Thursday Bird Droppings: The Rodolfo Martinez fan club is growing daily

Non-roster invite to Orioles camp Rodolfo Martinez has gotten some eyes on him early on in spring training.

Hello, friends.

As of today, Orioles Opening Day is now seven weeks away. Between now and then, we’ve got the whole Grapefruit League schedule to get through, most of which will be spent hoping that nobody gets hurt. The exhibition season begins on Saturday with a 1pm game against the Pirates. This is one of the few spring games that MASN is actually bothering to televise.

For now, we’re still in the workout days, where the reporters who should know better are all marveling about bullpen sessions, batting practice appearances, and guys looking jacked. None of these things matter all that much. It only matters what everyone looks like and what they’re able to do once the games that do matter get going in late March. Spring training games offer scant proof of what positive things might happen this year. The time before spring games offers even less proof than that.

Do you want to give in? Maybe you’re looking for an obscure non-roster invite to hang your hat on. Rodolfo Martinez is probably your guy:

Or maybe you want to dive in on Cade Povich, because the Orioles are going to eventually need to have some young pitchers take places in this rotation:

These are the kinds of things that can stand out as the exciting stories in camp because it’s not like there are any brand new debut prospects who are going to be making the Opening Day roster. Of course, there are still plenty of young players who have either moved beyond prospect status (like Jackson Holliday) or are close to doing so (like Coby Mayo) who are still of interest. Samuel Basallo doesn’t fit into either of those categories but he’ll be fun to see against maybe higher-level pitchers in the exhibition games.

Could there still be a shakeup to the roster in the form of a move that we’re not expecting? Mike Elias has shown he’s generally amenable to making a move in the final days before Opening Day. Not a big move or anything, but he still shook up the Opening Day roster last year by sending Tyler Nevin packing and bringing in Tony Kemp for a few days. The true dreamers can imagine something like a Dylan Cease trade any day now. But today we’re probably just going to get more bullpen and batting practice videos.

Around the blogO’sphere

The Orioles are baseball’s most fascinating team-building puzzle (FanGraphs)
Ben Clemens at FG riffs on a recent observation that the Orioles added the second-most payroll this offseason – just that they went about it in a very uncommon way.

Zack Britton excited with the talent he’s seeing in Orioles camp (School of Roch)
The great closer and current guest coach went so far as to proclaim there’s more depth and talent on this team than the playoff teams he was a part of. That would be something.

O’Neill’s ripped physique makes a strong impression on coaches and teammates (Orioles.com)
If Tyler O’Neill being ripped means he stays healthy and hits a whole bunch of dingers, I’m sure not going to complain about it.

Albert Suárez adapted to return to MLB. This new pitch could help him stick. (The Baltimore Sun)
Veteran guys messing around with a new pitch is almost as much of a spring training staple as “best shape of his life.” Maybe Suárez will really benefit from it.

Once temperamental, Samuel Basallo is impressing Orioles coaches with how he’s matured (The Baltimore Banner)
Really interesting tidbits in here about how the Orioles helped Basallo not feel so much frustration and pressure, with one successful strategy being that he wrote frequently in a notebook for three years.

Birthdays and Orioles anniversaries

Today in 2016, the Orioles were reportedly in agreement with free agent pitcher Yovani Gallardo, though in the coming days there was a problem on his physical and this deal was renegotiated to be shorter and for less money. It appears in retrospect that the O’s would have been better off walking away entirely.

There are a pair of former Orioles who were born on this day. They are: 2016 six-game outfielder Julio Borbón, and 1955-56 pitcher Jim Wilson.

Is today your birthday? Happy birthday to you! Your birthday buddies for today include: actor Sidney Poitier (1927), musician J. Geils (1946), basketball Hall of Famer Charles Barkley (1963), model Cindy Crawford (1966), comedian Trevor Noah (1984), singer-songwriter Rihanna (1988), and singer-songwriter Olivia Rodrigo (2003).

On this day in history…

In 1472, current Scottish islands Orkney and Shetland were transferred from Norway to Scotland as part of a dowry for a marriage between Princess Margaret of Denmark and Scotland’s James III.

In 1877, the Tchaikovsky ballet Swan Lake had its premiere performance, held at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow.

In 1962, the Friendship 7 mission with astronaut John Glenn aboard was in space for four hours and 55 minutes, allowing Glenn to complete three Earth orbits. He’s the first American to have done this.

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And that’s the way it is in Birdland on February 20. Have a safe Thursday.