Sunday Bird Droppings: Where it’s a snow day!

Happy Sunday, Camden Chatters. And happy snow day! For those of you in the Baltimore/DC area, anyway. I love a good snow day. It looks like we got a decent amount overnight and it’s still coming down.

Since I work somewhere that closes for snow, I prefer my snow days during the week, but I’m not complaining about this one. I will still go play in the snow, drink hot chocolate, watch movies. I like to bake cookies when it snows, but I’m still a little cookied out from Christmas. But I’ll figure out something good. What will you do with your snow day?

It’s hard to think about baseball in this kind of weather, but it’ll be here before you know it. We are exactly one month from pitchers and catchers reporting to Sarasota for spring training. A week and a half after that is the first spring training game of the year. Have you ever been down to Florida for spring training? I went to one game as part of a long weekend a few years ago and it was lovely. I gotta admit I don’t understand making a whole trip around it.

There are still 74 days until Opening Day if Mark’s math is correct. Now that still feels like it’s a long time away. I have been a season ticket holder since 2013. That year we did a 13-game plan and the following year we upped to 29 games that we share with my in-laws. We’ve done a lot of deliberating over the recent weeks and finally decided to go back down to 13 games (and still share them).

Obviously the Orioles being terrible is part of our decision, but it also got a lot tougher to go to those many games once we moved a bit further away and got ourselves a kid. Those hassles might be worth if the Orioles were going to win 90+ games this year, but they are not. Maybe we’ll jump back up to the larger game plan in the future.

They did add a new rewards system to to the plans that I think is pretty cool. The amount of points you get is based on how many tickets you have and how many games, and you can redeem them for things like playing catch on the field, a visit from the Oriole bird, and more. They’re also offering discounts on concessions to season ticket holders, which is long overdue. I’m guessing even with those improvements they’ll lose a lot of their STH base after last year’s season.

Anyway, I’ve babbled long enough. On to the (sparse) links!

Links

Camp at Newtown Estates serves as introduction to the game - Herald Tribune
Brian Roberts update! He's created the Brian Roberts Youth Baseball Clinic in Sarasota, and he brought along some friends.

RHP Bo Schultz Signed To Minor League Deal - Birds Watcher
I don't know who Bo Schultz is, but he had TJ surgery in March 2017 and is 33 years old. Also this Birds Watcher blog has been cranking out the stories over the off season. Kudos to them.

Reviewing the coaches, arbitration figures and Trumbo's recovery - School of Roch
Roch sorts through, well, everything. I missed that the new Orioles hitting coach is named Don Long. Maybe I'll bid on one of his charity jerseys!

Is today your birthday? Happy birthday! You have two Orioles birthday buddies. The first is Oliver Drake, who set a record in 2018 by pitching for five different teams in the same season. Since November 1st he has changed teams three more times as he’s been claimed off waivers by the Rays and then the Blue Jays, and then was traded back to the Rays. He started his MLB career with the Orioles in 2015 and turns 32 years old today. It seems like the Rays like him so maybe they’ll keep him the whole year.

It’s also the birthday of Odell Jones, a pitcher who appeared in 21 games in relief for the 1986 Orioles. Jones had a nine-year major league career, mostly with the Pirates. He turns 66 today.

On this day in 1982, Frank Robinson was elected into the baseball Hall of Fame.