O's and Pirates update

For the Pirates and Orioles start to the season there is bad news and really bad news. Should we expect anything else? Let's start with the really bad news first. The Orioles are a league worst 1-9. The most obvious problem is the bullpen. Gonzalez has blown two of three save opportunities and the rest of the bullpen has not fared much better. It looked like a weakness of the team coming into the season and so far it has proven to be just that. If the Orioles get a quality start and score a few runs it still looks like it may be tough to hold onto a lead. That doesn't mean the Orioles have been getting a lot of leads. They have scored 29 runs in 10 games, which is not going to get it done. The 2.9/game barely bests Seattle and the only other team that is scoring less per game is 1-8 Houston in the National League. It's hard to envision the Orioles scoring a lot of runs consistently either. The questionable acquisitions of Atkins and Tejada have not proven wise so far. Atkins is hitting .222 with no homers and has as many strikeouts (9) as hits and walks combined. Tejada is batting .205 but has been a little more productive with two home runs and 7 RBIs. Jones is giving the team an average performance and continues to fail to live up to expectations. Izturis is useless with the bat. Luke Scott hits a dinger every now and then but mostly wiffs. Pie and Wiggington have performed well so far but that's doubtful to last. The biggest problem so far for the offense has been Roberts and Markakis. Two of the three biggest offensive weapons have done nothing so far and that should change and bring some more runs with it. Wieters has been good so far and continues to be the big hope for the future. He looks legit. Still, if you're big three are Roberts, Markakis, and Wieters and you play in the AL East, you're probably just not going to score enough runs to be competitive. The starting pitching has actually been pretty decent. Millwood continues to pitch well. Gutherie, Matusz, and Hernandez have been average. Bergersen has been terrible. The starters as a group look like they may keep the O's in some games. The question is if the offense can score enough runs and if the bullpen can hold a lead if they do. It's happened only once thus far. My concern about the optimism for the O's future is that you are building around Wieters, Markakis, Jones, Gutherie, and Matusz. There isn't much else there to be excited about. Matusz could be an ace. On the hitters’ side, it's becoming more doubtful that Jones is going to develop into a great hitter and while Wieters and Markakis handle the bat well, it remains to be seen if they will develop significant power. I'm not up on O's prospects, so there may be some guys in the pipeline to be excited about. I'm just not sure that the core young talent has the upside to compete with the Yankees and Red Sox even when they do develop.

Now to the Pirates who are 4-5. Considering they have played 6 road games and 3 at home, that doesn't appear so bad. However, they have won their close games, which they always won't do, so I don't think you could say they have played solidly so far. They have been outscored by 26 runs, the same margin as the Orioles. Part of that is due to the failed experiment of Hayden Penn. He was brought into a couple of games where the Pirates were behind and it turned into a rout. He and his 30.86 ERA in 3 games have since been cut. Also, the Pirates #2 Ohlendorf had back spasms and missed a start. Because of an odd technical rule for the first two weeks of the season, the Pirates couldn't call up anybody on their 40 man roster. Their worst AAA starter got the ball to fill in and he was rocked. The encouraging thing for the Pirates is the bullpen, particularly the back end. They had two good young arms (Hanrahan and Meek) and they built around that this season with Dotel and Donnelly. If they get to those four guys, the Pirates should have a pretty good shot. Carrasco is decent as a middle reliever, but they Pirates don't have a long man and it's shown in games where they got behind early. For the starters, the Pirates look solid 1-3, but they need Ohlendorf to get back soon because they don't have anyone currently ready to step in. In fact, the 4 and 5 men for the Pirates really darken the picture for the Pirates this year. Charlie Morton has great stuff, but he seems to lack the mental toughness to fight out of jams and he gives up the long ball. The number 5 pitchers is anybody's guess. McCutchen's first crack at it didn't go so well. Because of days off, the Pirates are going with a 4 man rotation the next couple of weeks. On the hitting side, the Pirates are scoring 4.3/game, which is good enough to give them a chance. McCutchen and Jones are both just below .250 but both have been impact players, Jones with 3 homers and 1 SB and McCutchen with 1 homer and 5 SBs. Milledge and Iwamura have been solid, but Doumit has struggled in the middle of the lineup. LaRoche has also struggled and Clement seems to be on borrowed time as he has stunk in his first chance at an everyday job, especially looking bad against lefties. It doesn't sound too impressive, so how are they scoring? Cedeno has been surprisingly good at the bottom of the lineup and the bench has been awesome. The four non catching bench players (Church, Young, Raynor, and Crosby) all are hitting at least .300. Church, Young, and Crosby have driven in eight runs, which are just two less than the 4-7 hitters of Doumit, Milledge, Clement, and LaRoche. Three bench players almost equaling four starters in RBI batting position is not usually the way it works. What's the outlook? Can they hang in a while? The 1-3 starters will give them a chance and the bullpen can shut the door, but the Pirates need help at the last two rotation spots. If Ohlendorf is out a while it will really hurt. Offensively, Jones and McCutchen look like they will continue to make some noise with Iwamura and Milledge getting on base and giving these guys a chance. However, as a long time believer in Doumit, it looks like he may never live up to expectations. Clement looks bad and LaRoche isn't going to offer much. I think Church will soon take over in right and Jones will slide to first for Clement, which should help the lineup. They will continue to try to hold on until Pedro and his big bat arrive in late May. I don't think they can.

I've always thought that a team is not out of the playoff race until they are 10 games out. So, we'll keep the count and see how close the teams are to falling out of it. After just 10 games, the O's are surprisingly close.

O's 6 out of first, 5.5 out of wildcard
Pirates 2 out of first, 1.5 out of wildcard