Just as expected, rebuilding is hard and not for everyone

Orioles executive vice president and general manager Mike Elias spoke a blunt truth about the team's immediate future in 2020. He said, essentially, that wins and losses are not going to be critical next season, as the club's rebuilding is still in the early stages.

This comes as common sense to some fans and rubs others the wrong way. We found out this year another truth: Rebuilding is hard, and some fans have a hard time dealing with mounting losses.

Now those fans realize that next year for the team may look a lot like this year.

Here is what Elias said when asked about winter moves to improve the team: "I think we'll take that as it comes this winter. We're taking a broad, strategic organizational view here and, like I just said, winning a couple extra games is not the end goal here. We want to get this team back to the playoffs and have this organization be in a healthy spot for a very long time. So that's going to be first and foremost."

That does not come as good news for fans who feel that improvement next year is a must for the team. It's a sentiment I can't get on board with, and I think Elias was right. Winning a few extra games will not add much to attendance and/or pacify the segment of fans who can't stomach all these losses.

This will sound harsh, but there is not much the team can truly do if you fit in that group. What all fans deserve and what will make all fans happy is a contending Orioles team, one that can make the playoffs and do some damage when they get there.

Building that team was never going to happen overnight. Many O's fans completely understand the rebuild and accept it. Many fans. Some still attend many games. But the team's best chance to get a lot of fans back is simply to win. The best promotion is the won-loss record. Remember how Camden Yards sounded when Delmon Young hit that double against the Tigers in the playoffs? That can happen again.

But in trying to make that happen, asking Elias and his staff to do something to hold fans over while they wait is not reasonable.

Elias himself said he understood fans who got worn out from all the losing in 2018 and 2019.

"I can't ask anyone to embrace losing the way we have been," he said. "Our record last year was historically bad. This year it's not going to be a ton better. Nobody wants to do this. We never want this to happen again, but this is where we started from. The group of people who joined the organization this year, we took this on, trying to fix it. In order to do that, we're making changes. We're not just doing the same thing with the same people that have (been) done here before.

"It's difficult. It's a long way to go. We're far behind. Like I said, no analytics, no international scouting were the two pretty big ones. There's a long way to go, a lot to be done. I think the support has been tremendous. The people coming out here, they love this team, the people in this city love this team. They know that this needs to be done. I'm confident that they're going to come back, and they're going to come back in a big way."

I agree with every word here. No one should embrace losing, but there is nothing that can be done to hasten winning. No quick fix. No promises to be made. But the fans will come back if and when the Orioles win again.

Remember what we saw in the 2012 playoffs? And that was after 14 straight years of losing.

The Orioles are looking at another losing record in 2020, and there is not much anyone in management can do about that apart from trying to make sure the Orioles are never in this situation again.