The Orioles are planning to bring some of their minor league players to Sarasota for an early spring training and there could be 30 or more players asked to report Feb. 23.
They are several reasons to do this. In the case of some players, like outfielder Trent Mummey, who will report early, he was hurt and missed a lot of last year and could use some extra work.
In the case of some pitchers, like Bobby Bundy, they could potentially be used in one of the early major league exhibition games to...
Orioles minor leaguer LJ Hoes could not quite contain his excitement this week. He got an important phone call Wednesday morning and before long posted this via his Twitter account:
"Just got the best news ever God is good...Big league Camp here I come."
Hoes will join Xavier Avery as O's farmhands that are getting an invitation to the Birds' major league spring training camp, where they join the big leaguers in the clubhouse and on the field.
"I'm just very excited," Hoes said by...
Daniel Kim is a reporter for what is basically the ESPN of Korea. He has been closely following the story of Kim Seong-Min, the 17-year-old lefty high school pitcher signed recently by the Orioles that is from his country.
The Korean Baseball Organization, which runs the nation's top baseball league, seems to believe the Orioles violated protocol in signing Seong-Min and have taken their concerns to Major League Baseball. The KBO has lodged a complaint with MLB over the Orioles' alleged...
Even though they played just about a half-season each last year in the Carolina League, it sure seems quite possible that the Orioles' top two minor league position players could begin the 2012 season with Double-A Bowie.
The Orioles have to decide if they will start the dynamic, young double play combo of 19-year-old Manny Machado and 20-year-old Jonathan Schoop in the Eastern League with Bowie after the duo played at both Single-A Delmarva and Single-A Frederick last year.
While the stat...
Here is a mild surprise to me: Keith Law of ESPN.com rates the Orioles' farm system 17th out of 30 in baseball. Frankly, with all the criticism the Orioles' farm system has been getting, I would have expected a ranking a little lower, maybe in the 20-25 range.
The Orioles, according to Law's ranking, which cannot be linked as premium content, still rank fourth among American League East teams.
2nd - Tampa Bay
3rd - Toronto
10th - New York
17th - Orioles
18th - Boston
I was shocked to see...
If a healthy Brian Roberts is batting atop the Orioles' lineup, they have one of the best leadoff hitters in the game to ignite their team. If Roberts is out - and his status remains very much in question for 2012 - the Orioles don't have a bonafide leadoff hitter in that spot.
Orioles leadoff hitters didn't rate very highly among American League teams in 2011:
* Runs - ranked tied for eighth with 92
* Batting average - ranked 14th and last at .240
* On-base average - ranked 14th and last...
Whether they liked the Jeremy Guthrie trade (a few did) or not, it seemed everyone had an opinion on the deal. It's Day Two WG (without Guthrie) and here are more thoughts on the deal and its ramifications.
* I would rather have seen the Orioles trade Guthrie for a couple of 22-year-old pitchers with some promise for the future, and many fans would agree with that. But I also realize that was very difficult to pull off and it sounds like the Orioles had virtually no chance for a deal like...
Jason Hammel was all set to report to spring training in Arizona with the Colorado Rockies. After today's trade to the Orioles, along with Matt Lindstrom for Jeremy Guthrie, the 29-year-old right-hander will now be heading to Sarasota soon to join his new team.
"Obviously, it was a surprise this morning," Hammel told reporters via a conference call this afternoon. "My plans had basically been finished for spring training in Arizona, but that doesn't change anything. Baseball doesn't...
This Jeremy Guthrie trade is not playing to rave reviews with fans or media.
Guthrie was a popular player who pitched well for this team and the early response from fans is that the Orioles did not get enough in return for the right-hander. This morning, he was sent to Colorado for pitchers Jason Hammel and Matt Lindstrom.
Keep in mind that the closer a player gets to free agency, the less value the player has in a trade. Plus, Guthrie is coming off a year where his ERA increased from 3.83 to...
The Orioles got Jeremy Guthrie through a waiver claim from Cleveland and today, five years later, he leaves for Colorado. All the trade talk about him actually culminated in a deal, ironically, at a time when there wasn't much talk about his leaving.
Guthrie was a pitcher thrust into a No. 1 role in a rotation that couldn't match the rest of the American League East, but he did his best, usually with sketchy run support.
He spent a couple of seasons among the top 20 in ERA in the American...
When can a pitcher's home park ERA of 5.40 be called respectable?
Before you say never, the answer could be when that pitcher makes 13 starts at Triple-A Albuquerque's Isotopes Park, where opposing Pacific Coast League teams averaged 7.2 runs per game last year (the home team averaged 7.5) and where Albuquerque's staff worked to an ERA of 6.52.
New Orioles pitcher Dana Eveland made more than half his PCL starts in that park last summer. Before his September callup, when he went 3-2 with a...
Thursday night, Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports quoted sources as telling him that the Oakland A's and Orioles had expressed the most interest in free agent Manny Ramirez. He said it was unclear, though, if either team had made a contract offer. This news was not met with elation from most Orioles' fans.
Ramirez has been linked to the Orioles pretty much ever since Dan Duquette took over as executive vice president. Duquette is the man that signed Ramirez to a whopping eight-year deal worth $160...
The Orioles have announced the hiring of Chris Correnti as a performance consultant. Correnti was most recently with the New York Mets as a rehabilitation specialist from 2007-2010.
Correnti will provide fitness and conditioning advisory services to the organization. He will be responsible for the oversight of the individual rehabilitation of injured players, as selected by the medical staff. Correnti will also implement year-round training and conditioning programs for the organization's...
Dan Duquette's continued pursuit of international talent for the Orioles led him to South Korea and the Orioles executive vice president this week announced the signing of 17-year-old, left-handed high school pitcher Seong-Min Kim.
"Kim is a top quality left-handed pitcher," Duquette said. "He's got an excellent breaking ball and very good command of it. It's a 12-6 breaking ball and he's got an average fastball. Our scouts really like this player and they've been following him for a...
The Orioles have three arbitration cases scheduled for the next 15 days. One with pitcher Jeremy Guthrie this Monday, one with pitcher Brad Bergesen next Wednesday and one with outfielder Adam Jones scheduled for Feb. 17.
Orioles executive vice president Dan Duquette would not speculate this morning on how likely the Orioles would be to settle on a 2012 contract with those players before hearings are held, but said the club is ready for the hearings if it comes to that.
The Orioles have not...
This will probably come as no surprise to anyone that follows the team, but when ESPN.com recently ranked the American League East teams position by position, the Orioles didn't fare too well.
This story was in the SweetSpot blog and authored by David Schoenfield.
First, the most positive news.
Matt Wieters was rated as the best catcher in the division.
1. Matt Wieters, Orioles
2. Russell Martin, Yankees
3. J.P. Arencibia, Blue Jays
4. Jarrod Saltalamacchia, Red Sox
5. Jose Molina, Rays...
Chris Davis began last season as the starting third baseman for the Triple-A Round Rock Express and Nolan Reimold began last year as the starting left fielder for the Triple-A Norfolk Tides.
Davis has 1,807 career at-bats in the minors and 1,005 in the majors. Reimold has 1,986 in the minors and 741 in the majors. Reimold has spent parts of the past three seasons in Triple-A, while Davis has spent time in Triple-A in each of the last four seasons.
Will 2012 be the year when both players get a...
If Dan Duquette is to make some actual lasting changes for the better for the Orioles' organization, some of it will likely begin to happen at the minor league level this year.
Upgrading the Orioles' player development and farm system is vital as the club tries to finally get better after 14 losing seasons. There are plenty of interesting angles and story lines to follow in the minor leagues this year. Over the next several weeks, I'll look to report on and address a few. Here are some to...
He is a submarine-style, right-handed relief pitcher and, if he reclaims the form he showed during an outstanding 2010 season with Texas, he could be a key piece to the 2012 Orioles bullpen.
The O's claimed 29-year-old pitcher Darren O'Day off waivers from Texas in November and now he wants to put last year, when he had surgery and missed a large part of the season, behind him.
O'Day went 0-1 with a 5.40 ERA in just 16 2/3 innings with the Rangers last year and also spent some time in the...
It strikes me that the MASNsports.com message boards were buzzing with a lot more positive talk this time last year. I remember the many, many fans that insisted the Orioles could be a playoff team last year, coming off their 34-23 finish in 2010.
The fans were also overwhelmingly in favor of bringing Vlad Guerrero in to serve as the DH, even at a $8 million price tag. The young pitchers finished real strong in 2010 and were ready to take the next step and the future was bright, many felt...