Thursday Bird Droppings: Orioles roster decisions aren’t getting any easier

A number of players in camp are playing like the Orioles will have to give them serious consideration

Hello, friends.

There are now just three weeks to go until Orioles Opening Day. That’s 21 days left, which on the current team is Austin Hays days remaining, and before him it was Nick Markakis. Hays would only have to play another 872 games with the Orioles to pass Markakis on the franchise career games list.

The Orioles picked up another spring training win in the game they played last night, which MASN did not bother to televise even though it was an evening game played in Sarasota. The O’s beat the Pirates in the game, 6-4, improving their Grapefruit League record to 11-2. The game saw Gunnar Henderson pick up three hits, Coby Mayo make what was apparently a phenomenal play at third as well as drive in the winning runs late, and making the start, Julio Teheran pitched two scoreless innings.

Check out the full box score here. There was also an Anthony Santander Homer and another scoreless inning for Dillon Tate. A lot of interesting things have been happening in these spring games. There are 19 more games to be played, including three days with split-squad action, before the regular season begins. One more bonus game is on top of that for the prospects, as the O’s prospects will play the Pirates prospects in MLB’s new “Spring Breakout” a week from tonight.

Florida-based Orioles prospect follower Eric Garfield got video of both of Mayo’s moments:

None of those games will be played today, however. This is one of two off days in the Orioles spring training schedule. The next one is March 18. The players will probably be fishing or golfing or playing Settlers of Catan or whatever it is they like to do when they have a free day. Maybe they’ll do more than one of these things.

Presumably soon the team will make its first wave of cuts from the camp roster – although it wouldn’t surprise me if they wait until after Sunday’s split squad action to do that, since they’re just going to need to bring guys over from the minor league camp to fill up two game rosters anyway. We probably won’t learn anything interesting as the first wave of cuts happens, because that’ll just be players getting reassigned who we already knew weren’t going to be on the Opening Day roster.

The really interesting ones are going to take longer to resolve. What’s going to happen for the #4 and #5 spots in the rotation while Kyle Bradish and John Means work their way back? We assumed before camp opened that it would be Tyler Wells and Cole Irvin, but maybe one of these non-roster invitees will bust into that picture – Teheran or even Albert Suárez, if you really got carried away by the hype from his appearance a couple of days ago.

Other questions to be answered: How will things shake out in the bullpen? Is Jackson Holliday going to push onto the roster, as everyone assumes? Is it possible for Mayo to force his way into the mix with an impressive camp? Are any of the out-of-options guys who aren’t going to make the team going to get traded? Or will there be other surprise trades? If you’re still out there convincing yourself that the incoming David Rubenstein group might clear the signing of Blake Snell or Jordan Montgomery, you can ask if that could still happen.

Unlike several years ago, when it was a wide open competition at pretty much every position, we have a pretty good idea of who’s going to do what on the Orioles this year. The few openings have a lot of intrigue around them. I’m confident in Mike Elias’s ability to put together another quality roster, but at this moment I do wonder how he’s going to juggle all of the players who don’t end up on that roster.

Around the blogO’sphere

‘Matrix’ pingpong, Christmas carols, and other acts from the Orioles talent show (The Baltimore Banner)
The spring training talent show is one of those wacky preseason rituals that is often just alluded to in hushed tones, so it’s fun to see players actually talking about some of the acts openly here.

Mullins: “I expect myself to be back in games sometime next week” (School of Roch)
Monday’s hamstring thing that had Mullins leave a game early is going to have him out for at least a week. It’s spring training, so there’s no need to rush him back, but if this was the regular season you’d have to think an injured list stint would be appropriate.

Observations on Anthony Santander’s stance, Coby Mayo making his case, others from Wednesday game (The Baltimore Sun)
It seems that Santander made a stance tweak before hitting the homer yesterday. May it bring him many more homers in games that count.

Bradfield Jr. taking his opportunity, running with it (Orioles.com)
There’s so much going on with the Orioles camp so far that last year’s first round pick Enrique Bradfield Jr. being a regular visitor from the minor league side is on the back burner. It’s still cool.

O’s may have found a pitcher in Suárez, is another hanging out in that clubhouse? (Steve Melewski)
There’s getting carried away about Suárez, and then there’s getting so carried away about Suárez that you preemptively get carried away about Ronald Guzmán too.

Birthdays and Orioles anniversaries

There are a pair of former Orioles who were born on this day. They are: 2021 two-game catcher Nick Ciuffo, and 1998 outfielder Joe Carter. Today is Carter’s 64th birthday, so an extra happy birthday to him.

Is today your birthday? Happy birthday to you as well! Your birthday buddies for today include: blueprint inventor John Herschel (1792), composer Maurice Ravel (1875), actor Bryan Cranston (1956), actress Wanda Sykes (1964), and poet Amanda Gorman (1998).

On this day in history…

In 1573, the Ottoman Empire and Republic of Venice concluded a peace treaty that ended the Fourth Ottoman-Venetian War after three years of fighting. Venice inflicted casualties at a rate of 4-5 to 1 but lost control of the island of Cyprus in the war, which was confirmed by the treaty.

In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell received a patent for the telephone.

In 1945, US Army forces fighting for control of the west bank of the Rhine captured Ludendorff Bridge at Remagen. Roughly 125,000 Americans crossed the bridge over ten days before it collapsed from German attacks, allowing further advance into Germany. The bridge was never rebuilt.

In 1965, civil rights activists on a march from Selma to Montgomery in Alabama were attacked by state and local police officers, with the day now dubbed Bloody Sunday.

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And that’s the way it is in Birdland on March 7. Have a safe Thursday.