and losses, and henceforth, how well the young players develop. Given Showalter’s track record of handling young players, one has to assume he’ll assemble a quality coaching staff to surround the young talent.

Showalter is also known as a bit of a “control freak.” Tim Kurkjian of ESPN, who worked with Showalter on Baseball Tonight, was on television this afternoon talking about the Orioles’ hiring of Showalter, and Kurkjian called Showalter the most prepared man he’s ever met in his 30 years of covering baseball. Control and preparation is exactly what the Orioles need. The young players have had a lack of productive veterans surrounding them in the lineup and in the clubhouse, so they’ve been asked to carry the load on their own. Showalter’s high degree of control and preparation over everything baseball-related can’t hurt the young players, and will probably help them.

Showalter is also known as a manager better for laying the foundation for a team rather than getting a team over the hump and to a championship level. That fits right in with the Orioles, since a foundation is yet to be created for the team. Probably the most important thing for Showalter this season is creating that foundation — establishing a way of operating on a daily basis (immense control and preparation) and demanding the same thing from the players.

Showalter’s track record in regards to handling young players and his high degree of control and preparation are why I love this managerial hire.

Another aspect of Showalter that could be quite useful are his possible “recruiting” skills. Look, the Orioles are going to finish with the league’s worst record. Free agents are not going to be clamoring to come to Baltimore, and it’s been that way for awhile. But a manager who is respected around the game may able to attract a quality free agent (so I’m stretching it a little bit – work with me, here.)

The bottom line is that the Orioles’ managerial job is the biggest challenge in the big leagues – perhaps in all of American sports. Best of luck to Showalter — he’ll need it.

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Ravens’ Training Camp Preview

by Luke Jackson on July 26, 2010

It’s that time of year again — it’s time for training camp.

But I want to know what it feels like to have a winning baseball team in August and be able to travel to Westminster in what I hope to be the start of a very special season. I want to be able to go to training camp in the morning and go to a critical game at Camden Yards with the Orioles in a pennant race. I want to be in August and not have the top question lingering around Baltimore sports to be a sprained ankle of a lineman that might not even make the team.

But alas, from this point forward, it’s all Ravens, all the time. But if the Orioles are ever in the pennant race at this time of year, it’d be the craziest Baltimore has been about sports since the Ravens’ Super Bowl title back in the January of 2001. As we go into training camp, the Orioles’ dismal season of historic proportions becomes more and more of an afterthought with every passing day. And that trip up to Westminster? It’s almost like officially turning the page. From that point, it’s all about the Ravens, unless Brian Matusz tosses a no-hitter or something. The trip to Westminster is the start of something that we, the fans, hope turns out to be quite special.

This year, Super Bowl asperations are abound. My advice for fans that are dreaming about a Super Bowl trip: stop it. No one should care if a team looks good on paper. What’s visible on paper in July can be something completely different from what transpires on the field starting in September. Remember the Ravens’ 2007 season? Yeah, remember that.

It’s almost as if some believe that the additions of Anquan Boldin and Donte’ Stallworth vault the Ravens to the Super Bowl. But those same folks will probably struggle to tell you when the last time the Ravens beat Peyton Manning.

No more Super Bowl talk. Let the players play and the coaches coach, and let’s see where this season takes us. Here are a few questions I have coming into the season:

1. Will offensive coordinator Cam Cameron be able to save himself…from himself? The answer to this question in the initial handful of games last year was a resounding ”no.” Cameron couldn’t help from having his second-year quarterback with the big arm fling the ball all over the stadium. Joe Flacco was still a maturing quarterback with a below-average receiving corps and an offensive line more suited to run-block than to drop back and pass-block, but Cameron still had Flacco throw the ball at quite the rate. Flacco’s pass attempts for the first six games of the season last year: 43, 26, 35, 47, 31, and 43. The nasty side effect of this was that Flacco was hit hard  entirely too much.

Now, it’s obviously not totally fair to just point to the raw attempts that Flacco had because of the given game situations throughout those first six games. But when watching the Ravens early last year, it was pretty clear that they weren’t playing to their strengths. Cameron had a corps of running backs — Ray Rice, Willis McGahee and Le’Ron McClain – that 28 other teams in the NFL would love to take off the Ravens’ hands. But Cameron chose to put the football in Flacco’s hands early in the season — probably too much, too fast, especially given what was surrounding Flacco at the time — when the Ravens were much more suited to run right over teams. Alas, by the end of the Ravens’ sixth game of the season, Flacco had a gimpy ankle and the Ravens were basically forced to play to their natural strengths from that point on in the season. Although the running game’s effectiveness picked up considerably and Rice matured into one of the league’s top all-around backs, Flacco’s ankle issue lingered for the rest of the season and the passing game struggled.

Cameron now has what appears to be an above-average receiving corps with the additions of Boldin and Stallworth, the re-signing of Derrick Mason, and the drafting of receiving tight ends Ed Dickson (third rounder out of Oregon) and Dennis Pitta (fourth rounder out of BYU.) So, can Cameron maintain a 50/50 split on offense? Or will a quarterback that appears that he may be ready to become a star, along with Cameron’s new toys on the perimeter, be too much for Cameron to resist throwing the ball all over the stadium? The fact remains, though, that Rice, a top-five running back in the league, needs 25 touches a game. McGahee needs his touches. McClain needs to be a force on short-yardage situations.

2. Will Ed Reed get a grip? Reed has apparently wanted a new contract since last year and has made it public knowledge that he wants a new deal. It’s often said that Reed marches to the beat of his own drum, and this request for a new contract further confirms it. This is an injured 31-year-old free safety that has three years left on his current deal. He had a hip reconstruction during the offseason and has dealt with the nerve impingement over the last couple of years. He’ll probably start the season on the Physically Unable to Perform list, in which he’d be mandated to miss the first six games of the season. It’s not totally guaranteed that Reed even steps on the field this season.

And Reed finds this to be the proper time to publically announce that he wants a new deal? Look, football is an incredibly physical game at the NFL level and players tend to have very short life spans in the league. Players know that they’re one hit away from retiring, and players who may be nearing the end of the road realize they may only have one contract left. But Reed is in the middle of a lucrative deal and no one even knows whether he’ll play this year. And if he does play, will this be same player as in years past? Reed and his team would be best off if Reed left the drama behind him once he arrives in Westminster.

3. Is there enough depth in the secondary? Will the Ravens create enough pressure? These two issues obviously go hand in hand. If a team creates pressure, that’s less time that the secondary has to maintain coverage, and a stingy secondary can make up for some deficiencies with the pass rush. The pass rush struggled last year, as Terrell Suggs had the worst year of his career, Trevor Pryce got a year older, Brendon Ayanbadejo got injured in Week 4, and Kelly Gregg didn’t play until Week 15. Also, Paul Kruger, Jameel McClain and Antwan Barnes didn’t develop the way the Ravens probably hoped.

The Ravens drafted outside linebacker Sergio Kindle to back up the very fundamentally sound Jarrett Johnson and Terrence Cody to rotate with a now fully healthy Gregg on the interior alongside Haloti Ngata, who is probably the team’s most valuable defender. Each draftee was hoped to provide a help to the pass rush. Those plans now have a bit of a hitch in them, as Kindle has a fractured skull from falling down two flights of stairs back home in Texas. There will be speculation as to how exactly he fell down those stairs, but the bottom line is that Kindle will miss training camp and probably won’t be able to contribute to the squad until mid-season. Kindle isn’t even allowed to travel to Baltimore for three weeks. If he’s not even healthy enough to travel for three weeks, I’d imagine that getting into football shape will be a difficult process for Kindle this season.

The Ravens’ pass-rushing hopes now rest on Gregg and Cody being able to collapse the pocket along with Ngata, the possible revitalizion of Suggs, the health of Ayanbadejo, and how well Kruger, McClain and Barnes develop. Although Kindle’s presence would certainly help, my guess is that a lot of teams in the NFL would take this pass rushing scenario.

The secondary has injury concerns, as well. Although Fabian Washington says he’s ready to play during training camp after tearing his ACL last November, the Reed injury still lingers, and hopeful future No. 1 cornerback Lardarius Webb has ACL problems of his own. For God-knows-what-reason, Webb was covering a kick during a December game in which the Ravens were blowing out the Chicago Bears and tore his ACL on the play. Webb’s status for training camp is unclear. Why Webb, who turned into an immensely valuable cornerback who could stick to receivers and play the run in a very physical and aggressive fashion, was covering kicks, I have no idea. Yes, Webb is a deft tackler. But you don’t put someone as valuable as Webb in a situation where an injury is just waiting to happen. Webb also was a very valuable return man last year.

Also remember that backup cornerback Cary Williams is suspended for the first two games of the season.

For the season opener at the Meadowlands against the New York Jets, it looks like Tom Zbikowski will be in Reed’s usual free safety spot alonngside strong safety Dawan Landry, while Domonique Foxworth and Washington should be the starting corners. If Webb were healthy, he’d probably be the team’s No. 1 corner for the opener. Walt Harris and Chris Carr may be the nickel and dime men, and Ken Hamlin could be the primary backup safety.

I wouldn’t be shocked if Frank Walker gets a call during training camp.

4. Who’s the hidden gem? Ravens’ general manager Ozzie Newsome always seems to find a diamond in the rough in every draft or in the form of an undrafted free agent. He found Webb in the third round last year out of little-known Nicholls State and signed Dannell Ellerbe as an undrafted free agent. Both made an impact last year. Who’s it going to be this year? I’ll say wide receiver David Reed out of Utah, who the Ravens selected in the fifth round of April’s draft. Look for Reed to make an impact as a kick and punt returner and as a slot receiver during the latter part of the year.

5. Will there be a training camp next year? We’ll be hearing about a possible lockout in 2011 all of this coming season. It’ll be the No. 1 football story for the entire year. Personally, I think there’s too much for the owners and the players to possibly lose for the cancellation of any games next year. I have to believe they’ll find a way to split up the zillions of dollars at stake. I really hope the owners don’t get their way on the 18-game regular season, though. There are enough injuries as it is.

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The five levels of anger, Orioles’ baseball style

July 24, 2010

The incredibly entertaining outbursts from both Ty Wigginton and Juan Samuel on Thursday night obviously, in part, had to do with a lot of frustration building up throughout the course of a horrid season, but was also just so awesome to see. Wigginton got up in the grill of first base umpire Gary Darling so quickly after Darling blew a call at [...]

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Don’t panic about the young pitching

July 21, 2010

You know what will get us Orioles fans feeling even more down than we already are? The three young arms that the organization and fans have so much hope and expectations for start three consecutive games for the Orioles and give up a combined 19 runs in 9.2 innings. Oh yes, that’ll get Orioles fans depressed. [...]

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There’s hope

July 19, 2010

Watching Brian Matusz get hit around like Bruce Chen on a bad day makes me sad. It also makes me think of this:

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See Inception

July 17, 2010

I saw “Inception” on Friday night. Wow. I’ll be blown for days. It’s the best movie I’ve seen in years. I’ll be seeing it a second and third time shortly — it was that good and that complex that I definitely need multiple viewings of it to fully grasp the movie. Watching it in 3-D wouldn’t hurt my [...]

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Five questions for the second half

July 16, 2010

It’s now time to look ahead to the second half of this dreadful Baltimore Orioles’ season.  The first half went about as bad as it could possibly go. The team managed to put together a 29-59 record by the All-Star Break, good for a .330 winning percentage, which is incredibly putrid, especially when one considers that a baseball [...]

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What should the Nationals do with Dunn?

July 14, 2010

This is from a series of seven tweets from Buster Olney of ESPN: “Heard this: Would-be free agent Adam Dunn has just about lost interest in working out a long-term deal with the Nationals because of what he perceives to be a lack of urgency from the team in working out a new deal. He does [...]

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All-Star Break perspective check

July 13, 2010

Last winter, hope was abound for the Baltimore Orioles. General manager Andy MacPhail had traded for accomplished starter Kevin Millwood to lead the Orioles’ young rotation. He acquired Mike Gonzalez to be a shut-down closer, and old friend Miguel Tejada to man third base until Josh Bell was ready. MacPhil had also taken a flier on Garrett Atkins, who had [...]

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