Evaluating Chris Davis at bat

The Orioles were hoping to have a better picture of what Chris Davis could do by this point, but his right shoulder injury and recent trip to the disabled list slowed their evaluation process. "No, I haven't seen enough of him yet," hitting coach Jim Presley said this morning of his evaluation of Davis as a hitter. "Injuries happen. Nothing we can do about it. Being around him, he's a great kid and he wants to get after it. These next two or three weeks will be a big indication. Yesterday he had a rough day, but this guy's got big-time juice. He knows what he's doing, he's just got to get into the flow of things. I think the speed of the game caught up to him the last day or two. He just needs at-bats," Presley said. After playing two injury-rehab games with Double-A Bowie, Davis returned to the Orioles for the last two games where he went 0-for-10 in New York with seven strikeouts. In 12 games since the trade from Texas, the 25-year-old Davis is batting .180 with one homer and three RBIs. He has fanned 21 times in 50 at-bats. Presley said it's too early to do any tinkering with Davis' swing. "I want to look at him for at least a week to 10 days and then just make my own judgement on what we need to do. It's going to take some time. The three weeks we didn't have him put him behind, but we'll see what he does here the next three weeks." Davis is a guy that has some big power. This year at Triple-A Round Rock he hit .368 with 24 homers and 66 RBIs in just 48 games. "It's strength, it's bat speed. A big, strong guy. It's tough to see a guy that weighs 245 pounds play first and third base and do it pretty good. He's athletic, he's pretty polished with what he is trying to do at the plate," Presley said. Now he just needs to knock off some rust so the Orioles can get a better look at one of the players they traded Koji Uehara for. "No doubt. You can't lay off three weeks and not do anything and come back and expect to face major league pitching," Presley added.