Saturday Bird Droppings: Watching the postseason from the sidelines

Good morning, Birdland!

The opening day of the playoffs was pretty neat, huh? Hopefully we won’t be sitting on the sidelines this time next year, unless it means the Orioles won the AL East and have a first-round bye. In that case, I’m perfectly happy enjoying a fall day without the associated stress of wild card games.

There was an Orioles-esque flair in some of Friday’s games. Manny Machado hit a home run. Mychal Givens tossed a scoreless inning. Ryan Flaherty sat on the bench. All the hallmarks of the glory years!

All eight teams that played on Friday are back in action today. We will have a gamethread coming later. But the two most intriguing games for me have to be Mariners/Blue Jays and Padres/Mets. The former has Robbie Ray returning to Toronto for what could be a series-clincher, and the latter is a matchup of Cy Young winners in Blake Snell and Jacob DeGrom. Spicy!

Your TV remote is sure to get a workout between four baseball games along with the weekly wave of college football. Or you could be like me, and go to a local pumpkin patch for some stereotypical, overpriced, Instagram-worthy fun. Both are solid options.

Links

Tate: “I still don’t feel like I’m established yet” | Roch Kubatko
It was a nice season for Dillon Tate. I’m curious to see what the Orioles do with him this offseason. In my mind, he is a trade candidate, only because the organization has now made a habit of trading away more established bullpen pieces, and his low strikeout rate paired with career lows in walk rate and BABIP seem ripe for regression. Could be a good time to capitalize on relief-hungry teams.

The Orioles and their fans set sights on 2023 playoffs, although dueling Angelos family lawsuits cloud offseason forecast | The Baltimore Sun
The ongoing lawsuit amongst the Angelos family is obviously ugly, but I’m not inclined to think it’s going to impact player transactions this offseason a whole lot. Mike Elias isn’t one to speak off the cuff. He has been rather straightforward since the trade deadline that this offseason is going to be different than the previous four. To deviate from that path at this point would seem an odd move for Elias and the club.

Henderson on 2022: ‘This is what you dream of’ | MLB.com
It was almost refreshing to see Gunnar Henderson start to struggle a little bit in the final two weeks of the season. Finally, we had proof that he was, in fact, human. Those struggles did coincide with the rookie facing a few opponents for the second or third time in his career. Sometimes you have to take a step back before you move forward. I think he will be just fine.

Orioles birthdays

Is it your birthday? Happy birthday!

• Manny Barreda turns 34. The pitcher appeared in three games for the 2021 Orioles, to this point his only big league experience.
• Keith Reed celebrates his 44th. The former first round pick played in six games for the 2005 Orioles.
• Mike Morgan is 63 years old. He spent the 1988 season in Baltimore, pitching in 22 games, split between the rotation and the bullpen.
• Enos Cabell turns 73. He began his 15-year MLB career with a three-season stint in Baltimore from 1972-74.

This day in O’s history

2012 - The Orioles win Game 2 of the ALDS 3-2 over the Yankees as Wei-Yin Chen out-duels Andy Pettitte. Chris Davis drives in two in the third inning, and Mark Reynolds singles in one more in the sixth.