Week in review: Givens' future role, trade talk and more

It is time for another week in review entry, where we take a look back at some of the stories and dicussions featured here in the last week.

On Monday, we looked at reliever Mychal Givens and his possible future as a closer for the Orioles. Givens went 8-1 with a 2.75 ERA and 1.042 WHIP last season. His average against dropped from .220 in 2016 to .200 and he reduced his walk rate from 4.3 per nine innings, which was much too high, to a more workable 2.9 walks per nine.

Givens seems to have the velocity, the quality of pitches and the makeup to be a future closer if the Orioles look at him for that role.

On Tuesday, in a somewhat related story, we looked at the possibility of trading closer Zach Britton. And just what the return might be. The Orioles clearly need starting pitchers, but are teams going to move established starters even for a pitcher at the level of Britton? It seems some of the top teams looking for a closer might be more inclined to move prospects rather than a starter with an established track record of success.

Among Friday's topics was second baseman Jonathan Schoop finishing 12th in the voting for American League MVP. Plus, we revisited a discussion on free agent pitcher Tyler Chatwood, who seems to be one of what is likely many starters on the O's radar.

Last year, he went 3-8 with a 6.01 ERA and .302 average against at home in Colorado. On the road, he was 5-7 with a 3.49 ERA and .200 average against. For his career, he has a 5.25 ERA with a 1.14 homers/nine innings at home and an ERA of 3.31 with 0.71 homers/nine on the road.

We are probably going to hear and read about the O's interest in many free agent starters and with three vacancies in the 2018 rotation, that makes perfect sense. Here are more.

Source: #Orioles interested in Lance Lynn, in addition to Alex Cobb, among free-agent starting pitchers. Baltimore believed to have slight preference for Cobb, based in part on AL East experience. @MLB @MLBNetwork

-- Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) November 18, 2017