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Does anything get more exciting than pop-up drills and bunt drills? That's what the Orioles were running on Sunday at the spring training complex in Sarasota. This is the work that will show up, or not, at random intervals through the season.
Even 53-homer man Chris Davis spent some time in the cage working on bunts:
Chris Davis bunting. Don't get used to it. #Orioles pic.twitter.com/RwPuxLrawV
— Brett Hollander (@BrettHollander) February 23, 2014
On one hand, if Davis bunts, he's not hitting a home run, but on the other hand, if he can successfully bunt against the shift every now and again, those would basically be free hits and free times on base. Just as long as he's never sacrifice bunting.
Dylan Bundy's rehab is continuing apace:
Bundy will get up to 150 ft again today and he will go back in to 90 after that, which is new. All going well so far w him
— Brittany Ghiroli (@Britt_Ghiroli) February 23, 2014
He told reporters that he's still throwing at 75% of max effort, which is in accordance with the rehab plan. He threw an extra 20 times from 90 feet after doing his throws from 150 feet. The expectation is that he will throw a couple more times from 150 feet and then move back to doing throws from 180 feet.
The Orioles will be having intrasquad games on Wednesday and Thursday. The Wednesday game will be four innings and the Thursday game will be eight innings. These are your starters:
Matusz and Gausman will start Wednesday intrasquad. Chen and Norris Thursday. 1 inning each #Orioles
— Roch Kubatko (@masnRoch) February 23, 2014
The Thursday game will be open to the public on the back field at Ed Smith Stadium. The Wednesday game will not be open. You can also look forward to Chris Tillman and then Zach Britton pitching in Friday's spring training opening game against Tampa Bay. That game is in the Rays complex and will be broadcast on WBAL radio.
Because it's spring training, there has to be at least one breathless update on a player you probably didn't even know was in camp. On Sunday, that player was Chris Marrero, who has sat out a couple of days due to an oblique injury. I'm sure his presence has been heavily missed.