Saturday’s Bird Droppings: Where it’s the final weekend of Orioles spring games

Good morning, Birdland!

The Orioles roster is starting to come together and hoo boy, it is gonna be a rough season. We knew that, but seeing some of these names written down together, and then looking at the sort of lineups that the rival Red Sox and Yankees can trot out is downright depressing. I saw a blog somewhere the other day that said something along the lines of “Mark Trumbo is the most feared hitter in this lineup...” That line alone made me light-headed.

Links

O’s release Young; Sucre to be backup catcher - MLB.com
This was the big news on Friday. Eric Young Jr. may return to the organization as a minor leaguer, but he prefers to try and earn a big league job first. Behind the plate, Jesus Sucre will backup Chance Sisco while Austin Wynns works his way back from injury. That means that someone on the 40-man roster will have to go to make room for Sucre.

Cardinals To Select Matt Wieters - MLBTradeRumors
It’s nice to keep track of notable former Birds. Matt Wieters (32) will serve as Yadier Molina’s (36) backup, making for what has to be the oldest pair of catchers in the league.

Wright goes four innings, O’s bats muted (O’s lose 4-0, updated) - School of Roch
Prepare yourself for “Mike Wright: the starter” once again. He’s still getting the ball this late in the spring, and it’s not like Brandon Hyde and company haven’t had ample time to see him play. That likely means he’s going to be in the rotation. Who knows how long that will last, but it’s better for all of us to just accept it.

Save for one wild inning, Jimmy Yacabonis has had a solid spring - Steve Melewski
I’m an unabashed Jimmy Yacabonis fan. The guy has some serious tools on the mound. He just turned 27 years old, so it’s about time he either puts it all together and becomes a productive hurler or he just is the guy he has been up to this point in his big league career, which isn’t great. I’m a glass half full kind of guy.

Orioles birthdays and history

Is it your birthday? Happy birthday!

It’s a trio of birthdays for former Orioles. Lee May (b. 1943, d. 2017) spent six seasons with the Birds from 1975 through 1980, putting together a .254/.299/.423 slash line with 123 home runs and a few down-ballot MVP votes. Salsbury’s own Bruce Howard was a right-handed pitcher that played just 10 games for the O’s in 1968 and turns 76 today. And it is a posthumous celebration for Sam Bowen (b. 1938, d. 2003), an outfielder in Baltimore for parts of five seasons between 1963 and 1967.

Baseball Reference did not have any Orioles nuggets among it’s list of events on this day in baseball history, so here are some other things that have happened around the sport:

2000 - The St. Louis Cardinals acquire Jim Edmonds from the Anaheim Angles in exchange for Adam Kennedy and Kent Bottenfield

2006 - Alfonso Soriano agrees to move from second base to left field for the Washington Nationals following a two-day standoff with manager Frank Robinson.

2009 - Japan wins its second World Baseball Classic. Daisuke Matsuzaka is named MVP. Yu Darvish earns the win in the final over South Korea and Ichiro Suzuki goes 4-for-6 with the winning hit in that same game.