great, great deal for the orioles

It is a good deal, as Olson has been predicted at a 4th starter potential, while Pie just fell into Lou Pinellas doghouse after a topsy turvy season

one hell of a defensive outfield. I’m not all that excited by Pie offensively, but there’s a good chance he’s going to be an average outfielder overall. For Garrett Olson, that’s a steal.

olson was the guy the padres wanted as part of the peavy deal. Pie was out of options and wasn’t going to make the team, so they had to move him. olson will either be the 5th starter or the long guy in the bullpen i think.

I thought he was rated pretty highly defensively in the OF.

Maybe Pie gets pushed to the bench if the O’s can acquire a big bopper to play LF?

I don’t have a dog in this fight, but Pie doesn’t do much for me.

Check out his range factors in the majors. I’m not saying RF is the end-all number — and it’s flawed in some ways — but Pie doesn’t appear to be insanely rangy.

Still, it’s only Garrett Olson.

ever seen Pie and Patterson together? Are you sure they aren’t the same person?

“Learn from the mistake of the past”

In relation to baseball players, the above quote couldn’t be more wrong. I’m willing to bet that Pie doesn’t take that same career path as Patterson.

He can always be the DH after Scott leaves.

is an interesting arm. He’s always been one of those well liked guys who managed not to get overhyped. That’s gotta be a good sign.

Plus, I doubt we’re keeping him.

Pie is…well I’ll live.

How people could possible evaluate Felix Pie’s chances if Corey Patterson had come up with, say, the Mariners instead of the Cubs.

I love this deal for the Cubs, don’t like this for the Orioles.

For the Cubs – No role for Pie. He wasn’t going to make the roster and another year of AAA wasn’t going to do anything for his value. This is dumping a guy that wasn’t in any plans anymore. Now, I’m still a believer that Pie might be a decent starting OF, and I always thought he was overhyped. That said, he’s got no role. Olson offers us an arm that we can either spin in another deal (Peavy) or utilize ourselves. Garrett looks and feels like your typical mid-end of the rotation lefty. What this move does is open up options for us if we can’t make another pitching deal. Pinella prefers a 2nd lefty, so he could go with Marshall or Olson as the starter, and the other one utilized as a swing/pen arm.

For the Orioles – Why? I don’t get it. They need pitching. A lot of people seem to be assuming that the Matusz/Arrieta/Tillman trio will be good. I think if 2 of them hit as good starters, the Orioles should be ridiculously happy. Even then, they have Reimold and others that they can work into LF. Moreover, the Orioles lack ready arms right now. Why not see if Olson pans out? I doubt he loses that much value if he struggles in the early goings of 2009. Not saying it’s a bad value deal, but I just don’t get the purpose of the deal for Baltimore.

For those of you who were unaware, Pie was out of options. And with Soriano, Fukodome, Reed Johnson, Bradley and Joey Gathright all ready on the team, Pie had not spot. So it was basically trade him for something or lose him on waivers. And I promise you plenty of teams would have claimed him on waivers.
If this is a precursor to acquiring Peavy, it’s a great deal. At worst, the Cubs have a guy who could start at the MLB level who they can have ready at AAA. And anyone who follows the Cubs minors knows their upper level pitching is EXTREMELY thin. So at least they turned a guy they couldn’t keep into insurance.
From the O’s perspective, great trade. Pie could still turn into a very good player. I’ve seen him play defense for the Cubs over the last couple of years and he’s an excellent defender. He’s definitely GG caliber. And he’s got a nice speed/power combo going on, if he can put it all together. And to be fair to the guy, outside of some struggles his first year in the big leagues, he’s hardly gotten much time to put it together.
The O’s are in position to let him take his lumps and hopefully mature as a ball player.
I see this trade as a win-win, especially if the Cubs can turn it into Peavy.

Olson is marginal at worse…great pick up by Baltimore

He was in the wrong organization to learn plate discipline. The guy oozes talent, but he just looked lost at the plate during his time in the majors. The guy had turned into a guess hitter. That’s a bad sign, to me. He was a very good defensive OF and had a good arm, but at the plate, I just don’t see him hitting enough to be even an average hitter for CF.

Moreover, the Cubs have never done a particularly good job teaching its prospects anything resembling strike zone judgment. Soto is the exception to the rule. Pie wasn’t going to pull a Jose Reyes and suddenly learn how to lay off bad pitches.

In Baltimore, perhaps he’ll have a chance to do that.