- The Orioles – the only team with more international money to spend than the Fish – had five representatives in attendance for the showcase of Victor Victor Mesa, brother Victor Mesa Jr. (also an outfielder) and Cuban pitcher Sandy Gaston on Friday in Miami, Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com reports. Baltimore sent vice president of baseball operations Brady Anderson, senior advisor Joe McIlvaine, special assignment scout John Stockstill and a pair of scouts (Dean Albany and Calvin Maduro), according to Kubatko, who hears that the O’s lack of a GM/manager won’t impact their pursuit of the Mesas. The Orioles said goodbye to both GM Dan Duquette and skipper Buck Showalter earlier this week.
Orioles Rumors
Poll: Which Is The Most Intriguing Managerial Job?
Six teams are currently on the hunt for new managers, leading to a flurry of rumors and reports about experienced skippers, and coaches/broadcasters/former players all linked to these jobs. If you’re being offered your first shot at managing a big league team, obviously, you perhaps can’t be afford to be too picky — the same could be said of veteran ex-managers who don’t know if they’ll ever get another chance at running a dugout.
So technically, the question of “which job would you prefer to take?” might not apply to many candidates, but it’s just fine for a hypothetical poll here on MLB Trade Rumors. All of these six openings have their pros and cons, and it really comes down to individual preference about what makes one job more attractive than another. Would you prefer to manage a team that has shown a willingness to spend? One with a proven organizational track record of success (and stability)? A rebuilding club with a bunch of promising minor leaguers on the way?
Here are the six teams currently conducting a manager search…
Orioles: Nowhere to go but up after 115 losses, right? Baltimore’s new manager will be entering an organization in a state of flux after a disastrous campaign, as the O’s are also looking for a new GM to replace Dan Duquette, as well as the Angelos brothers fully taking over the team’s operations from their father. With the rebuild just underway, however, a new skipper wouldn’t be expected to win for at least a few years, creating a low-pressure teaching environment to help bring along the Orioles’ younger talents (some of whom were acquired in the team’s deadline fire sale). There’s plenty of opportunity here for a manager to enter at day one and put their stamp on a new era of Orioles baseball.
Blue Jays: Another AL East team that is technically “starting” a rebuild, though the front office has unofficially been reloading the farm system over the last few years. Some of those young names made their debuts in 2018, though the biggest stars of Toronto’s highly-touted minor league ranks (including Vladimir Guerrero Jr.) are still to come in 2019 or 2020. Since GM Ross Atkins is targeting 2021 for the Jays’ return to contention, a new manager has two years of building and development ahead before expectations rise. With payrolls topping the $160MM mark in each of the last two seasons, a new manager can be confident that ownership and the front office will eventually spend to add talent.
Reds: Similar to the situation with the Jays, Cincinnati’s new skipper will step into a situation where some of the heavy lifting has already been done in terms of rebuilding. The Reds have built an interesting core of position players (Eugenio Suarez, Scooter Gennett, Jose Peraza, Jesse Winker, and franchise cornerstone Joey Votto) that should only improve once top prospect Nick Senzel cracks the big league roster. The problem, of course, is a dearth of starting pitching, though the club is prepared to spend this winter to address that and other needs.
Rangers: Here’s another team in sore need of pitching help, which GM Jon Daniels has said “is a priority” for the coming offseason. The Rangers are in an interesting, and perhaps unwelcome, spot compared to the other teams on this list, in that they’re not really clearly rebuilding or planning to contend in 2019. This is what happens when a team almost entirely en masse, as neither the established players (Elvis Andrus, Rougned Odor), the youngsters (Ronald Guzman, Willie Calhoun) or the former star prospects in between the two camps (Joey Gallo, Nomar Mazara) particularly distinguished themselves last year. That said, a new voice in the dugout could help in unleashing the talent that this group clearly possesses, plus there’s organizational stability in the form of Daniels, who is the game’s second-longest tenured general manager.
Angels: What manager wouldn’t relish the opportunity to lead the game’s best player in Mike Trout, or the game’s most fascinating player in Shohei Ohtani? Combine those two with Justin Upton, Andrelton Simmons, Andrew Heaney, Tyler Skaggs and a host of young relievers, and there’s a lot to like about the Angels’ roster. Beyond the star names, however, the Halos are still trying to fully get through a stunning onslaught of pitching injuries that have thinned the pitching depth (including sidelining Ohtani from the mound in 2019 due to Tommy John surgery). The new Angels skipper will be expected to turn things around quickly, especially with Trout only under contract for two more seasons. There are some big shoes to fill in the wake of Mike Scioscia’s departure, and it’s fair to wonder how much rope owner Arte Moreno will give to a manager who didn’t have a World Series title on his resume or the organizational influence that Scioscia held in the club.
Twins: If the team continues its yo-yo performance of the last four seasons under Paul Molitor, then it should be due for another winning season in 2019 — do we have a bizarro Giants/#OddYear scenario here? In all seriousness, Minnesota might actually be in the best position of any of these six teams to contend next season, given the weakness of the AL Central. The better odds might be on a bit of a step backwards as baseball operations heads Derek Falvey and Thad Levine figure out which of their young talents are actual building blocks and which might be trade chips. A manager who can get Byron Buxton or Miguel Sano back on track, however, could make a quick impact.
(poll link for app users)
Early Speculation On Orioles' GM Search
The Orioles face a pivotal decision in naming their successor to recently dismissed general manager Dan Duquette in the coming weeks, and Jon Meoli of the Baltimore Sun and Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com run through some speculative candidates for the job. Both mention former Red Sox GM and current Blue Jays VP of baseball ops Ben Cherington as a logical candidate, and it’s worth noting that The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal reported yesterday that Cherington “wants to build an organization from the ground up” (which likely played a notable role in his decision to withdraw from consideration for the Mets and Giants vacancies). Kubatko adds that executive vice president John Angelos met with former Dodgers GM Ned Colletti earlier this summer but emphasizes that there’s no clear indication it was in connection to a potential GM role or that any formal interview will take place. Meoli, meanwhile, suggests that the team will pursue younger execs from data-driven organizations.
Over at The Athletic, Dan Connolly campaigns for the Orioles to place Cal Ripken Jr. in a president-type role (subscription link), though Ripken has no baseball operations experience. Rosenthal has previously suggested a role similar to the one Derek Jeter holds in Miami, but Ripken would still presumably need an experience exec to work underneath him, and it’s not clear that the organization is even pursuing that type of reunion with the franchise icon.
Orioles Wanted Gavin Lux In Machado Trade Talks
- Infield prospect Gavin Lux was the Orioles’ “main target” in the Manny Machado trade talks with the Dodgers. Los Angeles managed to swing the deal without moving Lux, the 20th overall pick of the 2016 draft. Lux broke out in his third pro season, hitting .324/.399/.514 over a combined 524 PA at the high-A and Double-A levels. MLBTR’s Jason Martinez recently cited Lux as one of his top minor league performers of 2018, and MLB.com ranked Lux 82nd on its season-ending list of the top 100 prospects in baseball.
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Did The Orioles Wait Too Long To Begin Management Search?
- The Orioles officially announced yesterday that Buck Showalter and Dan Duquette wouldn’t be returning to the club in 2019, though the fact that the team waited until after the season to announce the changes “makes absolutely no sense” to ESPN.com’s Buster Olney (Twitter link). Both Showalter and Duquette were in the last year of their contracts and there was a clear sense that changes would be made in the wake of Baltimore’s disastrous 115-loss season, so in Olney’s view, “valuable time [was] squandered” by the Orioles. Rather than begin their search for a new manager and GM over the last several weeks or months, the O’s will now be competing for candidates with other teams looking to fill managerial or front office vacancies.
Dan Duquette Won’t Return To Orioles; Team Will Hire New GM From Outside Organization
7:10pm: The Orioles have announced that neither Duquette nor Showalter will be retained for the 2019 season. Director of player development Brian Graham will oversee baseball operations while the team conducts a search for an outside hire. He’s been with the team since 2007 and previously served as an interim GM for the Pirates as well.
“The club will hire an executive from outside of the organization to lead the Baseball Operations department,” the Orioles said in tonight’s press release. “Once in place, this individual will have the final determination on all baseball matters that he or she believes will make the Orioles successful on the field, entertaining to fans, and impactful in the community.”
5:06pm: The Orioles have indeed moved on from Duquette, tweets Fancred’s Jon Heyman.
4:59pm: Not only will the Orioles reportedly part ways with manager Buck Showalter, they’re also “expected to let go” executive vice president/general manager Dan Duquette, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (Twitter link).
Like Showalter, Duquette’s contract expires at the end of the 2018 season. However, while reports in recent weeks had largely indicated that Showalter was likely to depart, the general sense was that the organization would hang onto Duquette. Instead, it now seems that the Orioles will be looking for both a new field manager and a new head of baseball operations this offseason.
Duquette, 60, has been with the O’s since the 2011 season and helped to orchestrate three postseason appearances, including an AL East division title in 2014. That said, Duquette’s fingerprints are also on the 2018 season’s MLB-worst 47-115 team — the fewest wins in franchise history. Not all of that disappointment can be placed on Duquette alone, as owner Peter Angelos has had his own detrimental impact on the organization at times. While Angelos gave the front office plenty of payroll capacity with which to work, he also reportedly had little interest in investing on the international amateur free agent market and was also said to be instrumental in bringing back Chris Davis on what is perhaps baseball’s worst contract at this point.
Duquette’s tenure with the O’s featured some notable successes — e.g. signing Nelson Cruz when his market collapsed in the 2013-14 offseason, extending J.J. Hardy, the initial acquisition of Mark Trumbo for pennies on the dollar — but there were as many, if not more missteps along the way as well. Free-agent deals for Ubaldo Jimenez and Yovani Gallardo proved to be busts, and the trade sending Jake Arrieta to the Cubs will go down as one of the more lopsided swaps in recent history, even if Arrieta had plenty of chances in Baltimore and was considered to be a project at the time of the deal.
Whoever steps into the GM chair in Baltimore, be it vice president Brady Anderson or an outside hire, will take over a rebuild that Duquette kicked off in earnest this past summer with the trade of Manny Machado to the Dodgers. The Orioles netted five prospects in that trade and, not long after, had also shipped out Jonathan Schoop, Zach Britton, Brad Brach, Kevin Gausman and the remainder of the injured Darren O’Day’s contract — netting a combined 13 new prospects and some significant international funds to aid their reported pursuit of Cuban phenom Victor Victor Mesa.
The Orioles’ farm system has improved with those deals and with the success of some recent draft picks, but the organization still faces a long road back to contention in a stacked AL East division that features a pair of powerhouses in the Red Sox and Yankees, plus a surprising 90-win Rays team that has an impressive young core of stars around which to build.
Orioles Part Ways With Buck Showalter
The Orioles won’t be retaining manager Buck Showalter, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports (Twitter link). Showalter will be leaving the organization entirely, and not taking on any other role in the front office.
Showalter’s contract was set to officially expire this month, and it was widely expected that the O’s would be making a change in the dugout in the wake of their nightmarish 115-loss season. There was some speculation that Showalter could be offered another job to remain in the organization, and while Showalter and O’s management had talks about that possibility in the past, Eduardo A. Encina of the Baltimore Sun tweets that “discussions never got to that point” in Showalter’s meeting with team ownership today.
The Orioles’ hideous 2018 performance dragged Showalter’s record as the team’s manager under the .500 mark, ending his tenure at 669-684. While the Showalter era ended on a very sour note, however, it was under his leadership that the Orioles enjoyed a big turnaround. After taking over as manager partway through the 2010 season, Showalter stewarded the team through one more losing season in 2011, extending Baltimore’s stretch of sub-.500 seasons to fourteen. That all changed in 2012, when the O’s made a surprise run to the AL Wild Card game and defeated the Rangers to earn a slot in the ALDS.
2012 was the first five straight non-losing seasons (the club went 81-81 in 2015) for the Orioles, a stretch that included another wild card appearance in 2016 and an AL East title in 2014. That 2014 team was Showalter’s best, a squad that won 96 games and defeated the Tigers in the ALDS to notch Baltimore’s first postseason series victory since 1997. All three of Showalter’s playoff teams in Baltimore outperformed their Pythagorean win-loss record, which is a good indicator of Showalter’s ability in managing a team that often seemed to catch opponents and pundits by surprise. While the O’s had such talents as Manny Machado and Adam Jones anchoring the lineup, plus the likes of Nelson Cruz or Chris Davis contributing big seasons at the plate, Showalter navigated his team to success with a focus on slugging, defense, and a quality bullpen, despite a constant lack of stability in the starting rotation.
Showalter has now concluded four different managerial stints with as many different teams, having previously stewarded the Yankees from 1992-95, the Diamondbacks from 1998-2000, and the Rangers from 2003-06. In each of those cases, Showalter helped take a struggling team (or, in Arizona’s case, an expansion team) to success, so he could stand out as a logical candidate for teams looking for a new manager this offseason. The Reds, for instance, seem to be targeting experienced names as they look to take the next step in their rebuild, so Showalter could potentially end up on their radar screen. The Blue Jays, Twins, Rangers, and Angels are the other clubs with managerial vacancies, plus more openings could still emerge. Of course, this assumes that the 62-year-old Showalter is still interested in managing, as he has been rumored to have interest in front office positions in the past.
Recent reports have indicated that Dan Duquette could stay on as Baltimore’s executive VP of baseball operations, and since Showalter was already in place before Duquette was hired by the Orioles in November 2011, this could be Duquette’s first chance at hiring his own manager (which is no small thing, as there have long been rumors of friction between Duquette and Showalter). It remains to be seen exactly what the Orioles braintrust of Duquette, Brady Anderson and the Angelos family will look for in a new manager, though with the O’s just entering what could be a lengthy rebuild, it seems likely that a new skipper will need to be experienced in developing and teaching young players.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images
AL East Notes: Yankees, Showalter, Duquette, O’s, Brasier
While many simply point to the Yankees’ payroll as the reason for their success, general manager Brian Cashman has spent over a decade quietly assembling an analytics department that rivals any in baseball, as Marc Carig and Eno Sarris detail in a fascinating piece for The Athletic (subscription required). Current assistant GM Michael Fishman was hired as the Yankees’ first full-time analyst in 2005, and today, New York has an estimated 20 employees on their analytics team. This ties them with the Dodgers as the largest such staff in baseball by Carig and Sarris’ count, though they note that teams are notoriously secretive in providing any details about their information-gathering practices. The increased focus on analytical data has impacted all levels of the baseball operations and scouting departments, with the results apparent in how the Yankees have built their outstanding bullpen, all their pitchers’ high velocity and spin rate on their four-seam fastballs, and in the sheer number of current Major League players that the Yankees originally signed or drafted.
Here’s more from around the AL East…
- We could know more about Buck Showalter’s future with the Orioles today, as The Athletic’s Dan Connolly (Twitter link) reports that the manager is expected to meet with ownership and the “sense is” Showalter will be offered some type of job to remain with the franchise. It isn’t clear if that job would be a front office role or if Showalter could continue on as manager in the wake of Baltimore’s 115-loss season.
- Questions also surround the job status of Orioles executive VP of baseball operations Dan Duquette, though Duquette didn’t give any hints about his situation, simply telling Dan Connolly (subscription-only piece) “that’s an appropriate question for ownership.” Though Duquette’s contract is up at the end of October, he is still proceeding as if he’ll still be with the organization in 2019. For instance, Duquette is considering joining at least five other Orioles talent evaluators in attending the showcase for top Cuban prospects Victor Victor Mesa, Victor Mesa Jr., and Sandy Gaston on Friday. The O’s have been heavily linked to these youngsters due to the space in the team’s international bonus pool, which Connolly estimates as roughly $6MM available to be spent.
- Hard-throwing Ryan Brasier has become a key contributor to the Red Sox bullpen, posting a 1.60 ERA, 4.14 K/BB rate and 7.8 K/9 over 33 2/3 frames for the AL East champs. It has been quite the showing for the unheralded 31-year-old, who had just nine innings of MLB experience (with the Angels in 2013) prior to this season. As The Athletic’s Chad Jennings (subscription required) writes, it was less than a year ago that a homesick Brasier was pitching in Japan and intent on returning to North America for the 2018 campaign. He sent e-mails to all 30 MLB teams over the offseason in search of a job, finally landing a minor league deal with the Sox, and then excelling after his contract was selected in July.
Orioles Will Reportedly Keep Chris Davis
- As of now, it appears first baseman Chris Davis will be back with the Orioles in 2019, Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com hears. The soon-to-be 33-year-old owns one of the majors’ worst contracts, so the Orioles’ only chance to get rid of Davis would be by releasing him. It appears the rebuilding club will continue with Davis on its roster, however, even after he posted an all-time worst season in 2018. Formerly an elite slugger, Davis hit a shockingly terrible .168/.243/.296 with 16 home runs in 522 plate appearances. He easily finished last in the majors in fWAR (minus-3.1) and wRC+ (46).
Latest On Buck Showalter, Adam Jones
- There’s still no official word on the status of longtime Orioles manager Buck Showlter, but it’s been reported for weeks that he’s unlikely to return. Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com writes that official word on Showalter could come as soon as today, and expectations of his departure have not changed. Kubatko also chatted with Adam Jones following what is quite likely his final game as an Oriole (barring a return late in his career). Jones acknowledged the strangeness he felt in hearing the word “rebuild” in Baltimore, as the only time he’d previously heard it was when he was breaking onto the scene with fellow upstarts Nick Markakis and Chris Tillman. Not that it’s been in doubt, but Jones certainly didn’t speak like someone who anticipated a return to Baltimore. “It’s been a great run here, great tenure here, so hopefully go somewhere and see what the next chapter in my career has for me,” said Jones, who received quite the tribute in his final game at Camden Yards yesterday. Showalter allowed Jones to take the field — center field, at that — alone in the first inning of the game before being removed in the top of the ninth to a roaring ovation from O’s fans (video link via MLB.com).
