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Baltimore Orioles 2013 in review: Chris Dickerson

The Orioles super-sub was lots of fun, and occasionally good.

Greg Fiume

Going into the 2013, Chris Dickerson was nothing more than one of Dan Duquette's now-classic scrap-heap pickups for the Orioles. Brought in to compete with the likes of Steve Pearce, Russ Canzler and Nolan Reimold for a reserve role on the club, Dickerson ended up making his way into 56 games with the club. From a baseball perspective, he had one really, really good month and didn't do a whole lot else. From a chemistry and .gif-ability perspective, he gave Orioles fans something to enjoy during a season that didn't quite go as planned.

Let's start with Dickerson the baseball player. Dickerson's overall line screams "replacement player": .238/.266/.400 (note the unsettling .666 OPS), 4 HR, 5 SB -- all good for -0.1 WAR, according to Baseball Reference. Now let's break apart the stats of two players we'll call Chris May Dickerson and Chris EveryOtherMonth Dickerson:

PAs Slash line HR
May 35 .314/.314/.714 4
EveryOtherMonth 74 .200/.267/.243 0

Chris Dickerson's May was more than the numbers indicate. He hit two solo homers in a win against the Yankees that snapped a six-game losing streak. He mashed a walkoff home run against the Tigers. Dickerson was right in the middle of a heady month where Orioles fans could reasonably believe that everything good was within the team's reach.

But then, there were the .gif-able moments. The fact is, Chris Dickerson may or may not be with the Orioles in 2014. If he is, he probably won't be a huge factor in the team's fortunes. The Orioles could choose to offer him arbitration (for which this would be his first year), or they could non-tender him and hope to re-sign him to a team-friendly contract. It doesn't entirely matter. I'm going to leave you with this gallery of Dickerson .gifs so that we can all remember the good times together.

Cd-aj-celebration-2_medium

Happy-chris-d_medium

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Thanks for the memories, Chris.