Wrapping up Orioles instructional league with Brian Graham

Another Orioles instructional league season has come to a close. From Sept. 22 through Tuesday, more than 50 O's minor leaguers took part in workouts and games under the sun in Sarasota, Fla.

Instructional league features mostly players who are early in their careers getting a lot of hands-on instruction to work on improving for the future.

"Instructional league went great," Orioles director of player development Brian Graham said. "The most impressive thing about instructional league was the young players and their development that went on over the course of the three weeks. Every single player had an individual plan. And we individualized areas that we were working on with every player - whether it be baserunning, defense, certain aspects of their hitting. We worked to make each player better."

For the Orioles' 2015 first-round pick, outfielder DJ Stewart out of Florida State, that meant some tweaking to his batting stance. He is no longer in a pronounced, very low crouch.

"He found a position where he is comfortable," Graham said. "He is not straight up and down and he's not in the crouch. He is somewhere in the middle where he feels comfortable. That is what he is going home with and he will come back to spring training in that same position."

Taken with the 25th overall pick in the draft, Stewart had his struggles during his first pro season. In 68 games for short-season Single-A Aberdeen, he hit .218 with six homers, 24 RBIs and an OPS of .633.

"He is a college player and it was a long year for him and he battled," Graham said. "You certainly see a good swing and you see raw power. He did well at instructional league. He probably played in 75 percent of the games."

Two O's outfield prospects with good speed used instructional league to work on specific elements of their games.

"Josh Hart and Jay Gonzalez were there primarily for bunting and base stealing," Graham said. "When runners would get on base, we were able to put them in to steal bases and they got chances to steal four or five times a game. Really pleased with their development from a base-stealing standpoint. They both did well with reading pitchers and getting jumps. They are both plus runners and both did a very good job."

Gonzalez stole 34 of 48 bases in 2015 between Single-A Delmarva and Single-A Frederick and Hart stole 30 of 45 with Frederick.

Meanwhile, 21-year-old left-hander Tanner Scott, who touched 101 mph on one pitch during an instructional league game, continues to work on improving his command and repeating his delivery. Scott can feature mid to upper 90s fastball velocity. After instructional league, the Orioles sent him to the Arizona Fall League to join six other O's prospects with the Peoria team.

"He is making strides," Graham said of the Orioles' 2014 sixth-round pick. "He doesn't quite have the command of the fastball that we hope to see in the near future. He's a development project and it's going to take some time, but he is definitely getting better. He's a young kid with a really good arm."

Two Orioles catching prospects, 20-year-old Jonah Heim and 21-year-old Alex Murphy out of Calvert Hall in Baltimore, took part in the workouts. Both got in some extra work and at-bats after dealing with injuries during the 2015 season.

"Heim played very well. He caught a lot," Graham said. "Offensively, his swing is continuing to get better. Murphy did well, he played some first base as well as catcher."

Graham added that Murphy will likely continue to catch and play first next season.