Are You Willing To Give Up Our 1st Rnd Draft Pick To Sign A FA?

[ofahn]

Suppose some of the better "free" agents become more realistic with their demands and fall into the Orioles price range. Are you willing to give up our 1st Round draft pick (24th) to sign them?

IMO the only player I can see this question becoming relevant for is Adam LaRoche. If Washington isn't willing to give him the three year contract he wants then his market be be us and the Red Sox at two years. If he decides he wants to play for a team that has a solid chance at the playoffs it might (for once) come down to us. If that happens, are you willing to give up our 2013 1st pick for two years of Adam LaRoche?

These are the players we would have to give up a draft pick for:


Michael Bourn, Braves
Josh Hamilton, Rangers
Adam LaRoche, Nationals
Kyle Lohse, Cardinals
Rafael Soriano, Yankees
Nick Swisher, Yankees


Read more at http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2012/11/2 ... 4ti827x.99

[Matt P]

I wouldn't be upset at losing a draft pick for Hamilton. Swisher and Bourn I would rather not but it wouldn't stop me from signing one of them.

Don't forget we also have a pick after the 1st round. I trust Duquette and his guys much more than I would trust Joe Jordan with a late 1st round pick.

[Old Sneakers]

I wouldn't. I honestly prefer keeping the draft intact and picking up solid players needing playing time.

[ofahn]

I wouldn't. I honestly prefer keeping the draft intact and picking up solid players needing playing time.

I have always felt the best way to win in baseball is pitching, defense, and player development. That being said I would give up the 24th pick for two seasons of Adam LaRoche. At 24 there's a lot of scouting, but even more luck involved in the pick. Let's say we beat the odds and got another Delmonico. Would you trade him for LaRoche? I would.

[Old Sneakers]

2012 Delmonico for 2012 LaRoche? Sure.

However I think that the 24th pick has a sound chance of landing a solid back of the rotation SP, league average position player or first rate reliever as well. That said, I still think I would rather stand firm and keep our draft intact. A few things I really do not enjoy is free agency and available talent on the trade market. I want our team built from within.

A few years ago we had Tillman, Matusz and Arrieta on the immediate pipeline and it was exciting. Didn't quite pan out the way we hoped but most SP prospects aren't immediate successes. 2010 and 2011 were disappointing to say the least. However were still substantial improvements over the horribly inept rotation of 2009. If the team keeps to it's plan it won't ever have to suffer through a season like that again.

Now we have the misfortune of drafting later where the talent is far more diluted. The rules regarding the draft have changed and there are limitations. OK, we are more likely to go after college talent. Which is fine because no 17 year old done growing and more of a projection anyway.

What are we likely to be looking at? Hard to say, but usually there are a few good arms that look like future closers, positional prospects that have some good tools but with some limitations and college arms that could be good back end starters. To some that sounds like a disappointment in and of itself. To me though if you look at the talent in the Orioles farm systems you know there is plenty of room for all three of those things. The good news is we have our draft intact (currently) and have a competitive balance pick.

[ofahn]

I think that the 24th pick has a sound chance of landing a solid back of the rotation SP,

This is just my personal bias, but at that low in the first round I would rather take a risk on a HS position player that has all the tools BUT has also produced at a very high level except maybe in a lesser competition level. That was the formula that the Angels used to take a chance on Mike Trout. Of course, he was a once in a generation find, but many solid players come from just such a risk.

[Old Sneakers]

Absolutely agree. This is where great scouting and farm systems shine. The only reason I suggest a guy coming out of college is that he's more likely to sign. Last year Colin Poche looked like a solid selection until the signing deadline. Otherwise I am perfectly fine with HS prospects so long as they really want to go pro. I know hindsight is 20/20 however, that selection in my eyes was a complete waste. Teams need to know what they face when making any choice in the draft.

The other reason I suggest a college prospect is because a number of good position prospects fall that far in the draft that have meaningful careers. Here's a few picked 24th in the last few years: Joe Blanton, Chad Billingsley and Brian Bogusevic. There were a handful of pitchers that made some contributions to the ML. However only in the last decade with more focus being placed on the draft has it proven fruitful for teams picking 24th.

[ofahn]

I suggest a guy coming out of college

Under other circumstances I would agree; however, college players are pretty much WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get). There is limited upside left in the player and at 24 the real IDENTIFIABLE talent is already gone. Taking that into consideration, since either direction is a gamble, I would rather go with the player (HS?) with the higher upside.

[mikezpen]

I'd gladly give up the 24th pick for a good free agent. Yeah I know the Angels picked Trout w/the 25th or 26th pick or whatever, but I'd still surrender the pick for someone really good.

[thezeroes]

I'd gladly give up the 24th pick for a good free agent. Yeah I know the Angels picked Trout w/the 25th or 26th pick or whatever, but I'd still surrender the pick for someone really good.

It is not just the pick you give up but the money allotted to that slot for the first ten rounds gets erased. The Orioles get a competition pick and that adds to the value of the pool to sign the first eleven picks a t $5.940 Million. If they sign a compensated free agent they lose $1.750 Million of that amount or will have their pool money deducted to $4.190 Million. If they were to trade the compensation pick when the season starts that amount of approximately $1.250 Million will also be deducted from the pool.The pool for the nine remaining picks would be $3.065 Million. Hamstringing the option to pay over-slot just because you want to overpay for a free agent IMO.

http://www.mymlbdraft.com/2012-mlb-draft-slot-values
http://metsmerizedonline.com/2012/10/20 ... money.html

[ofahn]

Hamstringing the option to pay over-slot just because you want to overpay for a free agent IMO.

You make a valid point, which is only ONE of the reasons I wouldn't want to overpay for a player, but I see another way of looking at it.

I value our First Round Pick as another Nick Delmonico. I see the comp as reasonable. So, the question becomes; if LaRoche was just another player on another team and had 2/25M left on his contract, would you trade Delmonico for a player like Adam LaRoche IF you knew that the 24th pick would be another Nick Delmonico? IMO it's easier to get to YES when you look at it in that context.

I value the draft and player development as much as the next guy. Maybe more, but I also recognize that we don't have much in the way of position players in our farm system and certainly VERY few that will be ML ready by 2014. I also accept that there is very little quality available on the trade market and that most teams undervalue the one asset we can afford to trade; OUR young SP. This may explain why we haven't made a trade yet.

There's another consideration. We will have ten really solid SP prospects in the rotations at Bowie and Frederick to start the season. One (Dylan Bundy) might be the best prospect in baseball by the mid season review, another (Kevin Gausman) might be in the top ten at that point, another (Eduardo Rodriguez) might be a top fifty, and there's enough quality in that group for one or more to breakout and crack the top one hundred. That's the good news. The bad news is that, really, the only two pitchers in the bunch that anyone at this point can seriously say MIGHT be able to fill in at the ML rotation for a short period of time this year are Bundy and Gausman; and neither of them are probably going to be allowed to throw more than 150 innings between the minors and the majors. That means that we need to have a reserve at AAA and right now the bulk of the SP reserve is our trade bait. In effect, if we trade that surplus away we leave ourselves ALMOST without a backup plan if a SP goes down or under performs. That's certainly one reason to think twice (or even three times) about using those pitchers in a trade.

IMO, when you look at the situation in that way, it puts a different value on giving up our first pick for a proven run producer with a plus glove that we would have for the next two seasons.

[birdwatcher55]

I doubt we will now. Seems like it would have happened by now

[thezeroes]

You make a valid point, which is only ONE of the reasons I wouldn't want to overpay for a player, but I see another way of looking at it.

I value our First Round Pick as another Nick Delmonico. I see the comp as reasonable. So, the question becomes; if LaRoche was just another player on another team and had 2/25M left on his contract, would you trade Delmonico for a player like Adam LaRoche IF you knew that the 24th pick would be another Nick Delmonico? IMO it's easier to get to YES when you look at it in that context.

I like it that you picked Nick Delmonico as the comparison of the 24th pick that we would lose as that also will help make my point.

Nick was the 6th round pick of the Orioles in 2011. He was considered a hard to sign player and dropped to that round. The Orioles got him to ink a contract because of a $1.525 Million signing bonus. If you sign the free agent La Roche you lose the money for the first round of the draft and if you are unable to undersign some other picks you would not have the $$$ remaining to sign a sixth round pick for that type of bonus with out exceeding your pool money. If you exceed your pool money you are both fined and lose draft picks the next year so in essence if you sign LaRoche or that type of free agent and lose the pick plus the $$$ and then inturn draft another Nick Delmonico in the sixth round you could either over pool sign him and lose next years first/second round pick or just let him return to the draft the next year.
With that scenario you not only are giving up Nick Delmonico (Your trade scenario) but also the next years Nick Delmonico or more. That to me is to much to pay for 2 years of anybody.

[ofahn]

If you sign the free agent La Roche you lose the money for the first round of the draft and if you are unable to undersign some other picks you would not have the $$$ remaining to sign a sixth round pick for that type of bonus with out exceeding your pool money. If you exceed your pool money you are both fined and lose draft picks the next year so in essence if you sign LaRoche or that type of free agent and lose the pick plus the $$$ and then inturn draft another Nick Delmonico in the sixth round you could either over pool sign him and lose next years first/second round pick or just let him return to the draft the next year.
With that scenario you not only are giving up Nick Delmonico (Your trade scenario) but also the next years Nick Delmonico or more. That to me is to much to pay for 2 years of anybody.

I don't see the logic of this PARTICULAR argument. If we surrender our first pick we also lose the slot money. It goes hand in hand with the pick. How does that affect any subsequent drafts?

I also don't see any difference in TRADING Delmonico to get a player like LaRoche and keeping the pick and slot money or keeping Delmonico and giving up the pick and slot money to get a player like LaRoche. In either scenario we have to give up something to get something. The draft pick is a hit or miss proposition. LaRoche is just about a sure thing and he's available RIGHT NOW when we don't have a similar player available in our system.

I'm a BIG player development guy, but I recognize that we need to use those prospects as currency to get what we need from time to time. A draft pick is just an unsigned prospect. If we lose our first pick we have a fair chance of making up for it by expanding our attention to the international market and using ALL of our available 3.2M this year. We didn't last year. That would be ALMOST like reallocating the slot money to the international market.

P.S. I'm really enjoying this debate. I don't agree with your position, but I can see the logic in the overall premise.

[thezeroes]

I don't see the logic of this PARTICULAR argument. If we surrender our first pick we also lose the slot money. It goes hand in hand with the pick. How does that affect any subsequent drafts?

If you go over the pool money to sign the second thru tenth pick and exhaust your pool of $4.190 Million you get penalized.
I got this from Bleacher Nation.

Any team that exceeds its pool by 0 to 5% must pay a 75% tax on the amount of the overage. Any team that exceeds its pool by more than 5% but less than 10% must pay a 75% tax on the amount of the overage AND loses a first round draft pick. Any team that exceeds its pool by more than 10% but less than 15% must pay a 100% tax on the amount of the overage AND loses a first round draft pick AND loses a second round draft pick. Any team that exceeds its pool by more than 15% must pay a 100% tax on the amount of the overage AND lose two first round draft picks.
http://www.bleachernation.com/2012/06/0 ... t-changes/

So by you using Delmonico as the scenario of trading for LaRoche, I had pointed out that he was a 6th round pick and was paid way overslot to sign ($1.525 Million). Using that draft as a scenario for the 2013 draft the Orioles may/will not have the pool money to sign a talent such as Delmonico in the sixth round if such a player should fall to us without getting into the above 5% feature above and therefore you lose your First Round (Signing the FA), You lose the $$$ for that pick and you lose your first round the next year for exceeding the POOL money. Just an example of what could happen when you sign those type of free agents and have players fall to you in the draft that should have went earlier but were a signability issue. ( Delmonico, Arrietta, are a couple of these over the past drafts)

Unless the Orioles draft for signability and we end up with Hobgood types through out the first ten rounds.