SEPTEMBER 19: Davis is out for the rest of the season, manager Brandon Hyde tells reporters (including Roch Kubtako of MASNsports.com).
SEPTEMBER 14: The Orioles have placed first baseman Chris Davis on the 10-day injured list with left knee patellar tendinitis, per a team announcement. They also released utility player Stevie Wilkerson, activated outfielder Austin Hays and outrighted outfielder Mason Williams to their alternate site after he cleared waivers.
This is the second IL stint in the past few weeks for Davis, who was previously out from Aug. 19-Sept. 11 with the same injury. Davis appeared in one game since coming off the IL the first time, and now it seems that his season could be over. If so, it will go down as the fourth straight dreadful campaign for the former star, who has batted .115/.164/.173 with no home runs in 55 plate appearances in 2020.
Wilkerson hasn’t played at all this season after suffering a broken finger in late July. The 29-year-old was a regular for the Orioles last season, but he struggled to a .225/.286/.383 line with 10 home runs in 361 plate appearances in 2019.
Williams will stay in the organization just a few days after the Orioles designated him for assignment. They’ve designated and outrighted Williams twice in the past couple weeks.
Chris Davis on the IL actually helps the O’s on the field.
Maybe they just release him?
Wouldn’t they have to eat 15 mil if he doesn’t get signed soon enough?
Aren’t they eating 15mil by having him bat .115 this year and .225 last year with 10 hrs? Either way it’s a waste. He should not take a 40man roster spot
agreed
they’ll have to not only eat $22 million (15 mil or so is after deferrals), but 2 years at that if they cut him now.
funny thing is, if this pandemic goes into 2021 season and it gets delayed like 2020 was, it would actually save the o’s cash to just hold him (since marlins didn’t with chen, they actually owe him 100 percent of 2020 salary rather than 40 percent of it).
i figure even if 2021 goes off without a hitch, they give him about half a season more to see if there’s anything left (possibly to use him to hold a spot til super 2 deadline passes, then just bring up replacement, cut davis, and get a 4th year of his replacement at low price).
Good point mfm
If they cut him, they’d have to pay him no matter what. If they keep him, injuries or retirement due to embarrassment gets them at least partially off the hook. That being said, this HAS to be his last year on the 40 man, doesn’t it?
Anyone surprised? The Davis contract will go down as the worst sports contract ever. Worse than Ellsbury’s, worse than Panda’s and certainly worse than Hanley’s. Can anyone name a worse deal in any sport given both years and total dollars?
ILYA. BRYZGALOV. The Davis deal is horrendous but at least there isn’t a salary cap in baseball.
Alex Rodriguez
From the day Rodriguez signed with the Rangers in 2001 to the day he retired in 2016 as a Yankee he put up 74.7 WAR according to Fangraphs. I would love to know how that’s a failure being as that by every measure those 2 contracts he signed were a bargain for any team.
Personality
ok, well you don’t have to like him and that’s perfectly understandable, his personality was once like a sand paper dildo, but that doesn’t make his contract any less of a bargain.
“Sand paper dildo”. LMAO
Hey, SandPaperDildo was the name of my rock band in college…..
He cheated so you can take your saberstats and shove them …
by any standard he was valuable, you don’t have to like him and its reasonable to cast doubt on anything he has done on the baseball diamond but he was valuable.
I really don’t understand how you can focus the PEDs with 1 guy so much, I mean really you would have to hate at least 50% of all players from the 80 through the early 2000’s.
‘…was once…” LMAO!
Aroid never even needed peds to be a HOF. Same with Clemens/Bonds/McGwire/Palmiero. What a shame!
Agreed on all except McGuire it definitely helped him stay healthy to last a few more years or he would of faded fast with his back and such. I get heat alot but Bonds, Clemens and Palmero belong in the hof, my opinion but im.sticking to it
i pretty much agree with all of this.
big mac needed roids to have any shot of a hall of fame career, the others really didn’t (even palmerio would have been fine, if having to wait a few years. dude would have benefitted a ton from stat geeks taking up his case like they did with raines).
palmerio is really the 1 of those that bugs me, since even with them, dude was still never given any real praise that he seemed to crave (was probably doomed to be a “wow, this guy was better than i realized” guy, now is pretty much a punchline because he lied the way he did )
.don’t know if you read canseco’s book, but he feels mlb put him up to it, under the guise of protecting him due to testing dirty, but once congress asked to see lists of failed tests, tossed him under the bus.
Then again, maybe the steroids helped lead to the injuries that ended McGwire’s career and he could’ve played longer without the ‘roids. We’ll never know.
Even his later extension turned out better than the Davis deal. At least A-Rod was still mostly putting up positive WAR in his later years.
John Wall is making a run for this title.
Josh Hamilton’s deal was an albatross!
Thanks Fragnoli. I forgot about that one.
Prince Fielder…..
Fielder’s contract is excused in that he had to forfeit a lot of the money when he was medically forced to retire early.
Rusney Castillo – 6 years, $72.5 million in 2014, good for 1.6 career WAR.
If you mention Castillo, you have to mention Yasmany Tomas as well.
Albert Pujols, Johnny Cueto, and Wei-Yin Chen both have pretty awful contracts but yeah, I have to agree with you when it comes to Chris Davis. He’s one of the guys who’s let all the money get to his head. Like, each player who’s had an awful contract has had one year during it that people could use as an argument that the contract was worth it but Chris Davis has been terrible every year since he signed.
Pujols the team knew the back end was going to be a loser but they needed the move when it was done.
Davis’ 2016 season was pretty good.
Papielf did you mean the pressure of the contract, got in his head? If so I think you’re right. Chris is a good dude and was a good player but he never deserved a 9 figure deal. Can’t blame him for taking the money though. All accounts say he’s worked hard but yea that money is hard to live up to.
Eh, Cueto’s been OK – not what he was expected to be, but certainly not a total bust or albatross.
Pujols still put up decent numbers during the first half of his deal.
Any deal that involves paying a player after they retired, like Bobby Bonilla or Rick DiPietro (NHL)
DiPietro got hurt and his deal was loooong but the money wasn’t like this.
Prince Fielder, sucky circumstances but at least the load on this contract was spread out over the Rangers, the Tigers and insurance,
He also forfeited a bunch of it when he was medically forced to retire early.
Can’t argue with you. Just another grossly overpaid average ballplayer. Once he got the contract, it appears he quit trying. Biggest problem in baseball history is free agency, because of players like this, Those who stop trying after they get the big bucks. Players always want big bucks for average play. Put incentives and maybe even a few risks in their contracts and things will change. The union has got baseball pretty well messed up.
That’s one way to look at it, but I would say that it has less to do with effort and more to do with WHEN they become FA’s. MLB is setup so these guys hit FA after peak years most of the time.
If you want to see these contracts prove valuable then MLB needs to find a way to get these guys to FA at a younger age,
Well, many of them enter free agency late only due to signing early career team-friendly extensions, which there are legitimate reasons for doing.
In any case, it’s a flawed but necessary system to ensure competitive balance so that small-market teams can develop homegrown stars at a relative discount for a reasonable period of time.
Besides, teams have gotten smarter in recent years at avoid paying free agents top dollar into their late ’30’s and beyond. If you can sign a top free agent only until he’s 36 or so (plus maybe a team option), then the deal is much more likely to turn out fair.
Yeah, baseball was better when owners controlled players as if they were slaves. Ah, the good ole days.
Rusney Castillo: “Hold my beer”.
Hahaha
Cobbs is bad too
Mike Hampton but hey atleast his kids went to A good school lol.
Ryan Howard’s deal didn’t work out all that great for the Phillies..
Albert Haynesworth 100 M with the Redskins
Gary Matthews jr. Guy had a big yr on roids and angels pd him for it……a- roid delivered 1 w.s. in all those ranger-yankee contract years and he was jacked up on roids out of his mind in 09….. jason bay is another….kei igawa…carl pavano..its endless with all the bad contracts given out
Alex Rodríguez, Yoenis Céspedes, Robinson Canó, Josh Hamilton, Prince Fielder, Gerit Cole, Manny Machado, Mike Trout, Bryce Harper…
LMAO if you really think Trout’s contract is even comparable to Davis’ you’re out of your mind. Just bc Trout got a crazy huge payday doesn’t make it a bad value for the Angels or diminish his immense value as a player. Lumping in Josh Hamilton in with him is flat out ridiculous
Mike Trout has already earned every cent of his extension.
Forgot about pavano lol.
Bobby Bonilla and Yoennis Céspedes
Anyone say Flacco yet? I know he “helped” win a super bowl the year prior, but that one was mocked at the time and only got worse.
umm Jed Lowrie with the mets or Carl Pavano for the yankees kinda rank up there.
9 at bats for Jed for 20M …. not one hit. that is literally 2 million per at bat and 20 mil for 1 walk in 2 yrs.
Carl Pavano and the infamous butt injury need i say more?
Jed Lowrie from the Mets takes the cake.
Barry Zito
Kei Igawa
Mo Vaughn
Bobby Bonilla
Stanton
That remains to be seen. The deal is almost certainly an overall loss for his teams, but it could go either way as to whether or not it turns into a true albatross.
NOOOO NOT STEVIE
Just procedural. He wasn’t coming back this year and was going to be a free agent in the off-season. This keeps the player pool at 60. The Orioles probably sign him in the off-season
So view released like designated for assignment., right?
As like-able as Davis seems and probably a good influence around the clubhouse. It’s time for the orioles to cut their losses with him. He’s taking up valuable 28 and 40 man roster spots.
The way mlb is getting, why can I see Davis in the future a hitting coach for some team lol.
That’s a shame. Wasn’t Davis having an awesome spring training prior to the season being put on hold?
Wasn’t Davis having a good spring training prior to Covid?
Davis quit using PEDs when he got caught and has been in severe decline since he got busted. At least I think that’s what happened. Canseco once said he would have never made it to the majors if he wasn’t using.
adderal isn’t a PED
Adderall is basically the same thing as “greenies” of another time. That doesn’t enhance performance?
Honestly, I abused Ritalin for a short period. And could work and work out twice as hard without rest. There’s a reason two thirds of the league has been diagnosed with adhd.
I think Davis took the money and didn’t want to cheat anymore. Risk an 80 game suspension. That’s $10 million to him
I absolutely agree…Adderall isn’t a PED as most PED suspension the last decade aren’t actual steroids but just labeled PEDs for click bait….Super dumb to get suspended for taking Adderall and labeled a PED user, but the next season you have a doctors note and its ok with no media coverage smh!…
What about the generic term Performance Enhancing Drug is that hard to understand? If you take a substance the league and players union has agreed to consider to be banned without a medical reason for the purpose of helping your performance in any way (perceived or actual) then you are taking a PED and subject to penalty
You are way off base. He got popped taking adderall without getting his script covered. It was a stupid move in 2014 when they had a great team and players were dropping from injures already. But it wasn’t “he stopped taking PED’S” that is completely false. He just lost the incentive to try and/or care once he got all that money guaranteed. It has happened dozens upon dozens of times before. But personally I can’t think of a player who took this horrible of a fall after Signing a big deal that couldn’t be attributed to injuries.
How does one get “Popped” for taking Adderall lol?!?!…its handed out like candy to kids by doctors and can be argued its far from an actual “PED” which originally meant for steroids. Do players get “Popped” for ‘Steroids’ or ‘PEDs’ these days?!
Ever considered that the US has a significant problem with over-medication? Drug companies rule the country – and the fact that pills like Adderall are so widely distributed to children, isn’t an example of “why it’s not a PED”, and more of an example of how screwed up the health system is.
There’s a reason why such a significant amount of players are “diagnosed” with conditions requiring “treatment” with Adderall – because it’s incredibly effective. Almost as if it’s a drug that enhances performance – what are they called again?
its all semantics…you can spin however you want. Protein enhances muscle growth. Pro-biotics enhances bowl movements lol. Vitamins enhances immune systems. Promethazine enhances allergy prevention etc. etc….Golden Tate was suspended 4 games for taking fertility drugs while he and his wife were trying to have have a baby, but it was reported ‘Golden Tate suspended 4 games for PEDs’ until he himself came out to say what happened…. When you compare Chris Davis taking prescribed Adderall vs. Conseco taking actual Steroids meant for Horses do you not see the obvious disconnect?! Again, a lot of these reports are headlined ‘Player x suspended for PEDs’ and they automatically get labeled cheaters which is just sad
Mason Williams has cleared waivers twice now. Can someone please take this guy?! We’ll also throw in Mullins as well.
Shoot I’d take Mullins on the Mets are you mad, that kid is gonna be a good ball player .
Mullins is fine. Great 4th OF material. Maybe Frank didn’t watch the Orioles play this year because there’s nothing wrong w Mullins.
Mullins will be a marginal MLB player, at best.
And to think, the O’s still have two more years of Davis unless they cut him.
has anyone put it together to see if davis’ slide started when he was made to stop the Adderall? They know he wasnt using it to cheat so why make him stop taking it…..i heard everything this guy is doing just to figure out what happened..its mind boggling,he’s tried everything but voodoo
You are onto maybe the biggest issue with this horrible deal. No one speaks to it in Birdland, but it seems that CD hasn’t been able to get a Therapeutic Exemption since his last great year, This has been a horrible deal for a small market team… at the end of the day–it is all on Peter Angelos…
Are the Orioles “small” market? With the exception of the last couple of years, I would have thought we were in the top half, if not higher on spending on contracts. However, I do think we’ve not spent wisely.
Small market, Yes.
The orioles are consistently in the bottom third in revenue. Worse during these bad years obviously.
Orioles payroll rank by year per spotrac and usatoday
2020 30th
2019 28th
2018 19th
2017 8th
2016 9th (made playoffs)
2015 15th
2014 13th (made playoffs)
Seems you thought correctly there!
They had a good market and would consistently be in the top teams in attendance and payroll in the 80s and 90s until the Nationals came in and ever since then the Orioles have gotten the shaft. Obviously the 20 years of stinking minus the 5 year stretch hasn’t helped and having an incompetent owner hasn’t helped. But that doesn’t change the fact that they got screwed by the Expos being put in Washington and they especially got screwed by the flip flop in the MASN agreement. It all has crushed the revenue and fan base of a franchise that 60s-90s had one of the best franchises in all of Baseball. They got screwed by MLB big time.
Thanks. Sure looks like anything but small market.
The TV deal fiasco is one thing, but blaming the Nationals themselves is a weak excuse. Did the Giants get screwed when the Athletics moved into their market area?
Besides, they played alongside the second Washington Senators from 1961-71, during which time the Orioles won 4 Pennants and 2 World Series Championships. Likewise, the Nationals have recently had several excellent teams and a World Series Championship while sharing their market with the Orioles.
He has received TUEs for Vyvanse since 2015, a long time-release version of Adderal He has looked asleep on his feet since then. It’s not that he “isn’t trying/doesn’t care.” He is physically unable to perform and has been for years now.
There goes the o’s chances
He defies the odds every year by somehow putting up a worse season than the one before. 337 ops this year!
They’ve got to just cut Davis and eat the money at this point
Agreed. Even if he somehow heats up a bit at some point, he’s been bad for so long that I really don’t think you’d find a team willing to take on that deal. You can pay him a lot of money to hit .115 or stay home, it’s a sunk cost either way. Time to do what’s best for the on field product.
Davis, worst contract in baseball history
Not a good last couple of years for players named Ckhris Davis.
Let the “he’s been out for a long time” posts start
If you only see the future salary, Miggy’s contract looks pretty bad too. 30M for 5 more years.
Davis has seemingly been able to top his worst season in each of the last three seasons. At this rate by next season he will bat below .100
O’s need to just eat th remainder of th contract. It would be best for all, maybe he could go elsewhere (Maybe Australia) and get a fresh start
Once again, anyone else think this may be one of those “fake” injuries that he easily could’ve played through if he didn’t suck? They probably brought him back for that one game just to say, “Oh, yeah, that injury was totally real and recovered, but what do you know, he just aggravated it again. Darn.”
O’s just needs to cut ties with Davis and move on. More they hold onto Davis, more it looks like Wilpons own the club. Maybe they get SNY rights as well? Either way, Davis needs to go and cut ties. Is this a buyout year for Davis? If so, I’d jump on it and look for something else to replace Davis. His best days are behind him
Getting paid millions for doing nothing. His best days are now.
Not surprising, but I’m disappointed that they released Stevie. I consider him a nice depth piece that can be player around the diamond sans catcher, who can hit just enough to justify a 40 man spot and a cup of coffee.
I guess they wanted to give it to someone else while it’s still good. The coffee that is.
Out for career
Those contracts Boras negotiates directly with ownership rarely work out, still have no idea who the O’s competition was for Davis when they signed him to that deal just like I have no idea who the Nats’ competition was for Strasburg when they signed gave him $230+ million.