More Orioles Analysis

I saw a blog that had the current available free agents listed by thier apparent role for a team. I figure it would be a good oppotunity it see if any of them might be worth adding to Orioles.

The Blog can be found here.

Let's Look at their starters on offense currently for 2008, with their stats from 2007 in RC%.

C Ramon Hernandez............-15%
1b Kevin Millar..................... 7%
2b Brian Roberts..................33%
SS Luis Hernandez.............. -39%*
3b Melvin Mora................... -4%
LF Luke Scott...................... 24%
CF Jay Payton..................... -24%
RF Nick Markakis............... 27%
DH Aubrey Huff.................. 7%

*Luis Hernandez stats based upon minors in 2007 (-41%) and short time in majors (-21%)

This lineup would give me a 2% starting line up. As opposed to a 5% for last year.

The first choice to improve is short stop, there's only two choices: Aaron Miles and Marcus Giles.

Miles...... -17%
Giles....... -35%

Niether seem like great options, and Luis Hernandez is still young with room to improve (only 24 years old this season)

Best Choice: Stay with Luis Hernandez, he's defensivly solid and should play better every year.

How About Center Field? Jay Payton is a terrible offensive problem

Lofton............ 20%
Patterson...... -10%
Cameron....... -2%
Hairston........ -57%
Wilkerson..... 7%

Lofton and Cameron are long past their prime, they're also going to be way too expensive. Patterson is not as good as his stolen base numbers make him look and Jerry Hairston just isn't an upgrade.

Best Choice: Sign Wilkerson to a short (and fairly cheap) contract and use him in rotation with Chris Roberson (just aquired from the phillies, he's a young defensive center fielder) and Tike Redman. Wilkerson is fairly versataile but is a bit of a defensive liability.

Third base is the only other positon that needs a significant upgrade.

Branyan........... -8%
Ensburg...........-17%
Macpherson.... 32%*
Koskie.............. 13% (in '06)
Feliz.................. -10%
Nunez............... -42%

Macpherson's numbers base on minor league numbers last year.

Feliz and Nunez are older and getting worse. Ensburg and Branyan are on the downside of peak years but could produce better numbers. Koskie's coming off a concussion but could be useful, while Macpherson could use another shot at the Majors.

Best Choice: Cory Koskie should be signed to compete with Mora while Baltimore waits for Mike Costanzo or Billy Rowell to make it. I like Dallas Macpherson and Morgan Ensburg but I feel they will under perform even further.


UPDATE:

Orioles have designated Chris Roberson as their center fielder, he's around a 5% offensive player