Orioles designate Stevie Wilkerson for assignment, claim pitcher Travis Lakins

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• I liked Stevie's heart but I'm not surprised, especially with a .220 something BA. He was put in a tough spot at CF after Mullins failed, then the guy from the Mets and Rickard did too. He made a lot of errors but I think he did a good job having never played CF prior.

  Not saying that Stevie would've been used there again, I do hope that they have a viable backup for Hays, it's a good possibility that he goes through some injuries with his aggressive play.

  I wish Stevie luck, maybe no one will claim him, he improves his bat and be back again.

• Put Steve on you have had him everywhere but second Alis does not deserve a good guy like Steve

  • Sure Stevie is a good guy but he hits .220.

  • Valid argument, wonder how long it takes before someone makes the obvious comment about you know who...go O’s...

    • If the "you know who" is who I think it is, I think J Guy already did but didn't spell his name right. :)

  • Nope the other .200 hitter...go O’s...

• Is Ellis nuts, get rid of the bad guys, not the good guys. Ok, now let’s get rid of Mancini & Means and tell everyone, we are not playing for today, but for tomorrow. I understand, what he is trying to do (I think )but I do not like, how he is doing it. you are all putting to much faith in this guy.

• Stevie is not a significant player. His batting was poor, and his defense at 2nd wasn't good enough to keep him there. If it wasn't for his save on the mound a lot less would even know who he is. Yes he made an outstanding catch to close the season, but no one considers that it was his poor defense that allowed the runs causing us to lose that game.

  As for putting too much faith in Elias, I think it's shameful how some have bashed him since his hiring. Most of our best players were gone before he got here, we were last the two years before he came and he took over an organization that was broken at all levels.

  Some are upset that he hasn't went out and acquired mid to high level free agents, even though THAT'S WHAT GOT US INTO THIS SITUATION. Some fault him for letting Villar go, but if Villar was worth the money why weren't there more teams interested in him?

  Our minor league system improved greatly in the year Elias has been in charge. Yes, as many will say, most of those players were in the system before Elias arrived. However, look at these players numbers from 2018 and 2019. Many improved substantially. Do some research on these minor league players, there's video of many of them explaining the reasons for their success. The majority of them attribute their improvements to things that were implemented when Elias came.

  I do construction management and am at times brought in to save a faltering project or get it back on track. The majority of time I either fire or get the preexisting supervisors off the job and replace them with my people immediately. Then I'll let most of the high paid tradesmen go, and let my supervisors bring in their men. This is what Elias did, and this is the way most industries overhaul a failing operation.

  An MLB team is much more than the starting lineup or even the 40 man roster. In the recent past we've been primarily focused on free-agents, but if this worked Duquette would still be here. This strategy is like a crapshoot, one with a small window of opportunity, we missed it, didn't have any talent ready in our farm system, zero presence in Latin America and way behind other teams in the areas of utilizing data and technology.

  Elias, as soon as he was hired, stated that his main focus was bringing back sustained success and the prestige that the O's had in the past. His proposed method for doing this is to build an elite pipeline. He also said that it would take some time, and that we would be facing a few rough years before the results would come to fruition.

  He's been on the job for 15 months and people are bashing him for doing what he said he was going to do when he was hired.

  Sorry for the rant but it's shameful how some constantly ridicule Elias. Some bash him and say we're tanking because he's not retaining certain players. Yes, they may be the best on our team, but they're far from being premier players and if we can shed payroll to reinvest or trade for prospects, it's ultimately helping the team unless the goal is playing .500 baseball. I don't know about anyone else, but I want a World Series and become a dynasty again.

  If anyone does even a little research, they'll find that Elias is working his tail off. He's involved at all levels to ensure that the entire system is focused on the same goal. In spite of taking heat from frustrated fans who are either unaware of, or don't understand his strategy, or just don't like it or him, he's still putting himself out in the public to share the new vision for the O's.

  I follow baseball pretty closely, actually a lot. Some may think that I have blind faith in Elias, well I think those who are bashing him at this stage of his tenure are only showing how little they know about how teams who are having sustained success are operating nowadays. What are the experts saying about Elias's efforts thus far? It's out there, research. Google is our friend when it comes to learning.

  We won't be competitive until 2022/23 at the earliest, but we'll be World Series contenders many years from then on. This is not my opinion, but that of many experts. He deserves our support.

  Many O's fans remind me of kids who learn about the nursery rhyme the "3 Little Pigs," and even though they know that the first two houses get blown down, they still think the pig who builds his house out of bricks is a fool.

  Signing a few expensive free agents, retaining players who will bring in prospects if traded and/or promoting minor league players to win a few more games, maybe even reach .500 is like building with straw and sticks.

  I want to do this rebuild using bricks even with it taking longer. It will not get blown down and will last. Elias is trying to do it like the 3rd Little Pig. And again, he deserves our support.

  • I agree.

  • I agree with your rant, long winded as it may be. I have no problem with Wilkerson being dfa. The goal isn't to build a losing team of nice guys. I want a winning team with a long term foundation of success. I think Elias is on the right track and support his efforts 100%. Seems like many fans can't look beyond 6 months into the future.

  • It is "shameful" for people to criticize the "boy wonder"??? Boy! How far up Elias's butt is your nose? Keep drinking the Orange Kool Aid.
    By the way, did you notice that only TWO of the O's top ten prospects were by the "Boy Wonder"? the other 8 were by Dan.

    HAPPY TANKING!!! Maybe the Boy Wonder can teach the O's the Houston cheating methods also.

  • I agree: it is a rant. But what is your point? That Elias has bricks in his head, but everybody should support him? Do you see any pattern to all of this tweedledee for tweedledum personnel churn beyond creating a constant distraction with the illusion that all change is progress? A GM is a very well-paid professional who doesn't depend on the support of spectators. Nor does he deserve gratuitous abuse. But as a public performer he is open to praise, comment, or criticism as the occasion warrants. The reasons the jury is out on Elias are that he has stipulated that he cannot be judged for a long time and many accept this as the necessary basis for all discussion. Others do not accept this condition as fact. Meanwhile, since things happen, neither group will be silent. The first group will not really wait a long time to give judgment and the second will not delay provisional conclusions.

  • Your commentary here is not a "Rant". It speaks to the truth of the matter.

    It takes 3-5 years to do a rebuild in this manner. We are beginning year 2..

    We have to trust Elias at this point. What few people mention is his total rebuilding of the Minor League Coaching Staffs, replete w adding an Analytics Coach at each team. He has brought in young and talented Player Development Coaches for every segment of the game and at every level of the Farm System.

    They will land 2-5 future ML Players in this June's Amateur Draft--including with any amount of luck a future Ace Starting Pitcher They will land some highly talented young International Players beginning this year.

    Gone are the self-serving former players like Brady and BJ Surhoff. The game has passed them by to a certain extent. This rebuild is taking place because the Owner Mr. Angelos is not longer in position to exert his meddling ways on how the team should be run. Credit his Sons for biting the bullet and hiring a capable Exec to come in and make all the difficult decisions that he is making.

    The Orioles team in 2019 was far more enjoyable to watch and far more personable that the roster of Manny, Adam, Schoop et al.

    Let's give this some time. It will pay off greatly.

  • Two thumbs up for Eastern Sho Joe and Baltimore Castaway. Very well stated by both of you. I’m totally content with knowing this will be another mediocre season because it’s leading towards a bright future.

    • Thank you.

    • Thank you Raymo.

  • ES Joe ...
    You had me at "Stevie is not a significant player". But by the time you got to the '3 little pigs' analogy, I was lost. (though I have to admit, that I fell to sleep in there somewhere) But what does building with bricks have to do with neglecting the current lineup? He's a genius and a millennial after all .. can't he multifunction?

    Dude...I really don't see anybody ... on this site anyway ... criticizing Elias for building the program bottom up. It's the immediate disregard to today's product on the field that is distressing. That's all. It's really simple. I think most fans are behind him in his work of reorganizing the farm system and his efforts in Latin America.

    BTW ... Are we being paid by the word these days?

    • Mr. Boog, I explain the question you asked about fielding a better team now in previous comment.

      As for people not being overly critical of Elias on this site, just the comments within this thread proves that you're mistaken about this.

      I apologise for the length of my previous comment, I know that this isn't the proper platform for that type of reply and this isn't a discussion board. In the future, if I comment again, I'll keep it to 50 words or less.

      Take care.

      • Just playing with you ESJ ... I"m often much too long winded myself. But that rant may have set a BB.com record! Lol Keep 'em coming!

  • LMAO...go O’s...

  • Well said Eastern Sho! It's frustrating to see so many fans clamoring for the Orioles to continue doing business the old way that got the organization into this mess to begin with. Signing mid-tier re-treads year after year while sacrificing player development at the lower levels was a recipe for disaster. Everything Elias promised to do when he was hired were all long term projects for sustained results such as improved relations and scouting of international players. These things take time, he has been here less than two years. Most prominent foreign prospects have already built relationships with other organizations so it will take longer to see the fruits of those labors. Nothing he is doing should come as a surprise this is what he was hired to do. I think its a very exciting time to be an O's fan and I can't wait to see where the organization is in a few years.

    • Thank you.

  • Joe, I generally agree with your take on Elias. My worry is that you forecast another 3 or 4 more seasons "at the earliest" before the team is competitive. And I'm not sure the franchise would still be economically viable by then. The Orioles don't (apparently) have deep pocket multi-billionaire ownership. Attendance has declined sharply, down almost 50% since 2014, to the lowest point since 1978. Add in the financial hit from the MASN arbitration, and the financial future of the franchise looks pretty bleak.

    • Mr. B, it's unimaginable that the O's have embarked on this new strategy without considering the financials. Elias said early on that attendance would be low for the first few years but that they would come back in a big way when the team became competitive again. Throughout baseball history attendance has been low when teams are bad, and the seats fill up again when the teams start winning again.

      Few have even said that this is all part of a ploy to sell or relocate the O's. To do this is a multi-year process, requiring approval from the other owners, stadium and television contracts and reorganizing the minor league system so they're not 1000s of miles away.

      While all we can do is speculate about this topic, I do feel that theyve planned for this downtime and for the long-term as well. The people who have come on board with Elias, their aggressive efforts in Latin America, and other factors shows this.

• And do you really think all the DUD scrub infielders Elias is bringing in this winter are that much better than Wilkerson?

  • Mr V, thanks for the chuckle I got from your statement about Elias's butt and myself.

    Anyway, to answer your question about if I thought that the other infielders who are being brought in are as good as Wilkerson. You can research this for yourself, but by you even asking the question clearly illustrates my point I made in my previous comment about some fans just looking at the immediate future and not the overall strategy.

  • Joe, you are right, correct and hitting the nail squarely on its head.

    • Thanks

• The commentaries on this website are collectively morphing into a Rorschach inkblot test. The optimists see a messy jumble of black and say "Good": The faster we strip the team of talent, the more games we lose, and therefore it follows that this will expedite the return to a winning team. Failure is seen as an assured stepping stone to success sometime in the future. Maybe it is and maybe it isn't. The happy view is based on hope, not provable analysis. Meanwhile, the pessimists look at the same inkblot and ask why it had to get so ugly so quickly. Where is it written that by flattening the team payroll (net of Davis.) to a Major League low, the owners will build up a great big cash reserve that they will happily spend sometime in the future when it is "appropriate." What are they doing with the money in the meantime? What will the reserve fund look like if attendance continues to fall because there are not enough optimists willing to pay big league ticket prices to see a really bad team full of waiver wire wonders and a grossly inadequate starting pitching rotation?
  There is NO inconsistency between accepting the fact that the rebuild will take a "few" years and denouncing, to paraphrase B.R.R.'s words, above, management's apparent dismissal of the desirability to place a respectable product on the field this year and next.

  • You say “strip the team of talent.” What talent? Machado and company were traded in 2018 because they were coming up on free agency and were unlikely to resign. Andrew Cashner? 54-74 lifetime record, pitched horrible for the Red Sox and still hasn’t signed with anyone. Jonathan Villar? Placed on waivers and 29 teams passed on him. And that was coming off a career year. As far as the Orioles not signing free agents that is a 2 way street. Players aren’t coming to a team that has lost 223 games over the last 2 years when there are better opportunities elsewhere. Does it make sense to overpay for a Madison Bumgarner or Mike Moustakas when that might get you to 70 wins? Not to mention, all the reclamation projects are still out there. From 1998-2011 the Orioles pretended that they were a contender buy signing mid level free agents and over the hill stars ( Sammy Sosa, Vlad Sr.) All it led to was 14 years of mediocrity. The Angelos’s decided it was time to go in a different direction

• You can NOT place a respectable product on the field in the beginning of a rebuild. Just doesn't work that way.

  In all respect to your sentiments though I will point to the 2017 and 2018 Pre-rebuild teams when Mr. Angelos, Buck Showalter and Brady Anderson were running those teams. They were terrible, and I mean T-E-R-R-I-B-L-E teams to watch every night for six months of our lives.. I will take the 2019 Team any time...young players who hustle, extend themselves every play, and never give up. Not some stupid Beer League (yes, I'm talking to you Manny and Adam, Chris and Jonathan) they sucked and "mailed-it-in" most of the time in those 2 seasons...

  I'm done talking about about putting a competitive team on the field. It is about rebuilding a shining new organization from the ground up intelligently and skillfully.

  • I can show you many examples of teams that have rebuilt without purposefully tanking, all the while concurrently putting competitive teams on the field. . It certainly CAN work that way my friend.

  • Agree Boog, again look at the Cardinals...go O’s...

  • I do not think you can prove your generalization that it is impossible to put a "respectable" product on the field in the beginning of a rebuild. You and the others who are fine with the current strategy of depending on the discards of other teams to fill out our roster should be furious with the signing of Iglesias, a very respectable acquisition even if he's only short-term. I daresay he is not going to delay the promotion of the unidentified prospects who are allegedly on the cusp of Major League success if only they would be added to the roster now. Those who offer only the advice of unquestioning patience need to stop generalizing--unless you can prove that we will perpetuate a losing franchise by signing two or three other short-term, "reasonably" price free agents, ideally two pitchers and an outfielder. If we do sign a couple of free agents to one or two year contracts, I assume the proponents of patience will scream bloody murder and demand that ownership immediately seal its wallet. Trying at the margins to prevent this team from being embarrassingly bad this year and next won't undermine achieving this "shining new organization" you speak of and all of us want eventually.

• I sure hope all of you who support the tank and rebuild process have multiple season tickets and will be out in force at every home game rooting for a 120 loss season. If you’re not then you are silently supporting the O’s move out of Baltimore since the franchise can’t exist with the attendance continuing to dive as it has been. Many teams have found better ways to keep people in their seats while improving their roster. Tanking stinks and is not a guarantee to a long term competitive team.

  • Would you suggest the Orioles do what they did from 1998-2011? Win 70 or so games, sign a few mid level free agents, tell the fans you are ready to contend and then win 70 games again. Wash, rinse, and repeat. The ultimate goal is to compete for a title, not to field a mediocre team with a few fan favorites. The minor league system, thanks in large part to Dan Duquette’s last few drafts is in the top 10. The Orioles now have a presence in Latin America. They are now using advanced analytics. It’s going to take a couple of years to dig out from 47-115, but the core of the future ( Hays, Mountcastle, Rutschman, GrayRod, D.L. Hall, and their #1 pick in June) is starting to come together. Better to lose 110 games this year and be competing for a title in 3 years than to continually go 71-91 and make cosmetic changes that don’t move the needle. Patience is required

    • Yes it is. It will be worth it all when things start to turn around.

      I am enjoying the progression of all the Minor League players in the System.

    • If you're really asking .... I think I can speak for the majority of the HOTT fans (haters of the tank), when I say we'd prefer to follow the recipes of the Cards/Sox/Yanks/Dodgers organizations, and remain in the championship hunt annually without tanking for a third of a decade at a time.

      • Boog, the problem is that the franchises you cite as examples to follow are are at the very top of MLB in attendance and financial resources. Elias has been dealt a different hand - it looks like Orioles ownership has Elias on a very short financial leash.

        • All very valid points Birdman. But I"m not saying to go spend big $$ ... but when you cut a player loose like Villar for what amounts to a middlin' 8 million dollars contract, that's simply chickenspit.

          THere's price to doing business at the major league level .... and I don't see the ticket prices at Camden Yard being much less expensive that those other guys ...

        • Mr. B-Man, we can only speculate how much spending freedom Elias has been given, unless there has been budgeting information released that Im not aware of. Keeping costs low during the early years of a rebuild is typical for many teams.

          Mr Boog, you may want to check your above comment for typos. Surely you didn't intend to write that the O's could follow the same "recipe" as the Dodgers, NY and Boston?

          If it wasn't a typo, you can't be seriously suggesting that the O's should outspend 90% of the other teams to remain in contention - because that's how NY, LA and the Sox have done it. They can only do this because they have the largest markets in America.

          As for following the STL recipe, while this is a little more realistic, it's still impossible to compare them with the O's. Being in the NL Central has allowed them much greater flexibility than the Os could ever dream of.

          They don't face NY and Boston multiple times per year like the Os do.

          Lastly, we had some horrible pitchers last year. If we were tanking, why were they being sent down? If our goal was to lose, why didn't they keep Mullins in the lineup? Surely a .090 hitter will help you lose. Why did they significantly limit the playing time, and finally bench C. Davis?

          The lack of signing big contract players and/or bringing up prospects slowly is not proof of loosing intentionally (which is what tanking is). While you may think it is, I think it's part of a different, and much better, strategy of cutting spending, developing players and consolidating resources needed to win it all, and build an organization that can stay there. But again, these are only our opinions and only time will tell who's opinion is right.

        • If our pitchers were so horrible and we weren't tanking .. how come they let Cashman go for practically nothing? And just a few years ago, the O's payroll was only slightly lower than the big boys from up north.
          Yeah I wish we would emulate the Sox & Yanks ... both teams with traditionally solid farm systems that know how and when to spend on FAgency.

  • Attempt to put the best team on the field, that’s all we’re asking, there were so many examples of better players in the minors that deserved to have their chance because we were awful, Elias choose not to because it would start their clock, PUT YOUR BEST players on the field...go O’s..

    • Ditto that CP ...

  • Who have the Orioles held back? Mountcastle has no position yet and could work on plate discipline. Hays would have been up earlier, but he kept getting hurt. Same with Hunter Harvey. I would love to see GrayRod and DL Hall up here, but they are a couple years away. The landscape is littered with pitchers who were rushed to the big leagues and never recovered.

    • Specifically last year it was Santander, Sisco & Hays.

      This year it's probably going to be Mountcastle.

  • Hays kept getting hurt. Would have been up sooner if he had stayed healthy. Frankly, Hays was rushed to the majors in 2017. If they hadn’t done that, he could have stayed off the 40 man roster until this off-season and the Orioles would have had 3 option years on him. Santander had an injury plagued 2017 and a poor season in AA in 2018. He needed at bats in Norfolk before he was brought up. As for Sisco, the Orioles wanted the veteran Sucre to start the year and work with the pitchers. Severino had no options, so the Orioles needed to keep him up here to look at him. When Sucre was DFA’d Sisco came up. And while he could hit a little bit, his defense is below average. As far as Mountcastle, maybe he gets sent down for 3 weeks to squeeze out an extra year service time. Every team does that. Don’t like it, but it’s the rules. Nunez can hold down the DH position for 3 weeks. The Orioles are going to lose 100 games most likely anyway. Three weeks won’t make a difference

    • The point is that all 3 of those players won the job in spring training. All 3 had also shown their stuff in the minors prior to that spring as well. Simple ... put the players that perform on the field and stop worrying about options and such. The league is littered with 20 and 21 year old players that have proven that you can either hit or you can't.

      Stop buying the party line from Elias, if you can't see a tank job in spite of your nose, well ....

  • Ditto that, couldn’t have said it better...go O’s...

  • First off , no one ever “wins” a job in Spring Training. For most players it’s to get your work in and play golf. When judging prospects, minor league numbers are a better, but not perfect, indicator of future success. As far as Hays, et al , are concerned, the ultimate goal is for them to be the best players they can be. Austin Hays with 70 or so at bats in AAA , is more seasoned than without those at bats. If we went by training camp stats, McSorley would have been the Ravens starting QB. Bring the player up when he is ready so as not to continue the Norfolk shuttle. As for Cashner, he was (is) a free agent. They made the best deal they could before he would leave and the Orioles would have received nothing for him. Have you been to the Dominican Republic and seen these guys play? Me neither. But I will wait 3 or so years before writing them off. Either way, Cashner would have been gone. 2 months of him wouldn’t have made a difference

    • One thing I do take issue with is that there were no Roger Dorns in Sarasota last year. I seriously doubt that many of these guys were to be found cleaning their golf clubs between innings.

      But other than that ... I bow to your seasoned knowledge. You've convinced me there is not, nor was there ever any tanky hanky panky at play here. Above board all the way.

      Can't wait for the Cabana Boys to show up.

• Glad they thought enough of him to let him try and catch on somewhere else_unlike Mancini. I see what's coming. A resurgence for Chris Davis who ultimately works with Mountcastle. First base be locked up letting Trey flounder in the outfield. What a shame. He shoulda never took over Adam's locker cause now they got to keep him for his leadership. Just like the Orioles. They ought to get an award for screwing up baseball careers. The Oriole Way.