Contributions From The Orioles' Non-Prospects

Game Day Employee - The [Norfolk] Tides' offense has just been terrible for the last three weeks. What's gone wrong?

Me: Their offense was never their strength to begin with, and Harbor Park depresses their offense. The real problem, though, is that when Parmelee got hurt, and Reimold, Urrutia, and Alvarez got promoted, there wasn't a good player to promote. That's partly because the Orioles have a terrible farm system, so there isn't any depth to promote from.

Press Box Visitor - How can the Orioles have a terrible farm system when their AAA and AA teams are leading their divisions and going to make the playoffs?

Tides Staffer, diplomatically - Well, I wouldn't say the farm system is terrible - the Orioles promote lots of players to help the big league team. Yeah, it is short in prospects, but it is functioning.

That is a paraphrase of a conversation that occurred in the press box before the last 2015 Norfolk Tides' home game. The Tides, who at one point had a six-and-a-half game lead in their division, staggered into the International League playoffs by losing 13 of their last 19 games. In this article, I do not intend to review the Tides' season, or to evaluate the Orioles farm system. Rather, I will explore the possibility that the Orioles' farm system is underrated because, while it may lack star-quality prospects, it's doing the job the Orioles need - providing players to fill holes on the major-league roster.

Commentators on and evaluators of minor-league organizations have emphasized the role of developing young talent into major-league stars. They rate farm systems by the amount and quality of its potential "impact players". In my opinion, these evaluations overemphasize young "lottery tickets" in the low minor league and under-emphasize higher-floor, lower-ceiling players - but that's another article. But a minor-league organization does have another role - to provide immediate help to the major-league team when needed. A seventeen-year-old in the Dominican Summer League may eventually become a Hall-of-Fame-quality player, but if your team needs a left fielder right now, that DSL rookie won't help.

The Orioles' farm system in 2015, and for the past few years, has primarily focused on having players available to fill immediate major-league needs. They have signed many 25-to-29-year old minor league free agents, many with major league experience, to free-agent contracts and assigned them to AAA Norfolk and AA Bowie, with the idea that they will be promoted to Baltimore if they play well and if the Orioles need them. The Tides' and Baysox' 2015 success is due, in large part, because the Orioles signed many of the best minor-league free agents. The Orioles called upon some of these minor league veterans to fill in when needed because an existing major-leaguer was tired, injured, or ineffective. If these veterans did the job, then it could be argued that the Orioles' minor-league system has been underrated. So, how much did the 2015 Orioles get from the players in their minor-league system whom the experts did not include when making their evaluations?

I will look at the 2015 Orioles to identify the players who (1) were on an Orioles' minor-league team at the start of 2015; (2) were promoted to the major-league team during the season; and (3) were not listed on the depth chart of prospects in the Baseball America 2015 Prospect Handbook. I believe that players not even listed on the organizational depth chart are not considered when BA evaluates farm systems. It is these players whose contributions were not, and possibly should have been, included in farm system evaluations.

The tables below include the position players (top) and pitchers (bottom) who meet the above qualifications. The data is through September 20:

Name	PA	Slash	OPS+
Nolan Reimold	155	.248/.335/.401	100
Chris Parmelee	102	.216/.255/.433	83
Steve Clevenger	79	.303/.329/.434	106
Rey Navarro	30	.276/.276/.448	93
Paul Janish	21	.250/.238/.300	46

Name	IP	ERA+
Chaz Roe	41	111
Oliver Drake	12 2/3	119
Steve Johnson	4	50
Cesar Cabral	1	---

The Orioles have gotten quite a bit out of the non-prospects in their system. Nolan Reimold has played about as much in left field as any other 2015 Oriole, and at least offensively has been the best of the bunch. (Other than Reimold and Chris Davis, the best OPS+ of anyone who has played corner outfield for even one inning for the 2015 Orioles is 90.) Steve Clevenger has been a productive bat as a third catcher and part-time DH. Chaz Roe has pitched very well in middle relief. Oliver Drake has pitched a few effective innings. There's at least a prima facie case that the Orioles farm system was better than the experts thought, because there were productive players not accounted for.

To determine whether or not the Orioles' farm system should be rated more highly relative to other teams because of Reimold, Roe, and Clevenger, we'd have to identify contributions to other teams by"non-prospects". We can say that, given that the Orioles didn't have a lot of young prospects to provide immediate help, they adapted and used their farm system efficiently. And it's possible that immediately-useful players like Chaz Roe and Nolan Reimold make their farm system better than rated by the evaluators.

But we also have to be reasonable. While Reimold and Roe have been useful to the 2015 Orioles, they're not likely to become key, long-term contributors. It's unlikely that the contributions of Reimold and Roe, when added to the Orioles' traditional prospects, will drastically change how we look at their system.