Author Topic: Hope beyond rock bottom for the Woe-rioles?  (Read 932 times)

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Offline EasyAce

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Hope beyond rock bottom for the Woe-rioles?
« on: August 11, 2018, 08:42:01 pm »
By Yours Truly
https://throneberryfields.blogspot.com/2018/08/hope-beyond-rock-bottom-for-woe-rioles.html


Manager Buck Showalter can only mourn
with the sparse Camden Yards crowd
while the Red Sox bury the Orioles' season
alive Friday night . . .


"I left my Orioles tickets on my dashboard and went into a beer store," a fan calling himself only Arthur wrote in the comments section on Yahoo! Sports. "When I came out, someone had broken out my window, and placed four more tickets on top of them."

That, ladies and gentlemen, is the sign of the Orioles having maybe the worst season ever since they came to Baltimore in the first place.

The 1932 Red Sox and the 1962 Mets are the only other teams in baseball history to be eliminated mathematically from a race on 10 August, but only the Orioles earned it with 46 games left on the schedule. They awoke Saturday sitting 46.5 games behind the Red Sox in the American League East.

Not even their St. Louis Browns forebears can claim to have been eliminated mathematically from a pennant or a division title with as many games left to play or a deficit as deep as this year's Woe-rioles.

Any bets on whether they can snatch a wild card with a 46-game winning streak? Oops. There went that idea. The Red Sox shut them, 5-0, early Saturday. And that's just adding insult to intensive care unit-level injury.

Look around the standings. No cellar dweller in any division is as far back as the Orioles, and only one (the Royals) woke up Saturday knocking on the door of being 30 games back in the AL Central. The Rangers are 21.5 back in the AL West. The others? Eighteen (the Marlins, National League East), the Reds (16.5 in the NL Central), and the Padres (17.5, NL West).

The way these Orioles got to 46.5 games back Friday night is almost as beyond belief as those Original Mets were. Almost. The '62 Mets' worst beatings involved seventeen runs against them twice---a 17-8 loss to the Dodgers in late May; a 17-3 loss to those Dodgers in mid-July. In neither game did the Mets have an early lead at all, never mind a five-run lead.

Tell someone the Woe-rioles had an 8-3 lead after three innings over the threshing machine known as this year's Red Sox . . . but blew that lead and lost, 19-12. Don't mention the Orioles at first. He or she might assume you were talking about those '62 Mets. Or some hapless antique Browns team.

The Orioles scored four in the second to overthrow a first-inning three-run homer by Xander Bogaerts to stake the Red Sox to an opening 3-0 lead. They scored four in the third to chase one of the new Red Sox toys, Nathan Eovaldi. The Red Sox scored a measly two in the fourth, one by way of a passed ball allowing Jackie Bradley, Jr. (an RBI triple) to score without so much as a by your leave.

Then, the Olde Towne Team exploded in the top of the sixth. And the Orioles pulled back to within a run with a pair in the bottom of the sixth. But Andrew Benintendi hit a three-run homer in the top of the seventh. Mookie Betts hit a three-run double and J.D. Martinez sent home a pair with a single in the top of the eighth. All the Orioles had left in the tank for the night was Mark Trumbo's solo bomb in the eighth and Jonathan Villar's RBI single in the bottom of the ninth.

The Red Sockers had nine extra base hits on the night and drew ten walks, including two with the bases loaded. Betts, who'd hit for the cycle the night before, had a 3-for-4 night with two walks to go with his eighth inning double. It ruined the major league debut of Orioles center fielder Cedric Mullins, who became the first in Baltimore history with three hits in his first Showtime---two doubles, a single, three runs scored, and two driven in.

"That's a long time for a team to be around," the rook said after the game, "and for me to be the first one, it's just a privilege." It was just about the only reason Mullins had to feel privileged on the night. Wait until it sinks in that the Orioles scored their third-highest single-game run total of the season and still lost for the history books.

Unlike the 1988 edition who opened the season 0-21, these Woe-rioles have no losing streaks that big. The longest losing streak of the year for this year's model is nine; the second-longest is seven. The problem is, they've had a bunch of six- and seven-game losing streaks while their longest winning streak of the year is four. Those '88 Zer-Os even managed to hang in the race mathematically for longer than this year's model.

And on Friday night they picked the wrong night to dissemble against a team who's now won twelve of fourteen and threatens to turn their division into a runaway. Mullins's sterling debut was spoiled by Red Sox bats taking complete advantage of Oriole pitching that looked more like batting practise than game competition.

Only one other team has ever lost like that despite scoring twelve runs in the game. The 1999 Cubs brought that one off, too, in a 19-12 loss to the Brewers. And they only finished thirty games behind the NL Central-winning Astros that year.

So what's the good news? Is there any good news?

Well, the Orioles' rebuild began in earnest well enough before the Red Sox bushwhacked them. They moved former All-Stars Manny Machado, Jonathan Schoop, and Zach Britton, plus notables such as Kevin Gausman (starting pitcher), Brad Brach (reliever), and Darren O'Day (reliever), at or before the non-waiver trade deadline, in exchange for fifteen players including fourteen minor leaguers and some fresh cabbage for their international spending.

And with Mullins' advent, it meant longtime center field mainstay Adam Jones moving to right field, a move manager Buck Showalter says Jones himself knew was just a matter of time and whom the Orioles would consider to take the job. In fact, Jones himself mentored Mullins in preparation for this during spring training. The coming of Mullins also meant making roster room for him with the designation for assignment of veteran journeyman Danny Valencia, whom Showalter expects to land on a contender for veteran utility presence.

The foregoing moves won't get them back to the postseason as soon as next year, perhaps, but it does mean the Orioles aren't going to just roll with the punches or the nukings, either. It'll make for some ugly baseball in Camden Yards for a good enough while. But at least they can use the rest of this season to look long at hard at their incumbent and coming youth. And they may be banking on the ugly period lasting not so long as masochists and Oriole fans (do I repeat myself?) fear.

Just pray the bank doesn't collapse. The Woe-rioles haven't yet got the best security for it, and the Red Sox made a too-healthy run on it Friday night.
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"The question of who is right is a small one, indeed, beside the question of what is right."---Albert Jay Nock.

Fake news---news you don't like or don't want to hear.

Online DCPatriot

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Re: Hope beyond rock bottom for the Woe-rioles?
« Reply #1 on: August 11, 2018, 09:11:17 pm »
Great analysis, @EasyAce !

Today, the Orioles are essentially, a triple-A team in the major leagues. 

...Maybe high double AA?
"It aint what you don't know that kills you.  It's what you know that aint so!" ...Theodore Sturgeon

"Journalism is about covering the news.  With a pillow.  Until it stops moving."    - David Burge (Iowahawk)

"It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light it scattered the night and made the day worth living" F. Scott Fitzgerald

Offline GrouchoTex

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Re: Hope beyond rock bottom for the Woe-rioles?
« Reply #2 on: August 12, 2018, 01:26:24 am »
Even MLB is getting into the act, releasing a tweet today:

Patriots 14
Ravens 10

Sad to see a team that I remember from the Earl Weaver days have to go through this.

Offline Applewood

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Re: Hope beyond rock bottom for the Woe-rioles?
« Reply #3 on: August 12, 2018, 09:32:05 am »
Then I guess I shouldn't feel so bad about my hometown team, the Pirates.   The Pirates at least haven't been eliminated and are not dead last in the standings...yet.

Offline EasyAce

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Re: Hope beyond rock bottom for the Woe-rioles?
« Reply #4 on: August 12, 2018, 05:18:45 pm »
Then I guess I shouldn't feel so bad about my hometown team, the Pirates.   The Pirates at least haven't been eliminated and are not dead last in the standings...yet.
They were only seven out of first place in the NL Central and four games back in the wild card hunt when play began today. They've been a pleasant surprise this year. So far.


"The question of who is right is a small one, indeed, beside the question of what is right."---Albert Jay Nock.

Fake news---news you don't like or don't want to hear.

Offline Applewood

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Re: Hope beyond rock bottom for the Woe-rioles?
« Reply #5 on: August 12, 2018, 07:38:23 pm »
They were only seven out of first place in the NL Central and four games back in the wild card hunt when play began today. They've been a pleasant surprise this year. So far.

Ok, but the Pirates have this habit of doing well, only to collapse into a steaming pile. Most years, the collapse starts right after the All Star break  This year's fizzle is a bit late, but it should come very soon. 

It's too bad.  Many fans blame Cliff Hurdle, but I think the Pirates are investing in cheap labor.  They dumped some of their best and brightest, although in a few cases, such as Andrew McCutcheon, it might have been justified.  Cutch is a good guy, but in baseball years, he's aging and he's not what he used to be.  But I think in many cases the owners unloaded their best talent simply because they didn't want to pay them so much. 

Seems to me if the owners aren't interested in winning, they should sell the team to new owners who are.