Projecting the Orioles’ roster for opening day,
Baltimore Orioles manager Brandon Hyde has his first chance to have all of his players in one place, and when the team breaks camp in four weeks and heads north to begin the season in Boston, his opening day roster will be set.
As with everything about this rebuilding club, 2021 will be about focusing on the future. But there’s not much room for those considerations when it comes to building a big-league roster for the present.
There are plenty of ways Hyde and executive vice president and general manager Mike Elias can put together the Orioles this spring, but they’ll always be guided by a few principles that have emerged over the past few years.
For starters, they aren’t going to rush a prospect to the big leagues before he’s truly ready, meaning it’s unlikely there are going to be any debuts on April 1 in Boston. They also won’t take a nonroster player unless they have to; every player they add to the roster often means someone has to come off it.
With all that in mind, here’s a forecast of what the Orioles’ 26-man roster could look like on opening day with a little more than four weeks left in spring training.
Catchers (2): Pedro Severino, Chance Sisco
Not a lot of intrigue to this group this spring, especially with top prospect Adley Rutschman spending the majority of his time at the minor league complex thus far and not really even training with the big leaguers.
In the interim, Severino and Sisco will each get another chance to solidify himself as Rutschman’s future catching partner behind the plate.
Infielders (6): Trey Mancini, Yolmer Sánchez, Freddy Galvis, Rio Ruiz, Chris Davis, Pat Valaika
This group will be relatively straightforward as long as everyone stays healthy, with Davis giving up the everyday firstbase role to Mancini, who moves in from the outfield. Valaika, who played shortstop at times last year, would have to cover all of the other infield positions as a backup.
Sánchez and Galvis will be the everyday middle infielders to replace
José Iglesias and Hanser Alberto, and Hyde will hope that he can call on
Galvis at shortstop more often than he could the injury-hampered Iglesias.
Outfielders (5): Anthony Santander, Ryan Mountcastle, Cedric Mullins, Austin Hays, DJ Stewart
Hyde said Monday that there was going to be an open competition between Hays and Mullins in center field, and that’s the only real question with this group, even if it’s a deep one. It’s not time for Yusniel Diaz or Ryan McKenna yet.
Mountcastle will likely be the everyday left fielder,
Santander will be a fixture in right field and whoever isn’t the starter in center field will be some kind of super sub, with the corner starters also strong candidates to be the designated hitter.
Stewart ended 2020 well enough that he should have an inside track to be a bench bat who also starts as the designated hitter against right-handers, but his spot is likely contingent on the Orioles keeping 13 or 14 pitchers. He’d be a luxury if they kept 13, and would be considered a hard-luck exclusion if they
went with 14.
Starting pitchers (5): John Means, Dean Kremer, Keegan Akin, Félix Hernández, Matt Harvey
It’s not often that the Orioles can boast such a rotation full of interesting pitchers who, whether out of enjoyment, hope for the future or simple curiosity, are worth tuning in to watch. But this group fits that bill.
Means will likely be the opening day starter, and barring a disastrous spring or injury, Kremer and
Akin will be behind him in the rotation. Likewise, just by virtue of being with the Orioles, it seems as if veterans Harvey and Hernández could have an inside track to making the team.
If the Orioles are able to get either back to even half their peak selves, they’ll be valuable at just $1 million apiece. There are a lot of checkpoints to get there, and someone like Wade LeBlanc could push them for that spot.
So too could Jorge López or Bruce Zimmermann, who could easily make the team as bulk-inning options.
But there’s a better chance the Orioles get short-term value from Harvey and Hernández, so that’s likely how they’d have it lined up now if all goes well this spring.
Relief pitchers (8): Tanner Scott, Shawn Armstrong, Paul Fry, Dillon Tate, César Valdez, Cole Sulser, Travis Lakins, Hunter Harvey
Hyde is hoping for his relievers to all be able to pitch multiple innings this spring to prepare for what will be a challenging year for the pitching staff, and how that goes will probably decide the makeup of the bullpen. Scott, Armstrong, Fry, Tate and Harvey are the fixtures.
Valdez will be stretched out to possibly be a starter or long reliever, but that length will still be useful out of the bullpen. Sulser was often asked to pitch two innings last year and can cover that, and Lakins could do the same.
If Hyde doesn’t feel as if he can count on this group for length, someone like Lakins or even Harvey might have to wait his turn in the minors while a long reliever like Zimmermann, López, LeBlanc or Thomas Eshelman breaks camp with the team.
López is out of minor league options, so if the Orioles don’t want to expose him to waivers, he’ll have to be kept on the roster for opening day.
MIAMI — NBA Commissioner Adam Silver has heard all the reasons why the league should not have an All-Star Game in Atlanta next weekend.
He has two reasons why the league should: the fans and the game’s economy.
Silver, in an interview with The Associated Press, said the fact that about 100 million votes were cast by fans for All-Star starters shows that the people who follow the game globally wanted the league’s midseason showcase to be played. And the league, he said, didn’t want to disappoint them.
“It’s the largest factor, the amount of engagement we get from our fans around All-Star,” Silver said.
Players have raised some questions about why the game is necessary and the risks involved in playing it during a pandemic. The league has said it will fly players into Atlanta privately, keep them in a hotel for one night, play the game on March 7 and fly them back out again immediately afterward. They believe that plan, combined with ongoing daily testing and with no outside All-Star events, will minimize risks.
“We know we can’t eliminate risk completely,” Silver said. “We never can in a pandemic.”
The NBA has touted the game’s global reach for years and All-Star is no exception, with the game to be shown in more than 200 countries and broadcast in about 40 languages. The league expects 1 billion video views on social media from the events on March 7 as well.
“For a league that doesn’t have a neutral-site championship series historically, the focus typically is having an opportunity during our season to bring the entire community together,” Silver said. “Of course, we don’t have the opportunity to do that in person this year. But the NBA community is 99% virtual. It’s a global community on social media, representing close to 1.9 billion people who are engaged with us. There fact that there won’t be the traditional receptions and parties and fan events — and we’ll sadly miss them — it won’t change the experience for the largest portion of our fans.”
There is a financial element as well, and Silver has not hidden from that.
He said last week that Turner Sports, a league broadcast partner, wanted the game to happen in Atlanta, where the network is headquartered — and that indeed is where the game is taking place. The league held last season’s final regular-season games and the entirety of the playoffs at Walt Disney World in Lake
Buena Vista, Florida; Disney owns ESPN, another league broadcast partner.
“My personal view is very few people do anything just for the money,” Silver said. “But at the same time, while we’re clearly in a health emergency in this country, we’re also in the midst of an economic crisis and that extends to the NBA as well. There are tens of thousands of people who are dependent on the NBA for their livelihoods. So, for those who say we’re doing it for the money, they could say the same thing about our entire operation, about the fact that we’re even playing our season.”
The league missed revenue projections last season by about $1.5 billion, and revenues will be down again this season largely because of fewer games and far fewer fans in buildings. Most arenas are empty for games; those that aren’t empty are playing to capacities 80% to 90% below normal.
Silver addressed some other issues with AP, including:
Pandemic season
The league has gotten about 95% of its scheduled games played in the season’s first half, with 29 called off for reasons related to the coronavirus pandemic. A handful of other games were called off after the ice storm that crippled Texas earlier this month.
Silver said the league went into this season knowing some games would be postponed, and said he’s pleased that almost all games have happened as scheduled. He also touted the success of the league’s protocols regarding health and safety and how they’ve evolved as the season goes along.
Expansion
Silver said he continues to believe expansion of the league is “inevitable,” but said there is no timetable, either officially or in his head about when that will happen.
It remains on the backburner and it would not be appropriate to expand right now, given where our focus is on trying to work through this season. All our attention is on getting the business back to being fully operable as quickly as possible.”