Minor League series on the way

I wanted to pass along another reminder about what you will be reading in this space beginning Monday. I'll present a series of blogs on the Orioles minor league system. We'll take a look at how the O's are doing on the farm, how they develop players, how scouting and player development work together and how the O's make decisions like deciding when to promote a player. For those of you that are diehard fans of the minors, I hope it will add some information for your further enjoyment of O's minor league baseball. For the more casual fan, it should provide some education on how a minor league system actually works. I've had extensive interviews in recent days with Andy MacPhail, John Stockstill, Will Lingo of Baseball America and former Norfolk Tides manager and current O's third base coach Gary Allenson. Each provided their own unique perspective and insights on how the Orioles run their minor league operation. I thank them all, especially MacPhail and Stockstill who provided plenty of time for plenty of my questions. I hope everyone takes this series for what it is meant to be. A chance to learn more about how things work and gain a better understanding of how the Orioles develop players, among other things. I spent time with those four key people for the series. I could have interviewed 10 or 20 more and run articles the rest of this season. One thing, among many, I enjoy about my coverage of the minors is that it provides a steady stream of interesting people and players with good stories to write about and discover. This series is not an end all and tell all of the O's minors. Every question you may have or wonder about, may not be answered here over the next few days. But I will publish information on pretty much every topic that was addressed and every quote I got. As many of you know, I enjoy writing about the minor leagues year-round. I'll continue to do that. Some topics that may not be covered here over the next few days of this series, are sure fair game for later stories and later reporting. The process of watching and covering those on the farm is always ongoing. We can always learn more and discover something we didn't know. I hope you enjoy the series and send in many comments on the stories you will see here starting Monday. Over the All-Star break, I will be taking a little down time to re-charge the batteries, but I'll be logging on from time to time to check out your questions and comments. If one is not published or answered right away, rest assured that I will get to it and look forward to reading all of your thoughts. So enjoy the final game today before the break, enjoy the All-Star game and I hope you take some time to check out what is coming here starting Monday morning. Thanks, Steve.