The 2003 edition of the Baltimore Orioles finished 10th in the American League in runs scored, and 12th in runs created.  On balance, the offense was lousy and, in a predictive sense, probably a bit worse than it appeared at first glance.

In the final analysis, and offense is essentially the sum of its conjoined parts, and a glance at those parts--relative to the rest of Major League Baseball--provides a fairly intuitive recipe for diagnosing the problems and identifying possible solutions.

What follows is a position-by-position breakdown of players (minimum 300 plate appearances) from both leagues sorted by Offensive Winning Percentage.  OWP is a great stat to use when accompanied by a PA minimum because it's park, league and era adjusted and because its definition is so forthcoming.  A .700 OWP means that a team with a full lineup of hypothetical Player Xs would win 70% of its games with an average pitching/defense.  In other words, Player X is a pretty valuable commodity.

The analysis is performed on a position-by-position basis because this all-encompassing measure of offensive production is most robust when a player can be compared with the immediately available alternatives.

(Note:  AL and NL averages at each position are represented by an amalgam of all players who played at that position--not merely those displayed in the table of qualifiers.)

For the sake of completeness, Geronimo Gil posted a .332 OWP in 186 plate appearances.

As poor as the production of Baltimore catchers was in 2003--and make no mistake, it was poor--relative to the rest of baseball, and to the rest of the American League in particular, the Orioles weren't markedly hurt offensively by the play of their catchers.  Incredibly, Brook Fordyce ranked seventh in the AL in OWP among catchers with at least 300 plate appearances.  Of course, relative to the three teams that finished above the Orioles in the AL East standings this past season--New York, Boston and Toronto--the Orioles fared extremely poorly.  Still, given some of the mainstays around the league who were worse than Fordyce, if Brook was truly a top flight defensive catcher, the Orioles would probably have picked up his option for 2004 and be discussing an extension.  But no matter how much pitchers like throwing to Fordyce--a marketable intangible, admittedly--he's not a top flight defensive catcher.  His throwing game could generously be described as poor, and he's not especially adept at blocking balls in the dirt.  And so, the Orioles find themselves looking for a front line catcher.

David Segui, who played only eight games at first base in 2003, finished with a .459 OWP in 252 plate appearances.  Carlos Mendez managed a .202 OWP while compiling only 46 PAs.

Jeff Conine's .562 OWP mark was entirely a function of his time with the Orioles; he played the outfield exclusively after the trade to the Marlins.  While Conine performed adequately with the bat for the Orioles--actually slightly above the league average--again the Orioles suffered in comparison with their divisional opponents in New York (be it Jason Giambi or Nick Johnson) and Toronto and his performance wasn't substantially better than that of Travis Lee (Tampa Bay) or Kevin Millar (Boston).  Still, Conine wasn't a drag on the offense, even if he wasn't giving it a big boost.

The only reliable (given Segui's constant injury woes) in-house replacement that the Orioles have for Conine is Jay Gibbons, who appeared in 13 games at the position in 2003.  More on that possibility below.

In 259 plate appearances in 2003, Jerry Hairston posted a .465 OWP.

Second base is a sink hole offensively in the American League these days; of all the positions, only catcher has a lower league-wide OWP.  Shortstop (see below) is a far, far stronger position in the AL these days, substantially impacted by Alex Rodriguez, Nomar Garciaparra, Derek Jeter and, to a somewhat lesser extent, Miguel Tejada.  There is relatively little strength and absolutely no depth at all at second base in the AL.  (The NL, interestingly, is the other way around.  The NL OWP average for short is .411, the lowest of all the positions, including catcher.  Second base, meanwhile, at .463, is higher than SS, catcher and third base in the National League.)

With that in mind, consider Brian Roberts' .472 OWP for the Orioles in 2003.  Only one player in the AL East (Alfonso Soriano of the Yankees) posted a higher mark, though Todd Walker of the Red Sox and Marlon Anderson of the Devil Rays weren't far behind.  Of qualifying second basemen who finished their seasons in the AL, Roberts ranked fifth.  When in the lineup, Hairston posted an almost identical OWP.  The numbers are no great shakes but again--the Orioles' offensive woes, relative to the league, can't be laid at the feet of Brian Roberts or Jerry Hairston, both of whom more than held their own compared with the rest of the circuit.

At last we see one of the areas where the Orioles' offense suffered--and badly.  Deivi Cruz was, predictably, an unmitigated offensive nightmare, placing second to last among AL qualifiers (last among those with at least 502 plate appearances) and far below any of the other AL East shortstops.  The Orioles have rejected Cruz's option for 2003 and it's unclear at this point what they'll do to fill the hole--something Cruz himself was unable to do in 2003.

The left side of the infield was a disaster for the Orioles in 2003, in virtually every respect.  While providing statue-like range in the field, Deivi Cruz and Tony Batista were making a plethora of outs at the plate.  Batista (like Cruz, second to last in OWP at his position among AL qualifiers and dead last among those with 502 plate appearances; also last among AL East qualifiers) serves as the modern day poster child for those players destined to prove its possible to lead your team in home runs and kill it offensively at the same time.  When Batista isn't hitting home runs, he's generally making an out (or two--he tied for sixth worst in the AL last year with 20 double play grounders).  Unless he's permanently collapsed as a hitter, Batista isn't really as bad as he played in 2003 (this was, by far, the worst full season of his career), but he's really never been particularly good either.  Regardless, this is another hole that the Orioles need to fill for the 2004 season, and it will be difficult for them to do any worse, performance-wise, than what they got out of the spot in 2003.  Short and third are the two areas easiest for the Orioles to upgrade because they really weren't even getting replacement level performances from either position this past season.

Left field was one spot where the Orioles thrived in 2003, whether it was Melvin Mora (who, though compiling only 413 plate appearances, shockingly had the best LF OWP mark in the AL) or Larry Bigbie manning the position.  Bigbie played roughly half a season and more than held his own, finishing with a .642 OWP.  Mora's mark stands out on his career ledger like a sore thumb, so expecting comparable production is probably foolhardy and regardless, he's likely ticketed for another position or locale (should he be used as trade bait) in 2004.  Bigbie definitely played well enough in his given opportunities last year to make left field his to lose next season.  What's perhaps most hopeful about Bigbie's performance is that it was in his second sting--after an injury curtailed his initial call up after about a month--that he really played well.

Luis Matos was a revelation for the Orioles in 2003, performing offensively well above the league average for his position and outplaying all of the other center fielders in his division except Vernon Wells of Toronto.  If this level of play is what can be expected from Matos over the long haul, the Orioles are set in center field for the foreseeable future.  In nearly 200 plate appearances prior to being traded to the Padres, Gary Matthews, Jr. posted an OWP of less than .200, which dragged down the team's overall mark for the position in 2003.

For all the hype, Jay Gibbons didn't have a particularly good season in 2003.  He was well below the (admittedly inflated) AL average for right fielders.  In fact, there are some worrisome issues surrounding Gibbons.  First, his home run total fell by five from 2002 to 2003 despite 141 additional plate appearances last season.  Second, and perhaps even more bothersome, Gibbons drew only 35 unintentional walks in 2003 in 682 plate appearances--a truly poor ratio.  Despite raising his batting average by 30 points from 2002 to 2003, Gibbons' OPS (and remember, batting average helps drive both components of OPS) actually fell six points over that span.  Jay really needs to pick up both the on base and slugging parts of his game to help the Orioles because right now--somewhat ironically given his apparent anointed status as the team's "only reliable offensive player"--he's arguably part of the problem, given the strength of the right field position in baseball today. 

As it turns out, many AL teams don't have a full-time designated hitter, and the AL average is somewhat misleading--it's badly subdued by all the (relatively poor) plate appearances compiled by non-qualifiers.  B.J. Surhoff was slightly above the league average, but more on a more telling point, finished 10th of 11 qualifying DHs.  Given David Segui's chronic inability to stay healthy, the spot is a hole at this point for the Orioles.

CONCLUSIONS

The Orioles aren't the complete wasteland that might have been expected.  The team can arguably point to a decent, if not necessarily overwhelming offensive unit in 2004 if all of the following things take place (probably not realistic):

1) Young players Brian Roberts, Luis Matos and Larry Bigbie must at least hold to last year's level of offense.

2) Jay Gibbons, must take a good-sized step forward, regardless of whether he's at first or right field.

3) The team must sign or trade for at least one true "plus" offensive performer at one of its holes--first/right (depending on where Gibbons ends up), DH, short, third and catcher.

4) The team must sign or trade for adequate (read:  at or near league average) offensive players for the remaining holes.

I'd say it's a given that Melvin Mora, assuming a position is found for him, will not be able to perform at the same level that he did in 2004.  He's never done it before, so 2003 was likely a fluke performance.  Still, Mora could post a .500 OWP and be a marked offensive improvement at short or third.  But if any of the above four points fails to be met, the Orioles are likely to be in the second division in terms of offense in the American League yet again in 2004.

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