Weighing in on Duquette, Snider, & More

With another FanFest completed, the offseason is drawing to a close, and I want to weigh in on a few topics that have dominated the headlines for the Orioles.

First, here’s my take on the Duquette saga: the blame for this is 100% on the Blue Jays and specifically, Ed Rogers.

There’s no doubt in my mind Rogers was hoping that the seed he planted with Duquette would fester and cause such an uncomfortable situation for the Orioles, that they would willingly hand over Duquette in exchange for next to nothing, just to be rid of the distraction.

Apparently, Ed Rogers doesn’t know Peter Angelos very well.

The national media didn’t help the situation either as writer after writer chastised the Orioles for having the audacity to have their executive honor his contract. How could Peter Angelos deny Duquette this opportunity? Meanwhile next to nothing is said about how sleazy and underhanded Rogers was and that Paul Beeston was still employed in the position Duquette would be taking, and didn’t plan on leaving until after 2015. All we heard was Angelos was denying Duquette the opportunity to advance and because of that, he was the bad guy.

Now imagine if the Yankees called up Adam Jones, told him that they would rip up his contract, and give him an 8-year/200 million dollar deal if they could get the Orioles to trade him.

That’s tampering you say? You are darn right, and that’s exactly what Rogers did with Duquette.

As for the compensation and Angelos’ so-called “unreasonable” demands torpedoing a deal – first we are talking about a division rival so the price better be high; second there’s no proof that any top prospects were offered by the Jays. Jeff Hoffman and Max Pentecost may have names discussed by the Orioles internally, but no sources said that the Jays upped their offer beyond the customary Mike Aviles type of player so there really was never a deal to be struck.

Where do things go from here? I hope the Orioles do file tampering charges with MLB because it is clear that this saga threw a wrench in the Orioles’ offseason plans. The penalty for Toronto should be steep as in the loss of a draft pick, just so that other teams don’t try to follow the same behavior. However, seeing as new commissioner Rob Manfred and MLB don’t exactly have the warm fuzzies for the Orioles right now given the MASN saga, my guess is that the penalty will be just a small fine if there is one.

As for Duquette, I think he’ll be just fine continuing as GM, and will faithfully carry out his duties to improve the Orioles as evidenced by the recent Snider trade. More opportunities will come up, and Duquette can only help himself by putting a World Series championship team on his resume, something that has evaded him for his career.

Fans also shouldn’t be shocked by Duquette not wanting to stay long term if a President or CEO job is offered. Baseball executives rarely stay in one place for a long period of time (with Billy Beane and Brian Cashman the exceptions). All you have to do is look at somebody like Pat Gillick to see that successful GMs do move from team to team and eventually to higher roles. Duquette however will not likely wind up in Toronto after 2015, because Angelos will rightfully still want major compensation to allow his GM to move to a division rival. I do see Duquette ultimately leaving after his contract is up in 2018 if he’s not fired first, and right now there’s no reason for Angelos to fire him.

Now let’s move on to the Orioles’ offseason itself.

As I mentioned, the Duquette saga seemed to really have an impact on the Orioles’ offseason as they hardly made any moves to improve the team since the news broke at the Winter Meetings until just recently.

Hiring Scott Coolbaugh as hitting coach previously was their best move, and I talked about that here already. He has a chance to really make an impact in the plate approach and on-base capability of the Orioles’ younger bats and he’s saying the right things already.

The transaction that supplanted hiring Coolbaugh as the best of the offseason was the trade for Travis Snider from the Pirates.

The Orioles needed another left handed hitting corner outfielder and with the best options off the board in free agency, the trade route was the most logical to follow. Snider’s name had come up before at the Winter Meetings, but a deal couldn’t be struck around Brian Matusz. That’s unfortunate, but the teams rekindled talks and the Orioles were able to obtain Snider for a couple of pitchers they could easily replace in any draft.

Besides the cost in players, Snider’s salary is relatively low at $2.1 million compared to other options like Andre Ethier, who I’ve advocated for in the past, and he’s under control until after 2016. I’ll admit, I didn’t see Snider as an option, but I think he’s a better fit than Ethier at this point because there is less risk dollar wise, he can provide a similar skill set with more power and he’ll be only 28 compared to Ethier who will turn 33.

According to Fangraphs, Snider has a career base on ball percentage (BB%) of 8.3% and had 9.5% last season. His BB% in the minors was around 13%. Another encouraging stat from Snider in 2014 was that his swing percentage outside the strike zone (O-Swing%) was the lowest of his career at 26.7%. His weighted on-base average (wOBA), was also the highest of his career at .343 and he saw 4.00 pitches per plate appearance (P/PA). Clearly a patient plate approach is part of his game, and that’s pretty refreshing seeing that the Orioles have mainly been acquiring free swingers in the Duquette era.

Some comparisons have already been made with Nick Markakis, but let’s look at the two with those statistics previously mentioned:

Though the numbers are close, Snider beats Markakis in every category.

Defensively, Snider profiles better in left field with +16 DRS for his career to go along with a UZR/150 rating of +5.3 compared to his -4 DRS and -5.5 UZR/150 in RF. Last season alone, Snider had +8 DRS in left field in only 226.2 innings for the Pirates.

Alejandro De Aza has logged most of his time in left field out of the corner outfield positions however, so it remains to be seen where Snider will get his playing time, but left field is where I would play him.

Some may call him a lottery ticket, but I think Snider has a good chance to be the next Steve Pearce and have a breakout season for the Orioles. Dan Duquette is known for making these types of acquisitions throughout his career and Snider will likely be another name he can add to his resume.

It is a bonus is that Snider is a former Blue Jays prospect, so that just will make any success of his all that much sweeter for Orioles fans.

And speaking of former Blue Jays, Dan Duquette still wants to add another bullpen pitcher, and Dustin McGowan would fit nicely.

He’s struggled with injuries and inconsistency, but when he was put into the Jays’ bullpen last season, he had a 3.35 ERA with a 7.5 K/9 and a 1.16 WHIP.

Those are pretty solid numbers, and maybe it’s just because I want the Orioles to keep trolling the Jays for the Duquette saga, but putting McGowan in their bullpen to pitch middle or long relief would give a deep Orioles bullpen even more depth. Depth in the bullpen is going to be important once again with the Orioles returning a starting rotation with pitchers that do not consistently log 200 innings per season.

Even though the Orioles’ offseason was seemingly put on hold to deal with the Duquette saga, and that saga dominated the headlines, with the replacement of Presley for Coolbaugh, the trade for Snider, and a deep Orioles bullpen likely getting deeper with Wesley Wright and another reliever in addition to the Rule 5 picks of Logan Verrett and Jason Garcia, the Orioles still have a great shot at winning the AL East title. I’ll take Duquette at his word that his “focus is on the Orioles”, so I’ll expect the same performance and roster moves during the season to keep the Orioles competitive and their shot at ending the World Series drought alive.

It was a long offseason in Baltimore for Orioles fans, but now that the calendar has turned, the Duquette saga has reached its conclusion, and Spring Training is around the corner, it will hopefully be worth the wait.