475 replies to this topic

[Nigel Tufnel]

One of Bill James's earliest theories was the plexiglass principle - the idea that teams who improve one year tend to decline the following year (and vice-versa).  We saw that with the 2011-2016 O's, who won 69, 93, 85, 96, 81, and 89 games.

 

Hopefully that won't happen with the 2023 O's, given how much better they played last year once Adley joined the team, and how the 2023 team will be adding the #1 prospect in baseball along with other young talent.  But a worse record is a definite possibility.

[BSLMikeLowe]

I mean, Angelos is a complete tool, but Connelly touched on something in that Athletic article: they are perhaps looking to sell off 20% of the team to local investors (where the Angelos’ retain control at 50.1%). It’s the only thing that makes sense given how he was talking about concerts, not having a large payroll, etc. 

 

What’s Kevin Plank doing these days? His net worth is ~2 billion. 

 

Connelly is disconnected from reality there. No individual is buying 20% of a pro sports franchise at today's costs. If you estimate the Orioles could be worth $2B on the open market, that's about $400M for 20%. And for what? You get nice club level seats at games and you can tell your friends at fancy cocktail parties you own part of a baseball team....just not enough to matter. Owning pro sports franchises is all about ego, and being a minority owner of one with no say in how it's run is worthless to one's ego.

 

I see 3 ways this could play out: 1) John finds some hedge fund that will buy that 20% just for the potential return, but it will come with strings he won't like. 2) He finds an individual who will do it, but only if it comes with the option to buy a majority share within a few years, like Bisciotti did with Modell. 3) He borrows money to finance whatever he needs to maintain control of the club, though that would be subject to MLB's debt financing rules, which could be a sticking point.

[BSLMikeLowe]

One of Bill James's earliest theories was the plexiglass principle - the idea that teams who improve one year tend to decline the following year (and vice-versa).  We saw that with the 2011-2016 O's, who won 69, 93, 85, 96, 81, and 89 games.

 

Hopefully that won't happen with the 2023 O's, given how much better they played last year once Adley joined the team, and how the 2023 team will be adding the #1 prospect in baseball along with other young talent.  But a worse record is a definite possibility.

 

But we were promised an arc.

[You Play to Win the Game]

Plus MASN isn’t part of the O’s right? So minority investors wouldn’t receive TV revenue.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

One of Bill James's earliest theories was the plexiglass principle - the idea that teams who improve one year tend to decline the following year (and vice-versa). We saw that with the 2011-2016 O's, who won 69, 93, 85, 96, 81, and 89 games.

Hopefully that won't happen with the 2023 O's, given how much better they played last year once Adley joined the team, and how the 2023 team will be adding the #1 prospect in baseball along with other young talent. But a worse record is a definite possibility.

It is possible. Twins won 83 with a young team in 2015 before crapping the bed in 2016. Bounced back and made the playoffs in '17. Thats in the back of my mind when I get pessimistic. Could happen in '23 for the Os. Regardless Im still high on this core overall. Ill be shocked if we dont make the playoffs by '25.

[Mackus]

Plus MASN isn’t part of the O’s right? So minority investors wouldn’t receive TV revenue.

 

Could be wrong, but pretty confident that the Orioles share of MASN is owned by the Orioles, not specifically the Angeloses.  My assumption would be that minority Orioles investors own an equivalent share of the Orioles portion of MASN.

[You Play to Win the Game]

I could’ve sworn MASN was owned exclusively by the Angelos family. I must be misunderstanding something about this.

[weird-O]

Yeah I really don't think hiring someone from a more successful org was a genius move for finding a candidate. Hiring the second/third in command for your head coach/GM/etc has been a pretty common and generally successful move in pro sports for as long as I've been alive and I'm pretty sure it was happening before that. I'm not gonna say he deserves no credit for the hire but I think anyone with a vague amount of baseball knowledge could've gone "hey the Astros are good, who can we hire from them?"  

Agreed

Sports leagues are mini-communities. Owners know the names of the quality execs. I give John and Lou credit for whatever it was they said, that made Elias want to come here. That's something Peter wasn't good at. From what I read, when Duquette was hired, it was because the young, forward thinking candidates walked out of their interviews and said, I'm not working for that guy. But that doesn't mean John and Lou saw something in Elias that no one else saw, or would have seen.   

[weird-O]

I could’ve sworn MASN was owned exclusively by the Angelos family. I must be misunderstanding something about this.

This was my understanding as well, so I did a quick search. Everything I saw, says the network is jointly owned by the Orioles and Nationals. 

[makoman]

I was also under the (apparent) misconception that they were owned separately, but everything I see now says owned by the O's and Nats. 

[dude]

Apparently he spoke for like 40 minutes. Hopefully one of the non-MASN guys writes an article.

 

The gist I got from reading reports was (sorry no cites and I need to step out...)

 

Not planning to sell any time soon

Hopefully a lease is signed around All Star break

Hopefully MASN litigation resolved then too

Payroll will expand but we're in the Tampa/Cleveland/Milwaukee tier

Elias and Hyde both under contract more than a year, long term

Still willing to open the books and share what he can this spring 

 

There's so much in there (just read Roch's rollup from the other day) it deserves it's own thread.

 

1) This interview is why I believed we'd see something specific that I mentioned back in Dec.  I'll be wrong about the specific thing (all indications)...but the context of it is 100% manifested.  Mike Elias has accepted the new paradigm.  I didn't think he would,

 

2) John is clearly working with an image (related/whatever) consulting team.  There's nothing actually wrong with that, accept we have to listen to the BS associated with putting lipstick on the pig.

 

3) All about Control. 

[dude]

Ok so while under this ownership no matter what you think they can and should do stop expecting a payroll in the top half of the league. At least we were finally told we are Tampa/Cle/Mil. Please someone make sure dude gets that message

 

You seem dim.  It's not about how they choose to act.  They can act however they want.  The fact is that are a mid-large market team and have that level of resources. 

 

The fact that they historically suck at generating their best revenue and don't want to spend it in the manner many well-off teams choose to has nothing to do with Market and everything to do with Competence and Approach. 

 

All of this small to mid market stuff is BS.  They are mid-large market.  How they act has nothing to do with their Market.

 

Also, I said they weren't spending.  You were the guy betting they'd take spend over 80+M this offseason.  You are the one that said "Elias wouldn't put himself out there if he wasn't going to do it".  They didn't do it.  They aren't spending because the family needs to build up resources and everything else is just BS to hide that.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

Yet you make all these trade prosposals that take on all this money and have the payroll in god knows what range. Live in the reality of the situation. I could care less if you think we are a "mid-large market". Thats laughable. Completely laughable but its irrelevant. No more dude trades that are unrealistic. It cluters massively.

[You Play to Win the Game]

He cites TB/CLE/MIL - who between them haven’t won a WS since 1948 - and we’re supposed to be okay with that? I just can’t stand that mindset from a sports owner. Just completely and entirely awful in every way.

[BSLMikeLowe]

He cites TB/CLE/MIL - who between them haven’t won a WS since 1948 - and we’re supposed to be okay with that? I just can’t stand that mindset from a sports owner. Just completely and entirely awful in every way.

Nor do they spend in the range of those teams. Milwaukee had a $130M payroll last season. Tampa’s was $98M. Only Cleveland was close, and they still outspent John by over $20M. He refuses to say it for some reason, though the numbers don’t lie, Oakland and Pittsburgh are their peers when it comes to spending.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

TB has been to two in the last 15 years. Cle has consistently won for 10yrs now as a small to mid small market. No problem wanting to model both teams consistency and or ability to churn out quality MLB talent consistently.

[You Play to Win the Game]

Nor do they spend in the range of those teams. Milwaukee had a $130M payroll last season. Tampa’s was $98M. Only Cleveland was close, and they still outspent John by over $20M. He refuses to say it for some reason, though the numbers don’t lie, Oakland and Pittsburgh are their peers when it comes to spending.

We’re not there yet. We got lucky last year due to our baseball ops people (well, if success is due to X - how is that luck?) and due to that accelerated success, we can’t spend money yet.

Total disgrace.

[You Play to Win the Game]

TB has been to two in the last 15 years. Cle has conistently won for 10yrs now as a small to mid small market. No problem wanting to model both teams consistency

If TB weren’t so damn cheap, maybe they’d have had the talent to win one of those.

And winning while ultimately not being good enough is just a fancier purgatory with nicer decor and furniture. But it’s still purgatory. You play to win the damn game. Not to have a better, closer view at whoever does end up winning.

[BSLMikeLowe]

We’re not there yet. We got lucky last year due to our baseball ops people (well, if success is due to X - how is that luck?) and due to that exceeded timeline, we can’t spend money yet.

Total disgrace.

It wasn’t the front office. Remember, COVID was John’s big lucky break.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

When they trade off their homegrown assets when they start to get expensive you can call them Pitt or Oak. Ill take the payroll hitting 90+ mil very soon even ifs mostly all in house arb numbers making it that way. They sell a Mullins for more prospects like the As would do Im out.