Yesterday afternoon, Kiley McDaniel published his consummately researched and demonstrably authoritative prospect list for the Baltimore Orioles. What follows is a different exercise than that, one much smaller in scope and designed to identify not Baltimore’s top overall prospects but rather the rookie-eligible players in the Orioles system who are most ready to produce wins at the major-league level in 2015 (regardless of whether they’re likely to receive the opportunity to do so). No attempt has been made, in other words, to account for future value.

Below are the top-five prospects in the Orioles system by projected WAR. To assemble this brief list, what I’ve done is to locate the Steamer 600 projections for all the prospects to whom McDaniel assessed a Future Value grade of 40 or greater. Hitters’ numbers are normalized to 550 plate appearances; starting pitchers’, to 150 innings — i.e. the playing-time thresholds at which a league-average player would produce a 2.0 WAR. Catcher projections are prorated to 415 plate appearances to account for their reduced playing time.

Note that, in many cases, defensive value has been calculated entirely by positional adjustment based on the relevant player’s minor-league defensive starts — which is to say, there has been no attempt to account for the runs a player is likely to save in the field. As a result, players with an impressive offensive profile relative to their position are sometimes perhaps overvalued — that is, in such cases where their actual defensive skills are sub-par.

t3. Christian Walker, 1B (Profile)

Last year, Walker hit 26 home runs in 599 plate appearances between Double- and Triple-A, recording a rate of 29 homers per 600 plate appearances at a ballpark that inflates that sort of batted ball by about 25% and then a rate of about 19 per 600 plate appearances a park that deflates home runs by roughly the same factor. This hardly leads to any strong conclusions about Walker’s power. That said, as a first baseman who lacks a decidedly above-average hit tool or walk rate, Walker’s success at the majors is probably contingent on hitting home runs. He’s projected to hit 19 per 600 plate appearances at the majors in 2015.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, D’Backs, Twins, Astros, Cubs, Reds, Phillies, Rays, Mets, Padres, Marlins, Nationals, Red Sox, White Sox, Orioles & Yankees

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

Amateur Coverage: 2015 Draft Rankings, 2015 July 2 Top Prospects & Latest on Yoan Moncada

Something that came up on every call with an Orioles official was their internal prospect list. Most teams I’ve talked to don’t have a consensus list; maybe a list a couple people in the office maintain with agreed-upon tiers of players, but not one that the whole organization refers to. Others in the org maintain their own lists as well. At one point or another, this master list was referenced enough that I saw some trends where the Orioles own list would diverge from my own.

They skewed high for the near big league ready players, with down list players like Dariel Alvarez and Henry Urrutia much higher than I have them and thus some lower level players like Stephen Tarpley lower than I have them. As you would expect, they also have some information a typical scout may not have, regarding injuries and progress in private workouts, so some players with subpar 2014 season are higher than I have them, like Urrutia, Michael Almanzar and Josh Hart. Other than those two main differences, our lists ended up being pretty similar, with only a handful of players we disagreed on that didn’t fall into one of those two groups.

There’s positives and negatives of having such a list. The official-ness of it means it gets referenced internally all the time and is the starting point for trade talks, so it can morph the internal dialogue about a player for better or worse. While it’s less divisive than it was 10 years ago, there is also still a scouts vs. stats divide on subjects like prospect lists in most organizations, since the evaluation method (particularly on high minors players with lots of data) differs a good bit.  There’s also a positive to having the dialogue that leads to a consensus list, so various factions within the organization know where “their” guys stand and thus know when to speak up in-season if they think their guy warrants a better ranking.

The O’s have had solid drafts under the Dan Duquette regime; they haven’t had tons of extra picks or a high draft position to give them the money or opportunity to get the super elite prospect. That said, the early returns are solid considering that and their lower investment in international bonuses, with Jomar Reyes looking like a steal less than a year after signing.   There’s also depth in pitching at the upper levels, with 5 of the top 12 prospects being pitchers that could contribute in the big leagues in 2015.  From my current ranking of the farm systems of all 30 organizations, I have Baltimore 18th, which may still change before I formally publish those rankings.

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The MASN dispute between the Orioles and Nationals continues to wage on in New York state court. As a review, the fight involves an arbitration decision issued last year by MLB’s Revenue Sharing Definitions Committee (the “RSDC”), awarding the Nationals roughly $60 million dollars per year in broadcast rights fees from the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network. This award was nearly $30 million more per year than the team had previously been receiving, but far less than the roughly $120 million it had requested.

The Orioles, who own a majority share of the MASN network, have contested the arbitration outcome, contending that the arbitrators – the owners of the New York Mets, Pittsburgh Pirates, and Tampa Bay Rays – were biased in favor of the Nationals. MASN and the Orioles filed suit back in August, asking the court to overturn the arbitration decision. Last month, the court ordered MLB to produce documents in the case relating to commissioner-elect Rob Manfred’s involvement in the arbitration proceedings.

This week both MASN and the Orioles filed new papers with the court, further describing the alleged bias of MLB and its arbitrators.

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The Baltimore Orioles are good at many things. Their greatest skill is probably confounding expectations. The rest of the league zigs and then the O’s zag their way into the playoffs, twice in the last three seasons.

While the rest of their division — the rest of baseball, really — gears up for a run at the playoffs, the Orioles sat back. Their off-season to date can best be described as “somnambulant”, They lost Andrew Miller, Nick Markakis, and Nelson Cruz to free agency, declined some options and added, um, Wesley Wright? That’s it.

Considering the state of their disabled list at the end of the season, returning Matt Wieters and Manny Machado from injury (and Chris Davis from suspension) will go a long way to improving their club. But there’s another reason the Orioles haven’t rushed out to apply quick fixes to their club – the unlikely emergence of Steve Pearce.

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There’s not a contract agreement yet or even an indication that one is close, but one thing seems clear about this particular baseball offseason: There might not be a larger gap between our perception and the conversations we’re hearing in the real world than in those regarding Nick Markakis. A few weeks ago, it seemed like the Orioles were ready to retain him for the next four years, but that hasn’t quite happened yet, and the latest rumors have the Braves, Blue Jays, Giants, O’s, and potentially others all showing interest.

Earlier this week, ESPN’s Jim Bowden — who’s really very good at this sort of thing — suggested Markakis could get four years and $52 million. MLB Trade Rumors said 4/$48M in October. FanGraphs readers were a little more conservative, coming up with an average of 3.4 years and $39.8M, but we also know that the FanGraphs crowd tends to underestimate free agent contracts somewhat.

Just by those numbers, one would think that Markakis is a desirable player to have, but you probably already know that most of the FanGraphs staff doesn’t really see it that way. A month ago, Dave compared Markakis to Nori Aoki, who clearly isn’t getting a four-year deal. Steamer pegs him for a 103 wRC+ and 1.3 WAR in his age-31 season, and that’s with the benefit of a projected 679 plate appearances. Using Steamer/600 on our Free Agent Tracker, he’s tied for the 15th-best unsigned hitter out there. (The usual “don’t overthink the decimal point” caveat applies.) You’ve probably seen many of us mention how down we are on him via tweets or in chats, as well. He’s not young. He’s not improving. He’s not even a source of righty power, this year’s trendy “must-have.”

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The Boston Red Sox, as you might have heard, currently have an outfield glut. There is ten pounds of outfield meat in their five pound bag. Something has to give, and that something is likely Yoenis Cespedes.

When the Sox acquired Cespedes from Oakland in the Jon Lester trade, it felt more like a rental than a long-term investment in the player. Cespedes’ unique contract allows him to become a free agent at the end of the 2015 season, so Boston put themselves in an enviable position. They received an established big leaguer in exchange for their walk-year ace and got an up-close and personal look at a potential big free agent bat.

Whether or not a look under Cespedes’ hood informed their decision to sign both Hanley Ramirez and Pablo Sandoval, that’s the route they went down. Now Cespedes is trade bait, the precious “right-handed power” commodity in a marketplace clambering for those skills. He’s headed into his age-29 season, he’s owed $10.5 million this year, and there’s going to be a line around the block to bid for his services. Where might he land?

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It was the year of the shift in major league baseball this season. It was also the year of the strikeout, the year of the position player pitching and, apparently, the year of the Royals – at least so far. But it was definitely the year of the shift.

As you are well aware, shifts were up across baseball this year. We saw them more than we’ve ever seen them in the regular season, and we’re seeing them more than we’ve ever seen them in the playoffs.

When we think of a defensive shift, we think of a second baseman positioned in shallow right grass against a left-handed hitter. Recently, we’ve seen three defenders positioned on the left side of second base become more common against pull-happy righties. But these aren’t the only kinds of defensive shifts. I mean, it’s right there in the name: defensive shift. A shift of the defense, away from standard positioning, to give your team a tactical advantage. Sometimes you see the corners hug the lines. Sometimes you see no-doubles in the outfield. Sometimes you see a third baseman creep in on the bunt. These are all ways we’ve seen teams shift against a batter. For the first time since perhaps Rickey Henderson, the Orioles shifted against a baserunner.
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So can we just go over this one more time? I know everyone knows about it, but it’s still freaking crazy. The Orioles are in the ALCS. That’s already pretty nuts. But Ubaldo Jimenez, who they gave a lot of money to, was bad. He’s not on the roster. Matt Wieters played 26 games before getting hurt. He’s not on the roster. Manny Machado managed half a season before getting hurt. He’s not on the roster. Chris Davis basically just sucked. He’s not on the roster. Even if, in March, you had a program of your own that predicted the Orioles would get this far, your program still would’ve been wrong about how it all happened. The Royals? Great story. The Orioles? Great story, too. There are so many reasons why so many people seem to find this year’s ALCS more compelling than its senior companion.

Clearly, the Orioles have gotten contributions from enough other people to make up for the missing or underperforming stars. Clearly, the Orioles assembled some depth. This all got me thinking about Dan Duquette, and a certain principle. One way to improve a roster is by adding more good players. Another way to improve a roster is by eliminating the bad players. Of course, you want to do both, but in theory you can either raise the ceiling or raise the floor. It seems to me the Orioles haven’t given much in the way of playing time to the truly bad. It seems to me that would be a credit to the organization. To what extent, though, is this actually true?

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Three and a half months ago, I wrote about Alex Gordon’s arm. Among regular outfielders, Gordon has one of the very best throwing arms in baseball, and that’s allowed him to pile up valuable runner-killing assists. Toward the end of June, I noticed that Gordon’s assists were down, but that his arm rating was still up high. The reason: deterrence. To that point, nobody had really been willing to challenge Gordon. While he was creating fewer outs, he was saving a ton of bases, and the value there is very much real.

Now, deterrence is a difficult thing to observe in real-time. Good speed, you can observe on a lot of plays. The same goes for good instincts and route-running, and on a decently frequent basis you can see a guy’s throwing arm at work. But deterrence requires certain circumstances, and you have to be looking for it. At the end of the season, I don’t think you have a “feel” for which outfielders deter runners the most, like you might have a feel for other things. But if you want to talk about Gordon, then we can just talk about Saturday. Because Alex Gordon stopped a runner from attempting to score, late in a 4-4 game.

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If you were to ask yourself, “Who are the two most dominant bullpen weapons – that aren’t closers – in the MLB?” the next logical step would be to ask yourself, “Well, how could I find out?”

One way you could find out is to head over to the FanGraphs leaderboards and export a custom leaderboard to Excel with the saves, FIP-WAR and RA9-WAR totals of all the qualified relievers in baseball this season. Then, you could remove all the players with more than 10 saves and sort the ones that are left by a 50/50 split of the two WAR totals.

Guess what? You don’t have to think or do any of that because that’s exactly what I already did. Here’s the top 10:
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