News Archives: August 2000

See what we mean about this team being all over the place? They play a good game just often enough to tease us, and then they get hammered. Their offense and pitching both take the day off. Of course, it's sometimes easy to see why their pitching takes the day off: it depends who the starting pitcher is. It should have been Sidney Ponson, but he's nursing some injuries (which hopefully explains his struggles of late), so Jason Johnson got a spot start in his place. As we noted last week, Hargrove has said that he intends to move Johnson into the starting rotation permanently, as soon as the bullpen is healthy enough to allow it. Somehow we're not quite so sure that it will happen after all, not when he pitches as he did on Tuesday night, when he had what was almost certainly the worst start by an Oriole this season. 12 runs -- 10 earned -- in 5 innings of work? Ugh. And when your starter is that bad, the offensive struggles seem unimportant, but they haven't escaped our attention, as the Orioles' failure to generate runs turned a bad outing into a 14-4 blowout loss.

• The good: Well, Ryan Kohlmeier continued his excellent pitching, going yet another scoreless inning.
• New callup Jay Spurgeon had a perfect inning in his major league debut, getting through 3 batters with only 5 pitches.
• The bad: with the exception of Mark Lewis (2 for 4 with a home run), there was little offense, and there's really little value in seeing Mark Lewis play.
• Melvin Mora made yet another error, and is up to 5 in his 2 1/2 weeks with the team.
• The ugly: Jason Johnson. Generally, we don't believe in such a thing as a "AAAA player," which is the derogatory label given to a player who dominates AAA but flops badly in the majors. But if there is such a thing, Jason Johnson is it. He was one of the best pitchers in the league -- in the International League. But in the majors, his ERA is over 7 this season, and over 6 in his major league career.
• We hate to keep picking on BJ Ryan, but his performance leaves us no choice. Once again, he was hit hard, giving up 2 runs in 2 innings of work, and his ERA is over 8.

See what we mean about this team being all over the place? They play a good game just often enough to tease us, and then they get hammered. Their offense and pitching both take the day off. Of course, it's sometimes easy to see why their pitching takes the day off: it depends who the starting pitcher is. It should have been Sidney Ponson, but he's nursing some injuries (which hopefully explains his struggles of late), so Jason Johnson got a spot start in his place. As we noted last week, Hargrove has said that he intends to move Johnson into the starting rotation permanently, as soon as the bullpen is healthy enough to allow it. Somehow we're not quite so sure that it will happen after all, not when he pitches as he did on Tuesday night, when he had what was almost certainly the worst start by an Oriole this season. 12 runs -- 10 earned -- in 5 innings of work? Ugh. And when your starter is that bad, the offensive struggles seem unimportant, but they haven't escaped our attention, as the Orioles' failure to generate runs turned a bad outing into a 14-4 blowout loss.

• The good: Well, Ryan Kohlmeier continued his excellent pitching, going yet another scoreless inning.
• New callup Jay Spurgeon had a perfect inning in his major league debut, getting through 3 batters with only 5 pitches.
• The bad: with the exception of Mark Lewis (2 for 4 with a home run), there was little offense, and there's really little value in seeing Mark Lewis play.
• Melvin Mora made yet another error, and is up to 5 in his 2 1/2 weeks with the team.
• The ugly: Jason Johnson. Generally, we don't believe in such a thing as a "AAAA player," which is the derogatory label given to a player who dominates AAA but flops badly in the majors. But if there is such a thing, Jason Johnson is it. He was one of the best pitchers in the league -- in the International League. But in the majors, his ERA is over 7 this season, and over 6 in his major league career.
• We hate to keep picking on BJ Ryan, but his performance leaves us no choice. Once again, he was hit hard, giving up 2 runs in 2 innings of work, and _his_ ERA is over 8.

And again, we see the split personality of the Orioles. A day after an erratic young pitcher gets knocked around by the Orioles, an erratic veteran continues the hottest streak of his career by completely shutting down the league-leading White Sox. Jose Mercedes allowed just 1 run on 7 hits -- six of them singles -- through 8 innings for his sixth straight strong start (without a bad one) since the All-Star Break. And the Orioles picked up 11 hits and 8 walks on their way to a cakewalk over the previously dominant Mike Sirotka and the White Sox, 8-2. If they could only play a few more games like this...

• The good: Jose Mercedes. Either he's the luckiest pitcher alive or the Os' pitching coach stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night.
• Jerry Hairston, trying to prove he should have been in the majors all along, goes 2-4 with his second homer in a week.
• Melvin Mora doesn't get a hit, but walks twice, steals a base, and scores, and Albert Belle and Chris Richard chip in with two hits each.
• Brook Fordyce continues with his hot bat, going 1-2 with 2 walks.
• Luis Matos picks up his first major league homer.
• The bad: Mike Trombley, again. He pitches one inning and allows a run on three hits. Admittedly it was mopup, pitching with an 8-1 lead, but if he can't get batters out then, how is he ever going to help the team in real relief situations?
• The Mets traded Mora because, while his bat was okay, they weren't confident in his defense at short. And on Monday he made his fourth error since he joined the Orioles.

Ugh. It's customary among sportswriters at a point like this to talk about "inconsistency," particularly if one can relate it to "youngsters." But the truth is, they're being very consistent: they're a bad team, consistently losing about 55% of their games. And they were this consistent when they were old and now that they're young. Today the failures came from pitching, but not just young pitching. The rookie starter was bad; the veteran reliever was bad. The offense, while solid, couldn't bail the team out, and so the Orioles lost, 10-5, dropping their record against the Royals for the season to 1-5.

• The good: The Orioles put together a decent offense again, with 12 hits and 4 walks.
• Brook Fordyce continued his great hitting with a 3-hit game, including a double and a homer (for the second straight game).
• Melvin Mora too continued his hot hitting, with a 2-hit game to raise his average to .431, and Jerry Hairston chipped in 2 hits of his own.
• A day after we criticized Chris Richard's lack of offense, he responded with two home runs.
• The bad and the ugly: the pitching. Newly acquired "prospect" Leslie Brea, making an emergency start in place of Pat Rapp (who had to leave the team on a family emergency) was terrible, giving up 6 runs on 7 hits and a walk in just 3 1/3 innings.
• BJ Ryan, unfortunately, still doesn't seem to have turned things around, as he pitched an inning and gave up a run -- though at least it was just one mistake, a solo homer allowed to Mike Sweeney. That's in contrast to the next guy...
• Chuck McElroy -- ugh. 3 2/3 innings, 3 runs allowed on 6 hits and 3 walks? And now his ERA is up to 6.31.
• The extremely ugly: Leslie Brea's post-game announcement that he's five years older than originally thought, turning him from a prospect into a punchline, and leaving the Orioles with only one injury-prone prospect to show for all of their firesale.

Well, that was something of a wild game, to say the least. Winning ugly is better than losing, but it's still ugly. To have your starting pitcher pitch badly (5 runs allowed in 5.2 IP), but leave with a 9-5 lead, only to see the bullpen blow it, and then to come back in the ninth inning and pick up a win, well, it's not the way you want to see the team play. But as we said, a 12-11 victory over the Royals is better than losing 12-11 to the Royals. And the offense is nice, particularly seeing home runs from the slumping Albert Belle.

• The good: Ryan Kohlmeier, again, is strong, a scoreless outing for a save. He could of course go bad -- after all, look at BJ Ryan after a strong start -- but still, so can veterans, as we have seen all too frequently. So why spend lots of money on a pitcher who might go bad? Let's let our youngsters play.
• Brook Fordyce: we still don't understand why the Orioles acquired him, but he continues to hit well, with his third homer.
• Three hits from Melvin Mora. Wow. Anybody can get hot for a short time, and it has only been two weeks, but wow.
• Two hits from Jerry Hairston and Delino DeShields, and Belle, including a homer which turned out to be the game winner.
• The bad: John Parrish coming back to earth? We're willing to be patient, of course, but we hope he can get back to the form he showed earlier.
• Chris Richard: while Mora's been hot, Richard has been cold, as another 0-3 drops his average to .229. And Luis Matos and Ryan Minor continue not to hit.
• The ugly: The bullpen, back to its old self. Trombley's ERA is now up to 5.21, and Buddy Groom, who has been strong, wasn't effective either, as they gave up a combined 6 runs in just 2 innings of work.

Did we say one step forward, one step back? We meant two steps back. Not only are they not winning, but they're not playing well. Now even ace Mike Mussina is having trouble, as, for the second straight start, he gave up 7 runs without getting out of the 7th inning. Each time the Orioles scored a run, he gave it right back, and ultimately he and the Orioles lost the game 7-6 to the Royals. And now they're tied with the Devil Rays for last place, and only four teams in baseball have a worse record. Since the Orioles have already written off the season, why should we care? Well, for one thing, because losing isn't fun. More importantly, because their continued losing will probably be taken by Peter Angelos as a sign that he was right to insist on keeping veterans around. That's not the right lesson to draw, but Angelos doesn't seem to be all that bright when it comes to baseball.

• The good: Delino DeShields continues his hot hitting, with a 3 hit game, falling a HR short of a cycle.
• Jerry Hairston, in his first major league plate appearance of the year, homered.
• Melvin Mora was on base twice, as was Jeff Conine.
• The bad: Mike Mussina. 6.2 innings, 11 hits -- including the 3 HRs -- and 7 runs.
• The offense other than DeShields and Hairston.

Roster moves: as we noted above, Jerry Hairston is back in the majors. To make room, Ivanon Coffie, who was fighting for playing time with Ryan Minor, was sent back to Rochester. Coffie has outplayed Minor, but neither one has played very well this year -- not that 50 ABs is a fair test -- but given Minor's age and lack of options left, the Orioles feel the need to evaluate him and make a final determination. We could have told you two years ago (Hey, wait, we did) that he wasn't a major league prospect, but they're still trying to figure it out. Meanwhile, although Brady Anderson's wrist appears to be okay, Alan Mills is being put on the disabled list, and newly acquired Lesli Brea is being called up to replace him. Finally, we wanted to note the bad news: one-time super prospct Calvin Pickering needs surgery and is now out for the season and for at least six months. His future in the organization is in doubt, even though Syd Thrift says the right thing: that it's not fair to judge a player while hurt.

Baseball America has come out with their annual "Tools" issue, in which they survey coaches and managers in each league to create a list of which players have the best tools. They select the top 2-5 players in each category in the American League, National League, AAA, AA, and A. The Orioles' pickings this year were quite sparse, as Mike Mussina (no surprise) was the only major league Oriole to get a mention: Best Curveball, and Best Control (third best). In the minors, the Orioles' showing wasn't much better, for all the hype given to Pat Gillick and Frank Wren for supposedly rebuilding the farm. At the AAA level, Josh Towers was recognized as having the Best Control, Jerry Hairston was named the Best Defensive Second Baseman, and Ryan Minor was named Best Defensive Third Baseman. Nobody at Bowie (AA) got even a mention. Finally, at A ball , John Stephens was listed under Best Control (second best) and Willie Harris (at Delmarva) was named fifth best Defensive Second Baseman.

Ex-Orioles had a much better showing, with Roberto Alomar, David Wells, and in the NL, Kevin Brown showing up numerous times, and with Jamie Moyer, Armando Benitez, Rafael Palmeiro, David Segui, Mark Parent, and the recently traded Charles Johnson also getting mentions. We don't know about you, but we'd be awfully embarassed to be running a team that let two of the top pitchers in baseball, Wells and Brown, get away for nothing because of personality conflicts. But isn't that what our complaint about the Orioles always is -- that they don't make decisions based on performance?

And speaking of ex-Orioles, a couple seem to be having legal difficulties. There's Manny Alexander, who is being sought by the police for steroid posession. And also catcher Lenny Webster, best known to Orioles fans as the guy who didn't chase a passed ball in the 1997 playoffs, allowing Marquis Grissom to score the winning run from third base, is in a bit of trouble, and not just for his bad hitting and defense. Unlike Ivan Rodriguez, this is the only time Lenny'll ever be accused of "having a gun."

Ouch. One step forward, one step back. A day after playing a well-rounded game against the Tigers, the Orioles wrapped up their four-game series by getting slaughtered, 14-3. Nothing went right -- not the offense, not the starting pitching, not the bullpen. Sidney Ponson was hit hard, continuing his erratic season where he has flashed brilliance in some starts but then pitched Drabekly in others. And the bullpen? Jason Johnson and BJ Ryan, who had each pitched well their last couple of outings, pitched awfully today. And the offense? Missing in Action.

• The good: Well, Delino DeShields went 2-3 with a homer and 2 RBI. That's about it, really.
• The bad: the entire offense, which managed just 4 hits outside of DeShields.
• Ponson, who went just 4 innings, allowing 6 runs on 7 hits and 3 walks, took the Orioles out of the game early.
• The bullpen made sure that the Orioles couldn't get back in, as Johnson and Ryan combined to allow 8 runs (6 earned) in just 3 innings of work, allowing 10 baserunners while striking out just 3.
• The ugly: three errors by the defense, including one by Trenidad Hubbard, Brady Anderson's defensive replacement after he injured himself and had to leave the game.

Roster moves coming? As noted, Brady Anderson hurt his wrist diving for a ball yesterday; his status is unknown. Alan Mills may go on the DL. What this does for the planned move of Jason Johnson to the rotation is uncertain. Also, with Jason Johnson's awful outing yesterday, are the Orioles really prepared to give him another shot right now? And of course Albert Belle has a sore hip which has bothered him for about six weeks now. Gee, what happens when you sign older players? Could it be that they get banged up more?

The way a baseball game is supposed to go for a good team: strong starting pitching, strong relief pitching, and a solid offense. It's a formula that will always work, and it did again on Wednesday. We don't know what's gotten into Jose Mercedes lately, but we like it, as he had his fifth straight strong start to maintain his position as the only Oriole starter with a winning record. The Orioles didn't hit homers, but managed 11 hits -- two of which demonstrated a new feature of the Orioles -- speed -- as Melvin Mora and Luis Matos each legged out a triple, and the Orioles beat the Tigers, 5-2.

• The good: Jose Mercedes allowed just two runs on 6 hits through seven innings. To be fair, he was hit somewhat hard, but Comerica Park's spacious dimensions saved him some runs.
• Ryan Kohlmeier continues to impress, as he pitched yet another scoreless inning for his second save.
• New acquisition Brook Fordyce continues to hit well, garnering 3 hits and raising his Oriole average over .430.
• Melvin Mora also hasn't slowed down, with a two hit game (including a triple) to raise his average to almost .450.
• Ryan Minor and Delino DeShields chipped in multihit games of their own, and every Oriole except Chris Richard reached safely at least once.
• The bad: Hey, it was a good day. Admittedly it only against the weak Tigers (but then, the Tigers are better than the Orioles, so we shouldn't make fun of them), so we have nothing bad to report.

More personnel news: the Orioles have announced that once Alan Mills, battling a sore shoulder, is healthy -- thus taking some pressure off the bullpen -- Jason Johnson will be moved from the pen to the starting rotation, taking Pat Rapp's spot, and leaving Rapp either to be waived, traded, or demoted to the bullpen. Seems awfully strange to us for Hargrove to make such an announcement a day after Rapp finally has a decent outing. And it seems pretty strange to announce that you're going to cut a guy soon, no matter what happens on the field. How exactly is that supposed to make Rapp feel?

Unfortunately, good pitching isn't enough to win baseball games. You need to score runs, too. The Orioles never seem to realize this, but it's true. Trust us on this one. And since the series of firesale trades, with the exception of two 10-run explosions the Orioles really haven't been scoring runs. Tuesday night was no exception, as the Orioles managed just one run against the Detroit Tigers (admittedly, it was against their ace Brian Moehler), and so despite Pat Rapp's best pitching outing in a month, the Orioles lost to the Tigers, 4-1.

• The good: new shortstop Melvin Mora continues to be hot, bumping his average to .444 with a 4 hit evening.
• New catcher Brook Fordyce adds a multihit game of his own.
• Pat Rapp, probably pitching for his starting job, goes 7 innings and allows just 3 earned runs.
• The bad: the rest of the team didn't do very much, as the other seven batters recorded just two singles.

As noted, Erickson had Tommy John surgery on his elbow on Tuesday. The surgery was described as "successful," but as Bill James once noted, have you ever heard a baseball player's surgery described any other way? The surgery leaves a gaping hole in the Orioles' 2001 pitching rotation, especially with uncertainty surrounding Mike Mussina's return. We know it's foolish to think the Orioles won't go out and spend money on veteran pitchers (despite Peter Angelos' recent statement, "I don't believe you can build a winner through free agency alone... The key is the farm system."), but if they do so choose, some Rochester pitchers are doing well right now, including new acquisition Anthony Shumaker.

Young pitchers shuts down team, young player drives in winning run late in game. For a change, that applies not to the Orioles' opponents, but to the Orioles themselves, and excitement is in the air. Rookie starter John Parrish wasn't as strong as he had been in his first two starts, walking 5 in just 5 1/3 innings while striking out only 2, but he kept the Orioles in the game by allowing just 2 runs, and he wowed fans with a dazzling pickoff double play in the first. Late in the game it was tied, but thanks to Carlos Casimiro's sacrifice fly and Ryan Kohlmeier's pitching, the Orioles beat the Tigers, 4-3.

• The good: John Parrish. There hasn't been a player to be this excited about since, well, since Sidney Ponson. A youngster -- a real youngster, not a 27 year old one that the GM pretends is a youngster -- living up to his minor league promise.
• Also, Ryan Kohlmeier, picking up his first major league save and running his scoreless innings streak to 6.
• The bad: the Orioles didn't dump all the old mediocrities, and one of the veterans they kept was Mike Trombley, who blew the save after coming in to relieve Parrish. When will the Orioles learn that signing "Proven Veterans" provides no more guarantees than letting the youngsters play?

On Sunday we heard about Cal Ripken's health issues. Today, an update on Scott Erickson. It seems that healthy pitchers generally do not have ERAs resembling airplane models. So when Scott Erickson's reached 7.87, the Orioles finally deduced that there was a problem. Now, they know what the problem is: he needs Tommy John surgery. It's will keep him out for at least a year, meaning he can't be expected back before 2002. Unfortunately, he's signed through 2003. Insurance will pick up 60% of his salary next year, but that's still an awful lot of money to pay for nothing. Obviously there's no way to know whether the decision to rush him back from March's surgery to correct his 1999 season-ending injury had any impact on this injury, but it couldn't have helped. And why did it take team officials so long to notice that he was hurt? Because, as a veteran, his struggles were ignored in favor of cliches like "He's a second-half pitcher." As usual, the Orioles weren't making decisions based on performance.

Finally, after much debate in Rochester among management, the Red Wings decided to renew their long-running affiliation with the Orioles for another two years. Red Wings officials had been upset with the Orioles for the same reason Orioles fans had been: the accurate perception that the Orioles, major players in the free agent market, could not care less about minor leaguers.

In related news, the Orioles re-inked Jim Corsi to a minor league deal to fill the Rochester closer role, vacant since the Orioles called up Kohlmeier and dumped Gabe Molina.

Well, we're back after a long hiatus for personal reasons, and we hope to never leave again. When we left, the Orioles were a bad old team that couldn't even beat the weaker teams in the league. Now? A bad team with some bad young players thrown in, who can't beat the weaker teams in the league. A 4-game winning streak last week seemed nice, but dropping 2 of 3 games to the Devil Rays makes the Orioles look more like the same old team. From the first inning, Mike Mussina wasn't sharp, the offense wasn't productive, and the Orioles lost to the Devil Rays, 7-4. Two gopherballs served up by Mussina in the third inning gave the Devil Rays a lead they never relinquished, and after Chris Richard's homer in the fourth, the Orioles didn't seriously threaten again.

• The good: Well, new acquisitions Chris Richard and Melvin Mora both recorded their first Oriole home runs. Richard's was one of three hits he recorded, including a double, while Melvin Mora continued his hot hitting with 2 hits, keeping his average over .400 as an Oriole.
• Two hit games from Jeff Conine and Albert Belle, who seems to have turned things around now that July is over.
• BJ Ryan had his second successful outing since returning from Rochester. Okay, it's not much, but given how badly he was pitching before his demotion, it's a good sign.
• The bad: Mike Mussina had a bad game. He's certainly entitled to a bad game every now and then, especially considering his near perfect game last outing, but given this team, Mussina pitching well is one of the few things we have to look forward to.

Now that the trading deadline has passed, and the Orioles have finally given up hope of contending this year, what's left to talk about? Well, the possibly impending return of Cal Ripken, perhaps. He's still several weeks away, assuming he has no setbacks, though. And Oriole fans have to ask themselves another question: do we want to see him return? Should we remember him as Cal Ripken, star, or Cal Ripken, hobbled veteran on his last legs?