The Orioles cleared out the remaining fodder from their spring training roster with a flurry of moves following the conclusion of their final spring tune-up game on Friday night. When the dust settled, the Orioles were down to 28 players plus one non-roster invitee still with the team, with a Sunday deadline to get the rest of the way to 25.
There were five non-roster players re-assigned to minor league camp: Pitchers Pedro Beato and Todd Redmond; infielders Paul Janish and Steve Tolleson; and outfielder L.J. Hoes.
The Orioles also passed pitchers Zach Phillips and Chaz Roe through waivers, outrighting them to Triple-A Norfolk. Those players are now off the 40-man roster.
Finally, catcher Francisco Peña was optioned to Norfolk.
That leaves one lone non-roster invitee still hanging around. The last one is outfielder Xavier Avery, who hasn't been in the majors since his stint with the 2012 O's. The 26-year-old had himself a good spring, however meaningful that may be to you.
Before Friday's game, Avery was batting .276/.432/.621 for spring - though Avery, it should be noted, faced slightly less than Double-A caliber competition while compiling his spring numbers. That's almost a full level weaker than any other Oriole faced in spring.
Presumably, Avery hasn't been reassigned yet because the O's are either holding out hope that Hyun Soo Kim will accept a minor league assignment, or they are considering releasing him after all, even though there was a report earlier Friday that they were going to keep Kim.
Avery is likely a more ideal reserve outfielder than Kim, but who knows. If they keep Kim and still really want Avery, that would probably mean they'd choose Avery's greater potential versatility over Nolan Reimold, who can never seem to catch a break.
The three players who will be headed to the disabled list for at least some time are Kevin Gausman, Brian Matusz, and Jimmy Paredes. Then they'll either make room for Avery somehow or they won't.
So that's that for now, until something changes later.
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