If there is one position where the Orioles are set for the next several seasons and one position where they can hold their own with just about every other club in baseball, it is catcher.
With Matt Wieters, they have a 25-year-old catcher that is a Gold Glove winner, was a first-time All-Star in 2011, a switch-hitter, a player that is big and durable and is under team control through the 2015 season.
Those factors would make most teams envious of what the Orioles have at that...
It was true last year and likely will be true again next year: The Orioles can improve as a team, but they need their young pitching to take a step forward in 2012. The opposite pretty much is what we saw last year.
* Brian Matusz ended 2010 going 6-0 with a 1.57 ERA over his last eight starts, then got injured, lost his fastball and went 1-9 with an ERA of 10.69 last season.
* Jake Arrieta's ERA increased from 4.66 during his 2010 rookie year to 5.05 last summer.
* Zach Britton had his ups...
First of all, on this joyous weekend, a merry Christmas and happy holidays to all of the loyal readers. I never take you for granted and am always appreciative that you are here, today and every day.
Since most are feeling happy and festive this time of year, I figured it was a good time to get your thoughts about baseball and the Orioles.
What makes you feel happy about the game and the team? What do you enjoy about Orioles baseball?
Sure, there has been that little 14-year losing streak,...
Whenever a team acquires a player in the offseason, some fans invariably asks the question, "Why didn't the Orioles do that?" Some have asked that of the Nationals' trade for pitcher Gio Gonzalez.
The Nationals gave up four prospects - three of their top nine as rated by Baseball America - to get the 26-year-old lefty. It was a deal where both sides got what they sought and the Nationals clearly feel they can contend in 2012 and gave up some potential key pieces of their future to go for...
Here are two things I feel are quite true about baseball:
* Defense is often underrated.
* Defense is very hard to statistically quantify.
I have heard Buck Showalter talk often enough about run prevention to realize he values defense. I think most managers understand a run saved is pretty much equal to a run knocked in. We hail a player with a two- or three-RBI game, but sometimes overlook the outfielder that made the diving catch in the fifth inning that kept two runs from scoring.
You can...
Three Tuesday quick takes for your reading enjoyment:
* Albert Pujols has become the latest baseball player to sign an amazing megabucks free agent contract with a new team and then say it wasn't about the money. This came after the Los Angeles Angels introduced Pujols on Saturday after he signed a whopping 10-year, $254 milion deal with the club.
"To tell you the truth, it wasn't about the money. I'm going to die saying that, because it wasn't about the money. It was about the...
The Orioles added to their infield depth and got a versatile player recently when they selected Ryan Flaherty from the Cubs organization in the Rule 5 draft.
A left-handed hitter, Flaherty, 25, is a career .278/.346/.462 hitter in four seasons for the Cubs after being selected out of Vanderbilt with the 41st overall pick in the 2008 First-Year Player Draft. He batted .280/.347/.478 with 53 extra-base hits and 88 RBIs in 132 games for Double-A Tennessee (83 games) and Triple-A Iowa (49 games)...
In reviewing some notes from the Winter Meetings, I found some quotes from an interview in Dallas with Jim Callis of Baseball America that had not yet been published here.
I know many fans love to hear Callis' insights, and I do, too. So here are some topics we covered there.
Callis said that when Baseball America puts out its next list of the top 100 prospects in all of baseball, both Manny Machado and Dylan Bundy could be in the top 10.
"We haven't put those lists together yet, but yes,...
The day the Orioles hired Fred Ferreira as their executive director of international recruiting, Ferreira told me he plans to add international scouts and also that he would look into the possibility of the Orioles adding an academy in Venezuela.
The Orioles have never produced a major league player from Venezuela, although the club has some promising young talent from there in the lower minors now, with players like catcher Gabriel Lino and pitcher Eduardo Rodriguez.
Ben Badler, who covers...
As Orioles fans wonder who will start at certain positions for the 2012 Birds, there are indications that manager Buck Showalter prefers Nolan Reimold as his starting left fielder next year.
No one from the club - Showalter included - has said with certainty that Reimold is the starting left fielder moving forward. But in an interview at the Winter Meetings with Mel Antonen of MASN's "The Mid-Atlantic Sports Report," here is what Buck said about Reimold:
"(I want him) just to continue to...
He was drafted by the Orioles out of an Oklahoma high school in the fifth round in 2006. After playing in 622 minor league games with 2,338 at-bats representing the Orioles, Tyler Henson will now find out what it's like with another team.
Last week, Henson and pitcher Jarret Martin were traded to the Dodgers when the Orioles acquired pitcher Dana Eveland.
Henson was working for the family business when he found out about the deal last Thursday, on the final day of the Winter Meetings.
"I...
I noticed on one of the comments on a recent blog here where one reader, when responding to another, said he was a "real fan." It got me to thinking. What makes for a good and true Orioles fan?
This is one very subjective topic and, of course, there is no right answer like there would be to a math problem. What impresses someone about one fan, may not another.
To take the subject a step further, what defines a true Orioles fan after 14 years of losing?
Over the years I have heard a lot of...
The Orioles were expected to have a contingent, including manager Buck Showalter and new international scouting guru Fred Ferreira, in the Dominican Republic this weekend to scout Cuban-born Yoenis Cespedes.
Cespedes is a 26-year-old right-handed hitting outfielder who defected from Cuba in 2011. He batted .333 with 33 home runs and 99 RBIs during the 2010-2011 season with the Cuban national team.
He has yet to officially establish residency and become a free agent, but that could happen any...
Even if the Orioles didn't make a lot of moves, the group from MASNsports.com had an eventful run at the Winter Meetings in Dallas. We set records for readership, so thanks for that, and we had fun covering and blogging about anything and everything.
Before we left Big D, we finally saw the sun come out, and Roch and I had time for one last video to discuss what did happen, what didn't and what still could.
Check it out here.
Even with the Orioles not making many moves and not generating many rumors, somehow the Winter Meetings still seemed very busy for those of us on the MASN team covering the Orioles and Nationals in Dallas the last few days.
It's nice to be home. I hope the readers here enjoyed the coverage and videos that we featured in this blog the last few days.
I was sitting in the press room between Roch Kubatko and the Baltimore Sun's Peter Schmuck. Yes the barbs were flying fast and furious with a...
DALLAS - The Orioles today added two players in the minor league phase of the Rule 5 Draft, getting lefty pitcher Andrew Loomis of the Phillies organization in the Triple-A portion of the draft and infielder Matt Sweeney of the Rays organization in the Double-A portion of the draft.
The 26-year-old Loomis is 10-10 with a 3.34 ERA in 133 career games in four minor league seasons. A 16th-round selection by the Florida Marlins in the 2008 First-Year Player Draft out of Purdue, Loomis went 1-2...
DALLAS - In our last one on one video interview of the Winter Meetings with Orioles executive vice president Dan Duquette, I asked him about several topics, including the club's acquisition of lefty pitcher Dana Eveland in a trade with the Dodgers.
But I also asked the question many fans are asking today: Do the Orioles still have a chance for some bigger moves this offseason either with trades or through a free agent signing, or is Duquette resigned to the fact the Orioles can't or won't...
DALLAS - Here is what Orioles executive vice president Dan Duquette said about infielder Ryan Flaherty, the player the Orioles selected from the Cubs organization today with the fourth pick in the Rule 5 draft:
"He's got a good bat. He can play third base and second base. He's a left-handed hitter and he has some power. He was a high draft pick (41st overall in 2008) which identifies his value and skills. He comes from a really top quality program, Vanderbilt," Duquette said.
"We like...
DALLAS - Baseball's Rule 5 draft will be held this morning at 10 a.m Eastern time and the Orioles will have the fourth pick. Any player selected in this draft must remain on the selecting team's 25-man roster for the entire big league season or be offered back to his original club.
Players are eligible for selection in the Rule 5 draft who are not on their major league organization's 40-man roster and:
* Were signed at age 19 or older and have been in the organization for four years; or
*...
DALLAS - In today's one-on-one video interview with Dan Duquette, the Orioles executive vice president indicated he is getting closer to making one or more trades and it could happen before the Winter Meetings end tomorrow.
"Well, I mean, we are a little further down the track on a couple of deals that we hope to close," Duquette said. "It takes a little time to get things together but hopefully we will have a couple more players to talk to the Oriole fans about by the end of the week. We...
