As reported by Kerry Leibowitz, Craig Steffen and David Berson

One of the real treats of attending the Orioles Fantasy Camp is the access attendees have to high-level personnel within the organization.  Last year, GM Jim Beattie was in attendance and shared a remarkably forthcoming perspective with the approximately 100 campers in attendance.  You can view the report of that Q&A session at this link. 

After last year’s session, Beattie told camp officials how much he enjoyed the experience.  This year, the Orioles general manager voluntarily decided to return for a repeat performance; unfortunately, a scheduling conflict prevented him doing so.  As a result, Co-GM Mike Flanagan made the trip to Sarasota and spent roughly an hour fielding campers’ questions on behalf of the Orioles front office.

The following is a synopsis of the salient points from that session on Monday evening January 31, 2005 .

Q:  Why did you decide to go after Sammy Sosa at this time when apparently there wasn’t much interest earlier in the off-season?

A:  Sammy was always on the radar for the Orioles, but initially the Cubs were “asking for the moon.”  As the off-season wore on and teams made player choices the Cubs’ options dwindled and their price dropped; so we pulled the trigger.  We aren’t the kind of club that can spend money on everything (hitting, pitching, defense) every year.  We have to be selective.  We think we’re really good at developing our own pitching, but with position players we haven’t been as successful.  So we’re going to spend some money to fill position player holes while we go with our own home-grown pitchers.  We pushed for the voiding of the automatic vesting in Sammy’s contract for 2006 not so much because of the money, but because we wanted “a hungry player.”

Q:  Do you think Sammy will “fit in” with the Orioles clubhouse?

A:  Sammy isn’t coming here to be the leader of this team.  We have a leader. Miguel Tejada is “the guy.”  It will be good for Sammy to be around Tejada and it will be good for him to be around Raffy.  Sammy doesn’t have to be the “center of chemistry here.  We expect him to be rejuvenated by the quality of this clubhouse.”

Q:  Why wouldn’t the Athletics give the O’s a 72-hour window to sign Tim Hudson?

A:  They felt that if they granted us that window, and we were unable to sign him, that all the teams they were talking to them about Hudson would conclude that he couldn’t be signed to an extension.  Beane felt that would make him “untradeable.”

Q:  So without having acquired one of these front line pitchers, who do you project to be in the 2005 rotation?

A:  I think you’ll see Lopez, Ponson, Cabrera, Bedard and someone from the group of Riley, Ainsworth and DuBose.  We have seven quality arms to fill five spots “and they all have options except for Riley.”  What we’re trying to do here is to “back up talent at every position and we think we’ve done that with the pitching.”  John Maine will get a good look this spring, but it’s possible that you could see a AAA rotation that includes Maine , Ainsworth and DuBose.

The pitching in 2004 was laid at the feet of Ray Miller and he did a remarkable job.  He taught Lopez a more effective change-up and now he’s doing the same thing with the other guys.  Cabrera has been very effective this winter as he’s learned this new pitch.  We have very high expectations for these starters this year.  Several of them just got their first year of exposure to the big leagues last year.  That’s the adjustment year.  Look at Scott McGregor, what was he in his first year 5-7?  That’s what we’re hoping to do here again – bring up a stable of young arms and get them the experience they need.  That was last year.  This year we expect them to take a big step forward.

Q:  What if anything can be done to address the dearth of position player prospects in the Orioles farm system?

A:  Many organizations seem to do a better job of producing pitchers or position players; few do both well.  We think we’re doing a pretty decent job on the pitching side of things; obviously we’ve been less successful with position players.  The Red Sox and Twins, on the other hand, seem to do well with position players but struggle to produce pitchers.  In fact, “we feel we have prospects at every level.”  That notwithstanding, we believe that we can—and should—use our pitching depth to acquire position players.

[At this point Scott McGregor, who also attended this Q&A session, said that the current brain trust feels that the Orioles have been pushing their position players through the system too quickly and that the organization is going to try, to the extent possible, to leave players at a level for an entire season.]

Q:  What can you tell us about the reasons behind the dismissal of scouting director Tony DeMacio and farm director Doc Rodgers?

A:  I’d chalk it up to a difference of philosophy more than anything else.  When you boil it down, though Tony managed surprising success with late-round picks, the results with most of his high-round choices were disappointing.  With Doc, he was brought in in large part to be a disciplinarian and he may have gone “a little over the top” from time to time in that regard.

Q:  What’s the plan for a back up catcher for Javy Lopez in 2005?

A:  Geronimo Gil is going to be the guy, at least out of the gate.  He’s having a great season in the Mexican winter league, hitting something like .350.

Q:  One of the nice things about the Orioles’ minor league system is that most of the affiliates are within fairly easy driving distance of Baltimore .  The exception is Ottawa .  What’s the plan for the Ottawa affiliate?

A:  Well, one thing that I can tell you is that “part of the reason that the Ottawa franchise was purchased was that it can be moved.”

Q:  What’s the plan for Jay Gibbons?

A:  He’s going start out the season as the starting first baseman.  We’re basically going to give Jay, and Luis Matos for that matter, a mulligan on 2004 because neither of them was healthy all last year.  Both of them are now; Jay’s back and hip are now 100%.  In addition, Gibbons had laser surgery on his eyes, which has improved his vision to better than 20/20.

For what it’s worth, we’re looking at a guy who had 28 home runs and 100 runs batted in is probably going to be hitting seventh.  That’s a pretty strong lineup.

Q:  I had a chance to watch Wade Miller pitch quite a bit a few years ago and was impressed with him.  When the Astros released him, did the Orioles look into picking him up?

A:  Oh yes, we certainly did.  We were one of the first, if not the first, teams to contact his agent.  We were told, however, that there was a “geographical bias” at work.  Apparently he wanted to play in New England ; we were told this in no uncertain terms so it was no surprise at all that he ended up with the Red Sox.  But yes, we definitely were interested when he became available.

Q:  Are the Orioles done with off-season player moves now that the Sosa deal appears to be all but done?

A:  I don’t think you’re ever really completely done with moves.  We don’t have anything particular in mind that we’re planning to take care of right now, but we’re always looking for ways to improve the ball club.  One thing that we do find particularly heartening is that we’re receiving far, far more calls from other clubs about our young players than was the case a couple of years ago.  In fact, we’re receiving more calls from other clubs about our players than the number of calls we’re placing to other teams about their players.  The media always wants to know who we’re talking to, but it’s a very difficult question to answer because in a given week we might talk to all 29 other clubs.

 Q:  What is the effect of the new Washington team on the Orioles?

 A:  The full impact remains to be seen, but in the short-term we felt really handcuffed in terms of what we could do this off-season.  Without having settled the matter of compensation, we’re finding it impossible to project the economic impact of the Nationals on the Orioles and the franchise’s ability to generate revenue.  This makes it almost impossible for us to accurately project our debt ceiling limit and we’re extremely concerned that we’re going to run afoul of Major League Baseball’s debt service limit and find ourselves facing a potentially large fine.  It makes adding significant payroll a difficult proposition.

The deal that we’re trying to make with major league baseball is pretty much all about television—the regional sports network, and the like.

It’s worth mentioning that Peter Angelos is concerned about the long-term effect of all of this on the franchise.  Another owner might only be concerned about lining his pockets—just negotiating the largest one-time cash payment that he can get.  Mr. Angelos isn’t like that.  His concern deals with the legacy of the franchise itself, beyond his involvement with it.  In my opinion, Orioles fans should feel lucky to have someone like this as owner of the club.

Q:  Is the split between the major and minor league spring training camps a handicap to the Orioles?

A:  Absolutely.  We like to bring minor league players into the major league camp, to see how things are run and expose them to major league players, and with the split camp situation, the logistics involved in that are brutal unless we take some minor leaguers directly to the major league camp.  We’d like to do something about it, by putting together a single site where both camps can be held.  Regardless of which coast we’re talking about, I’d like to see something done.  It could happen in Ft. Lauderdale , if they agree to build us an expanded site.  But I like it here as well; it would be nice if they could do something in Sarasota .

Q:  With all the stuff going on in baseball today with players using steroids and getting into trouble, how concerned are the Orioles about good citizenship amongst their players?

A:  This is something we feel very strongly about; this is the kind of organization we’re trying to build.  You can’t really make people behave, but by strongly emphasizing this point, and staying in touch with the players and consistently reiterating the concern of the organization on this point, it’s our hope that the players do “get it.”

Q:  With all the rumors that have been flying around about Jorge Julio potentially being traded for Aubrey Huff, are you at all concerned about Julio fixating on the possibility of being dealt and suffering some kind of a mental meltdown?

A:  [McGregor answered by saying that Julio simply needed to learn to put concerns about things like trades aside, recognize that things like this are out of his control, and concentrate the things that he can impact, which are on the field.]

Q:  The Phillies have a AAA first baseman named Ryan Howard who is blocked by Jim Thome.  Have the Orioles thought at all about trying to acquire him?

A:  We are very much aware of Howard and have talked to the Phillies about him, but the Phils are looking for “top dollar” from anyone interested in picking him up.  The Phillies’ thinking is that they can afford to ask for the moon because Howard’s value will only increase in the event that someone’s starting big league first baseman goes down with an injury.