The Mets beat the O's today, and now the Birds coming home. A couple exhibition games with the Nats remain, and Opening Day with the New York Yankees is just a few days away. On Monday, the Orioles take the field and it counts.

It's been a long, frustrating spring in many ways, but now it's basically over. Now we get to REALLY judge players, because these stats MEAN SOMETHING!

Oh the times we'll have...

Batten down the hatches.

More photos » by Richard Drew - AP

Koji Uehara will be the No. 2 starter in the first rotation of the season. How good a thing that is is entirely relative to your expectations. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

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...that way if it's passable, we feel like we win!

In 2008, the Orioles gave up 869 runs, second-worst in the American League (Texas allowed an unholy 967 guys to cross home plate). The team's ERA was 5.15, also second-worst in the league.

Here's how Orioles pitching has done during The Losing Years:

• 1998: 4.73, 7th
• 1999: 4.77, 4th
• 2000: 5.37, 12th
• 2001: 4.67, 10th
• 2002: 4.46, 7th
• 2003: 4.76, 10th
• 2004: 4.70, 7th
• 2005: 4.56, 10th
• 2006: 5.35, 13th
• 2007: 5.17, 13th
• 2008: 5.15, 13th

The proof is pretty much in the pudding: This franchise's recent pitching history certainly stinks, but the last three seasons it has been worse than ever. The Leo Mazzone and Rick Kranitz teams have bottomed out, with only some pretty awful performances from the '08 Rangers, '07 Devil Rays and '06 Royals saving their bacon to any degree.

Now, there's something to be said for talent provided these coaches, yes, and that's the biggest thing. No one was getting good results out of these guys. But it's not like those Ray Miller teams were lighting it up out there; the fact that the '99 team finished fourth is a miracle and a reflection of the league at the time, all 'roided up and crazy. You look back on those guys (outside of Mussina, who had an excellent season) and there's not a lot more talent than what's been handed these last three squads.

It won't be fixed any time soon. The days of Matusz, Tillman and Arrieta (and maybe Bergesen and Erbe, etc.) are still pretty far off. This season...

Let's get right down to it. We have talked and talked and talked about the rotation, but it is my firm belief that right now, if only about the pitching staff, every Orioles fan needs to take a good sober think on the following statement: This will be the worst pitching staff yet. It will be abysmal. It will hurt to watch them.

Obviously strange things happen, but it is very rare indeed that anything as strange as Guthrie, Uehara, Simon, Hendrickson and Eaton being successful happens. The Hardball Times projected the Orioles to have the worst staff in the league by far this season, and this was pre-Eaton and pre-Uehara and even pre-Hendo, and freaking Alfredo Simon has come out of nowhere to win a job the team couldn't hand to Hayden Penn with a clear conscience.

Baseball Prospectus VORP projections for the five guys:

• Jeremy Guthrie is at 13.9. That's fine and all, but it would represent a massive tailing off in quality. Guts has been at 39.4 and 41.9 the last two years. Every projection system is going to show him unable to sustain what he's done in 2007-08 because what he's done isn't easily explained. Frankly I think he'll outdo the PECOTA projection once again. He's better than it looks like he is.
• Koji Uehara is at 15.4, which is pretty good for what we're paying him. I am personally not much of a believer in Koji but love the signing for a great number of reasons. He's cheap, he gets our foot in the Japanese market's door, and frankly he'll be exciting to watch unless he really stinks because he's something different than the retreads, journeymen, has-beens and never-will-bes we've been carting out there. Speaking of...
• Mark Hendrickson is at 0.1. Zero-point-one.
• Adam Eaton is at -6.4. Negative six-point-four. The last time Eaton got any substantial major league time with the Phillies in 2007, he put up a sterling -10.8 VORP. Negative ten-point-eight. Last year with Philly he brought that up to a -3.1.
• Alfredo Simon's projected VORP is -10.1. Negative ten-point-one. Listen, I'm rootin' for the dude, I like his story this spring, I'm happy the O's rewarded good work instead of old hopes, buuuut...Simon would have to pull a minor miracle to not get shredded as a major league starter.

More about Alfredo. Here are his VORP numbers since 2006:

In layman's terms, he has sucked, no matter where the ball was being played. A-ball, AAA ball in the PCL, MLB, Mexico.

In some ways discussing the rotation like this reminds me of Sarah Jessica Parker as Dolores Fuller in Ed Wood, when at the end of one of Ed's bizarre wrap parties, with everyone hooting and hollering and having a great time, she suddenly bursts out with, "You people are insane! You're wasting your lives making s***! Nobody cares! These movies...ARE TERRIBLE!"

See, I don't think Ed and the gang were wasting their time, and I don't think we're wasting our time talking about this crummy predicament. But it's undeniable that his movies and this rotation are crap and that outside of us weirdos, nobody cares. Frankly, it's a little peculiar that we're as invested as we are in guys like Alfredo Simon and Adam Eaton. Sad, even. But that's the hand we were dealt. Ed Wood wanted to make movies. I want to root for the Orioles. He had no talent. I have no choice.

It also pains me to beg of everyone to not just "stay realistic," but to actually expect the worst pitching staff we've seen to date during these lousy years.

Think about how we all get by mid-July. I'm not saying we won't still drop so many game thread F-bombs that someone really ought to do something about it, but maybe the harsh impact this team will have on your mental well-being will be lessened.

Or completely ignore my advice, get psyched for Kojimania, and be like the many GMs that have been tricked by Adam Eaton in the past.

There's also this lingering feeling I have that this rotation did not HAVE to be as bad as it's going to be. There were things that could have been done. There were ways to make it less of an imminent disaster. There's really no way this rotation isn't the worst in baseball. It was going to be bad either way, but this is going to be a new level of garbage.

The truth is... I miss you.

That's right. I read an article on the internet, and now I like Lou Montanez.

Not only does Montanez come off like a humble guy that has learned from some mistakes, but openly attributing his failure to live up to his draft spot and early hype to a poor attitude sort of endears me to him, and even sort of gives me the hope that maybe he'll actually be a good player in Major League Baseball.

It's foolish, but sometimes I'm a sucker.

What's really turning me on Montanez is his competition, Felix Pie. While Montanez is hitting .354/.415/.438 this spring, Pie is batting a paltry .200/.260/.267 -- a .527 OPS. Against spring pitching.

Making that even worse is the fact that his glove has stunk, and that was supposed to be his biggest asset. But then we heard that about Luis Hernandez, too.

Let's not beat around the bush about it, because others have stopped doing it, too. Felix Pie was a vanity pickup by Andy MacPhail, or perhaps an obsession pickup. His top prospectdom had a lot to do with tools that may have made him a good baseball player. Pie is 24, which isn't old, but when your Major League line is .223/.284/.331 in 260 at-bats, it starts looking kinda old. Montanez finally made it to the bigs late last season and his mediocre .295/.316/.446 line is better than Pie has to offer.

It's also not like Pie has torched the minors at any point. He didn't stall like Montanez did, but he wasn't exactly lighting it up down there. He's hit .299/.353/.470 in 2500 minor league at-bats. Better than Montanez's mediocre career minor league numbers, yes, but isn't the point that he's supposed to be better? If he can't actually outplay Montanez (and he has not this spring, make no mistake about that), then why did we even get him?

MacPhail has done a great job so far and this won't be some make-or-break deal either way. Neither of them are likely to be the long-term solution, I don't think. But Pie was acquired because he's Andy's boy and Andy thought this was the right situation for him. If he can't hit and can't field, the situation was not right for him no matter what the team's expected W-L record was.

Now if Pie plays well and shuts me up, then great! We have a good left fielder, and Montanez is just sort of SOL unless someone gets hurt. But they're talking platoon with Ryan Freel, who hasn't been healthy in years and is a great idea in the superutility role, but not much further than that. They're talking platoon with Ryan Freel, and we're talking about the guy MacPhail went out and purposely got to start in left. He has no minor league options left, he's been left for dead by another organization, and this just isn't a great start in Baltimore for Felix Pie. If he flops as hard as it looks like he might, Andy will have some 'splainin to do.

I also feel it's worth mentioning that Luke Scott is a better player than both of them and that we wouldn't even be having this conversation if the team had signed a first baseman.

After Hayden Penn's latest bad spring outing, it doesn't sound good for the 24-year old righty:

Penn, one of five candidates for three rotation spots, is forcing the Orioles to make a difficult decision. He is out of options, meaning the Orioles would need him to pass through waivers to get him to Triple-A Norfolk. The Orioles aren't confident Penn will make it through waivers, as a number of teams, including the pitcher's hometown and pitching-desperate San Diego Padres, have expressed interest in him in the past.

Ol' Hayden just isn't getting it done out there, which he acknowledges (in those words even):

"Actually, I felt pretty good out there," said Penn, who needed 62 pitches to get eight outs. "Obviously, the line is bad and I didn't get it done, but I felt pretty good. I really did. That's probably the best I felt physically all spring. ... I felt I was making some quality pitches. That's the way it goes. That's baseball."

At what point when you're Hayden Penn does "Well, that's baseball" start driving you plum effing crazy, though? This is a guy that was about to get another call to the show last year before being impaled by a bat. He has had some ridiculously awful luck. Trembley talked about him having a sharp curveball the other day. His control was bad, too, and let's not discount that, but Penn's out there feelin' it and his curve is working and he still stinks, and he has the resolve to go, "Well, hey, you know, that's baseball. Am I right fellas?"

I imagine him saying this again a dozen more times when spoken to after rough outings and finally just losing it and going on some weird tangent like Michael Richards in UHF.

The thing is, Hayden Penn was basically handed a golden opportunity this spring to right his own ship. There were FOUR open rotation spots before Koji Uehara was signed, and three after. He wasn't being asked to beat out the brightest stars in the galaxy, either. But it looks like he's going to lose this shot to the likes of Adam Eaton, Mark Hendrickson and probably Alfredo Simon. I'm not the biggest Penn backer in the world or close to it, but I was relatively sure he'd make it out of camp with a rotation spot. I thought there was a good shot he wouldn't keep it very long (perhaps after being attacked by a giant squid), but I really thought he'd win a spot. Doesn't look good now, though.

Yesterday Dave Trembley announced that David Pauley is no longer in the running for the rotation, and today he gave Danys Baez the bad news (bad for Baez, not for us).

That leaves 5 men fighting for the three remaining spots behind Guthrie and Uehara: Hayden Penn, Adam Eaton, Mark Hendrickson, Brian Bass, and Alfredo Simon.

Should Dave and Kranny call me up today and ask for my advice, I'd suggest Penn, Bass, and Simon to round out the rotation. Penn hasn't been lighting up ST but he's young, he's been looked on highly in the past, and he's out of options. Brian Bass will, in all liklihood, never amount to anything. But let's at least give him a chance to not amount to anything. Mark Hendrickson and Adam Eaton have been proving for years that they're useless. Alfredo Simon came into camp as an unknown but he's performed well and I think has earned a shot.

Sadly, Dave and Kranny will not be asking for my advice, and I think their final rotation will be different from what I'd choose. My gut tells me it'll be Hedrickson, Eaton, and Penn, with one of them going to the bullpen/released when Rich Hill returns from the DL.

I know this rotation isn't that important in the grand scheme of things. Sounds ridiculous to say that, but it just has to hold it together for a little bit longer  until our saviors can arrive. But there still is no excuse to have a rotation with both Adam Eaton and Mark Hendrickson. Just for fun I looked them up on baseball-reference.com today. Eaton's ERA+ for the last five years: 84, 90, 90, 73, 75. Hendrickson? 94, 74, 108, 88, 78.  Can we please give the younger guys a chance to prove they suck as badly as these two?

BTW, I am SO tired of Spring Training. Bring on the games! I at least had the WBC to keep me occupied for awhile but now I'm just staring at the wall, waiting.

I don't care about March Madness. There, I said it. So let's talk baseball.

The O's starting rotation continues to look a hot mess and it's not getting any better.

The Orioles made a formal request for Jeremy Guthrie to return to the team from the WBC so he can prepare for the season, but so far he hasn't returned. Kranitz had tentatively penciled him in to start today's game, but according to Roch the starting pitcher today is Mark Hendrickson. Jeremy has looked just awful in his two WBC appearances and though I'm not yet panicking about him, it's a bit disconcerting that the only sure thing we've got is looking less and less sure.

Speaking of Mark Hendrickson, his chances to make the rotation just increased now that Rich Hill won't be ready to start the season. According to Jeff Zriebec, Dave Trembley wants at least one lefty in the rotation. Hendrickson is the only lefty still in the running, so it appears to be his job to lose. Ugh is all I have to say to that.

Koji Uehara is still on pace to be ready for the start of the season as he continues to rehab his strained hamstring. Kranitz and Trembley hope to get him at least two starts to prepare him, but they don't seem worried.

Despite his impressive spring, Brad Bergesen was optioned to AAA. Like many of you, I think it'd be a shame for Eaton or some other garbage pitcher to get the spot instead of him, but I don't think this is a huge deal because we will see Bergesen up here sooner rather than later. Here is what Trembley had to say about him:

"We had to send him out so he can be out for 10 days so if somebody gets hurt we can get him back,'' Trembley said. "He's going to pitch for us, but it's probably not going to happen on April 6.

"He had a good spring,'' Trembley said. "He's a guy we all feel would be at the top of the list of guys who are called up here. We needed to get him out so he could get his innings. We think a log ot him. He just didn't make the club out of spring training.

"I told him it's inconceivable to think the 12 or 13 guys we break camp with are going to be here all season."

We now sit two weeks and 1 day from Opening Day and the three spots are still open in the rotation. Hendrickson seems to have a leg up based simply on being left handed, which is just ridiculous in my opinion. What does it matter if you're left handed if you aren't any good? Still in the running are Penn, Pauley,  the recently effective Alfredo Simon, and of course, Adam Eaton. 

Bottom line is the rotation is going to suck no matter how you slice it. But Andy, Kranitz and Trembley are going to have to start making decisions soon to make sure their rotation is prepared for Opening Day.

He's number 58, you probably don't know much about him, and you probably didn't think you'd ever have to care.

But with four scoreless innings against the Nats, Alfredo Simon might be in the rotation chase. He's got six scoreless innings overall this spring.

"He's a horse. He's a big guy and he keeps going right at you," Orioles manager Dave Trembley said of Simon. "He had a nice outing."

Simon has now thrown six scoreless innings in two spring games, forcing himself into a rotation scrum that includes at least eight others vying for three slots.

"I don't know what they are going to do," Simon said. "But I have to show what I've got and put in the best [effort ] and they'll decide what they are going to do."

Usually I'd say we shouldn't be wasting time considering Alfredo Simon, but that's sort of the spirit of the rotation battle. I still like the David Pauley pickup, but heaven knows he's not doing worth a damn this spring. Guthrie and Uehara are the only guys set for the rotation. Simon should be given every chance the other guys are being given. Who knows? Maybe some nice sleeper action. Maybe he stinks. Who does it hurt if he earns his way in over another guy who might be a sleeper and might stink?

One of the first things I ever did on this site was give way too much of a crap about the Chris Gomez v. Enrique Wilson utility infielder battle of Spring Training 2005. Gomez won. All was right with the world. Gomez then hit .279/.359/.342 in 2005 and poked even more singles around in spot duty the next two seasons, and now he's back in camp, but he's really too old now and his numbers in '08 with the Pirates (.273/.322/.333) show his usefulness fading.

Still, Enrique Wilson got 22 ABs with the Cubs in 2005 and never played again.

This spring it's not really a battle. There's a super sub role open with the team, and though the O's traded for Ryan Freel who fills the role nicely, there's also Jolbert Cabrera -- who was once shot in the buttocks -- and I think he deserves a long look.

Numbers this spring:

Freel's going to play a lot if they can help it. He adds plenty to the team in theory. He's got plate discipline, which makes him a viable pinch-hitter even if his contact abilities have slipped and his power has become basically negligible. He runs really well. He can handle center if he has to, plus the corner OF spots and second base. He's probably a lesser shortstop than Cabrera, who's probably not as good a CF as Freel, although we also have Pie if Jones goes down or whatever, and Pie might be the best center fielder on the team. Freel is also injury-prone and has played in 77 and 48 games the last two years.

Cabrera isn't as good a base-stealer as Freel, but he's not a slow runner and can be used just for extra wheels in a tight situation, same as Freel likely will be at several times this year should he stay healthy.

I know Freel came over in trade for Fat Ramon Hernandez and Cabrera is just a spring training scrub for all intents and purposes. If Freel is healthy, he's the guy. But here's what I'm actually more intrigued by: Does Jolbert Cabrera have a place on this team sometime in 2009?

Assume the Birds go north with 13 pitchers and 12 position players. We know we'll have:

C: ZAUN + one, probably Robby Hammock, who can play other positions

1B: Huff

2B: Roberts

3B: Mora

SS: Izturis

OF: Markakis, Jones, Pie, Scott

1B/3B/2B/DH: Wigginton

That would leave one open spot. It'll be Freel. But should he come up lame, Cabrera seems like a guy that would fit in. He can play a lot of positions, including a better short than Freel, and Izturis is going to have days he has to sit, or he's going to have times where he'll need to be hit for late in a tight game.

I'd rather have Freel, with Wigginton also offering some level of positional flexibility (as well as Hammock) than see Cabrera over Freel right off, and with the way Gomez is hitting (.095/.269/.143) he's well out, too. Donnie Murphy isn't doing anything, either.

It's simply food for thought with little going on. The battle isn't much since Freel is all but guaranteed, but if (when?) Freel goes down, who comes up?