It’s June. Your baseball team is floundering again, already more than 20 games out of first place. You have one of the weakest farm systems in the majors – again. Your pitching staff sucks. Outside of one man, your hitters don’t. Your attendance continues to fall for the fifth straight year. Welcome to the world of Baltimore Orioles fans.
The Birds have one commodity, shortstop Manny Machado. He deserves to start in the All-Star Game in Washington, D.C. on July 17. Unfortunately for Machado, he plays for Baltimore so fans won’t vote for home. He will, however, make the team.
Machado had an on base percentage + slugging of 1.030 after June 2’s loss to the Yankees. He is hitting .327, with 47 RBI and 18 home runs. The only way to help this morbid crew, and the one guy who has been a consistent bright spot in the lineup for the past six seasons, is to trade Manny.
Baltimore’s best starter, Kevin Gausman, is getting hit at a .284 clip and has a 4.63 ERA after 70 innings. The offseason free agents who were supposed to help the Orioles are a combined 4-19 with a 6.90 ERA as of June 3. If owner Peter Angelos or GM Dan Duquette cared about the club, they’d look for solutions. The question is, do they?
Potential suitor
Given that the San Diego Padres have a shot at the NL West and arguably the best farm system in MLB, it only seems natural that Baltimore should call the Padres to work out a win-win opportunity.
Light-hitting Freddy Galvis is not going to help the Padres compete for playoff contention.
San Diego has two prospects at shortstop who are in the MLB top 100. The Orioles have a pair of names in the most liberal list available. That is for the top 100, not just a position. Fernando Tatis, Jr. and Luis Urias are thought to be a year or two away, but either offer more hope than what the Birds have.
The Friars have more pitching than an organization should be allowed to have. MacKenzie Gore and Cubans Michal Baez and Adrian Morjon aren’t ready today, but by 2019 or 2020 they could be ROY candidates. In fact, San Diego has five hurlers in Fangraphs’ top 100 prospects.
Put something on the table
Here’s is something for fans on both coasts to think about.
Machado and any Baltimore starter for Tyson Ross, Galvis, either Tatis or Urias and a couple of pitching prospects. San Diego would get to compete now. The Orioles could start rebuilding. What do you think?
Similarly, Atlanta and Philadelphia are in contention and both have an abundance of exciting minor leaguers. The Braves have several pitchers who have already debuted this season. Would they part with Dansby Swanson and two or three pitchers for Machado? It can't hurt to ask. The Phillies have a rising shortstop prospect in Arquimedes Gamboa. Philadelphia also has southpaw Ranger Suarez looking good in AA and Enyel De Los Santos tearing up AAA -- just something else the Birds might want to think about.