Thursday Bird Droppings: The Chris Davis contract anniversary edition

Hello, friends.

There are now 70 days remaining until Orioles Opening Day. The 1970 season, as we all know, was quite a good one for the O’s, who won 108 games in the regular season and then won the World Series too. Jim Palmer led all Orioles with 6.4 bWAR, with Paul Blair’s 5.9 topping the position players, though it was Boog Powell (5.1 WAR) and his 114 RBI that took down the AL MVP that year.

We’re also down to less than four weeks until pitchers and catchers report for the start of spring training. There probably won’t be much in the way of O’s news between now and then, though there is still the presumably forthcoming penalties to be levied on the Red Sox because they hired a cheating manager who before that was a cheating bench coach.

This would be a lot more satisfying if the O’s were in a place to benefit from the Red Sox being thrown into chaos in 2020. Just about the most interesting short-term effect for the O’s is if the Red Sox lose the same picks as the Astros did (first and second round picks in 2020 and 2021) that would move the Orioles second and third selections up to the #29 and #38 picks in the 2020 draft. They were #31 and #40 before the Astros penalties.

It’s not nothing, but it’s not much either. In terms of slot money, those two picks sliding up two spots each is probably worth about $200,000 overall. And maybe there’s a future timeline where either the Red Sox or Astros would draft an eventual Hall of Famer and now the Orioles can pick that person instead. It’s just not very likely to matter all that much.

Around the blogO’sphere

Wondering about Orioles’ outfield alignment (School of Roch)
I’ll be happier about the Orioles when a positional logjam doesn’t keep shoving Trey Mancini into right field.

Checking in on last season’s worst rotations (MLB Trade Rumors)
The Orioles were really bad and haven’t added personnel to make it better for 2020. It’s not news, of course.

DL Hall among MLB’s top 10 left-handed pitching prospects (MLB Pipeline)
What’s having the 10th-best left-handed prospect worth to you? In another few years, we’ll know how much it’s worth to the success of the Orioles.

An early 2020 mock draft (Steve Melewski)
Steve reacts to Baseball America having the Orioles drafting Emerson Hancock, a University of Georgia righty, at #2. The landscape may look different in five months time.

Birthdays and Orioles anniversaries

Today in 2016, the Orioles signed Chris Davis to his seven year, $161 million contract, exciting at least one idiot on this website. The last deferred payment will occur on July 1, 2037.

There are a few former Orioles who were born on this day. They are: 2016-19 slugger Mark Trumbo, 2008 eight-gamer Eider Torres, and 2003-04 stumbler Jack Cust. Eider played eight games? That’s too perfect, though he would have probably preferred more. Torres’s O’s action was his only MLB experience. He’s got two career hits more than any of us ever will.

Is today your birthday? Happy birthday to you! Your birthday buddies for today include: Michelin co-founder Andre Michelin (1853), actress Ethel Merman (1908), baseball Hall of Famer Dizzy Dean (1910), auto racer A.J. Foyt (1935), musical man Lin-Manuel Miranda (1980), and Super Bowl champion quarterback Joe Flacco (1985).

On this day in history...

In 1547, the Grand Duke of Muscovy, Ivan IV, decided he’d had enough of being a grand duke and proclaimed himself Tsar of the newly-existing Tsardom of Russia.

In 1707, the Parliament of Scotland ratified the Act of Union, which once it took effect in May led to the creation of the Kingdom of Great Britain.

In 1919, five states ratified the Eighteenth Amendment, with Nebraska officially putting it over the line for nationwide ratification. One year later, the prohibition on alcohol it allowed took effect. Maryland was the sixth state to ratify.

In 1964, Hello Dolly! had the first of its then-record 2,844 performances on Broadway. Today it sits merely in the top 20, and could drop out of that if Disney’s Aladdin runs for another year-plus. The current record holder, The Phantom of the Opera, has been running since 1988.

In 1991, Coalition forces began the Gulf War with an aerial bombardment campaign that would last for 46 days before an invasion of Kuwait and Iraq.

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And that’s the way it is in Birdland on January 16 - or at least, unless something happens later. Have a safe Thursday.