I have determined that I must be the World’s Strangest Fan.  I am once again saddened by the departure of a member of “My Team.”

Luis Matos has been designated for reassignment.  There was never a doubt that this would happen someday, but I am never happy when the day finally comes.  He was never a great outfielder, never really hit for average or power.  You really aren’t going to do well in the Beast that is the AL East with players like Luis.  None of that mattered to me.  Every time I had the opportunity to speak with him, he seemed like he was genuinely happy to respond.  We saw him last year with his hand still bandaged from breaking it during a bunt attempt, running the ramps at Camden Yards.  We asked him how his hand was, and he slowed down, turned and smiled, and said it was getting better and he hoped to be back soon.  He could have kept going and yelled “Fine” over his shoulder, but he didn’t.  I don’t have great expectations for civility from professional athletes, so all it takes is a little courtesy to push one of them into my “Top Fourty.”

I don’t understand why, and it seems sort of un-American, but for me it’s not about winning and losing.  Of course I want my favorite team to win, but that isn’t the most important thing to me.  I like to watch baseball players play baseball.  I believe that most of them come to the ballpark every day and do the best that they can.  Some are better than others and, honestly, some try harder than others.

There have been many players who have come and gone in the last couple of years and they will soon be more to follow.  I won’t miss some of them, but several of them, although not stars, made my trips to Camden Yards more enjoyable.

I will admit that I would cringe every time Matos came to bat this year, but I didn’t want him to leave – I just wanted him to get better.

Goodbye Luis, and may you find success wherever you go from here.

Ninth inning.  Scored tied.  Markakis on first, no outs.  Your .300 hitter, Brian Roberts, sacrifice bunts, and moves him to second.  Matos strikes out.  Two outs.  With first base open, they intentionally walk Tejada.  Hernandez strikes out.  Inning over. No runs scored.

OK, that plan didn’t work.

Eleventh inning..  Scored tied.  Markakis on first, no outs.  Your .300 hitter, Brian Roberts, sacrifice bunts, and moves him to second.  Matos strikes out.  Two outs.  With first base open, they intentionally walk Tejada.  Hernandez strikes out.  Inning over.  No runs scored.

Score for the entire game – 3 sacrifice bunts – ZERO runs scored.

Final result – game lost.

I’m making a rare weeknight entry partially because I got home from work at a reasonable time, and partially because I can’t believe what I’m hearing.

On Sunday, with the Orioles leading the Yankees by a score of 10-4, Corey Patterson stole second, and then third. Larry Bowa yelled something to him about playing the game correctly.  Corey had violated part of the “Unwritten Law” that says you don’t steal with a big lead.  It’s now Tuesday, and ESPN is still talking about it.

Hello out there – this was against the New York Yankees!!!!! They had just scored 4 runs in the top of the 7^th! This is the same New York Yankees that scored 7 runs the next night in the second inning against Josh Beckett!  The Oriole’s bullpen isn’t exactly Josh Beckett.  Their ERA is about 40.00. Six runs, with 2 Yankee at bats to go, is not a big lead.  I was paying careful attention, and I didn’t see Joe Torre waving a while flag.

Maybe we should have more parts to the Unwritten Law.  How about adding to page 2, paragraph 4, section 5 – “No breaking balls with a big lead”? How about putting on page 12 – “No diving for catches if your team has more than a 5 run lead.”?  Or maybe – “If you team is ahead by 6 runs, you must strike out until they catch up.”

OK – those may be a little extreme, but shouldn’t we at least ban the changeup?

I have received a few e-mails asking me “Where have you been?”  Well, there have been several reasons that I have been absent from Blogdom for a while – work, life, Daddy Duty (band stuff), and the need for a little “down time”, have all contributed to a lack of postings.

But the main reason I haven’t posted is because I have had nothing to say that someone hasn’t said already.

You would have to read all of my previous posts (including the archives) in order to understand my position on all of this, but my purpose here was not to chronicle the season, nor to win the “Most Prolific Blogger” Award.  This Blog thing is a hobby for me, and unfortunately there are only so many hours in a day.

I have posted comments to the Baltimore Sun, and sent an e-mail or two to the local sports reporters, but when I sit down to write something to post, I write it, read it, and say “who cares?”

I do wish the Os were playing better, but around here (at least according the people who are the most vocal) the solution is always to go get some better players and for Angelos to sell the team.  A few days ago, I posted the following comment to Roch Kubatko’s Blog on the Baltimore Sun’s site (BTW – Roch (pronounced Rock) is a Sun sports reporter):

I just don’t get it.

The 1971 Orioles had 4 twenty game winners.  The team was full of some of the most beloved Orioles of all time.  If you ask any Oriole’s fan to name 10 of the greatest Orioles, most of them were on this club.  Peter Angelos was not around. 

Baltimore loved that team.  According to most of the things I hear and read, the reason people don’t go to O’s games now is because they don’t have the things that the ’71 Orioles had – a winning team, All Star players, great pitching, and no Angelos.

If that’s true, then why did the Orioles average less than 13,000 for home games and didn't even sell out Memorial Stadium for games 6 and 7 of the World Series that year?

I received a single response – We had the Colts back then.

I still don’t get it.

Just wanted to say “thanks” to all the Moms, and hope you all have a wonderful day.

Roberts – DL

Newhan – DL

Javy Lopez – DL

Matos – DL (back as of yesterday)

Millar – Day to Day (but back now)

Tejada – Relegated to DH, but should really be sitting.

In a single inning last Saturday, Sam Perlozzo made 7 substitutions, most due to injury.  You know it looks bad when the infield is:

3^rd – Backup Outfielder (Conine)

SS – Utility Infielder (Gomez)

2^nd – Your 3^rd baseman (Mora)

1^st – Your starting catcher (Hernandez)

And then on Sunday – “Starting at Shortstop, substituting for your All-Star, MVP of last year’s All Star Game, former AL MVP, League leading hitter Miguel Tejada, is Brandon Fahey.  I may have been the only person in the stadium who knew who he was.  If you have read my Blog before, you already know that I am a Fahey fan, but last September I saw him playing for the Bowie Baysoxs in AA.  At one point in Sunday’s game, there were 3 players who I watched 8 months ago in Bowie.  At least the tickets are cheaper there, and parking is free.

The bad news is that the Os lost, and even though Fahey went 2 for 4 and made an amazing defensive play, the highlight that made it to ESPN was his strikeout in the 9^th.

The good news was that it was a great day for a ballgame, and because my family was in  Florida, I had the chance to go to the game with 2 good friends.

From where I sit, the good was far better than the bad.

The Arundel High School Music Department has been crowned Overall Grand Champions of the Festival Music Competition in Orlando, Florida.  Marching Band, Concert Band, Jazz Band, Guard, the Percussion Ensemble, and two choral groups all won Grand Championships in their events.  They were the Grand Champions in every event that they entered.

None of these kids will be getting $25 Million signing bonuses.  You won’t see their faces on ESPN.  You won’t even see an article in the Baltimore newspaper, but nobody works harder than these kids.  The Marching Band and Guard start working in mid-summer, in the heat and humidity of Maryland, with 8 hour a day practices.  After school starts, they practice 3 hours a night as a group.  This doesn’t count the time each one of them spends at home practicing their individual instruments.

My youngest daughter is a member of several of the AHS bands, and I couldn’t be prouder.

Rain, rain, don’t go away,

We’ll play again some other day.

A win against the Yankees is like no other win.  They are the best franchise in the history of professional sports.  You know every position player in their line up and they are all great ballplayers.  They have no weakness.  Every batter can beat you, and probably has at some point.  The Yankees are the standard of excellence.  Love ‘em or hate ‘em, you have to respect ‘em.  They are who you want to be.

The Yankees jump out in the lead.  The Os go with three when Wang turns into Cabrera and can’t find the strike zone.  The Yankees go ahead.  The Os do it again.  The Yankees pull within one.

A one run lead, bottom of the ninth, bases loaded, 2 outs, the count is 3-2, and 51,000 screaming Yankee fans are on their feet.  Chris Ray, a rookie closer with a 96 mile an hour fastball, is facing Hideki Matsui.  Buck Martinez, who you know is an honest broker because he was the manager of Team USA in the WBC, has been saying throughout the game that you never get the close ball/strike calls in Yankee Stadium, but honestly the strike zone has looked pretty random all night.

Everybody knows what’s coming.  Ray is going to reach back and throw the best fastball of his life.  He will use the adrenaline of the situation and find a way to get a couple more miles per hour.  The only question is where Matsui will hit it.  The runners are off with the pitch, and Ray throws a SLIDER!  My heart sinks into my stomach as the ball breaks towards the outside corner.  Matsui is called out looking!  It could have been called either way, but in this game, that pitch was a strike.

At this stage of the season, this was not a big defeat for the Yankees, but it was a big win for the Orioles.  On this April night, they beat the best.

We just got back from the Os/Angels game, and, once again, had a great time.  It was a great day for a ballgame.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t such a good ballgame,

I watch a lot of baseball, and this was one of the strangest games I have seen.  Tejada was on first.  Javy Lopez hits a ball to center field.  The center fielder leaps, and comes back down on the warning track.  The umpires make NO SIGN.  Was it a home run?  Did he catch it?  I guess after waiting for 5 minutes, that Tejada figures he must have caught it, so he goes back to first.  Still NO SIGN.  Lopez actually runs into him on first.  Still NO SIGN.  Lopez passes him on the basepath.  Finally a sign.  It was out of the park, but since Javy passed Tejada, he was called out.  Shouldn’t there be some sort of 24 second clock for umpires?

Back to the season.  So far, so good.

The Os are 7 and 6 and have shown some promising signs.  Last year it seemed like if they were behind after the seventh inning that the game was over.  They have already had 2 ninth inning wins this year.

Except for Cabrera, who has walked more batters than the rest of the AL East combined (OK, a slight exaggeration), the starting pitching has been fair, and, although it doesn’t seem like it, the bullpen is at least as good as it was this time last year.

Yesterday, Melvin Mora said he was going to hit Cabrera in the ribs, so that he wouldn’t try to throw so hard.

No one in the AL East is scary yet.  As expected, the Yankees are scoring a lot of runs, but 30 of them were against the Royals (which is only slightly over their average Runs Allowed), and Rivera has blown more saves (1) than Papelbon, Ray, and B.J Ryan all put together.  Last year, they were changing their starting lineup almost every day trying to get the right mix.  This year, the starting lineup is about as good as they are going to get.  If it doesn’t get the job done, it doesn’t look like they have many other options.

Shilling and Beckett are looking very good, and even though they are giving up a lot of hits, Randy Johnson and Mussina seem to be on track.  The Blue Jay’s one-two of Halladay and Burnett doesn’t look great right now, but it’s too early to judge.  It would be nice if Burnett could stay healthy for the rest of the year, so we can see how good he really is.  For the Devil Rays, Kazmir hasn’t looked good, and it’s a shame Hendrickson is on the DL.

The Devil Rays have the same record as the Yankees against the Royals (3-0), and if they ever get all of their injured players back, I think they will win a lot of ballgames.  Even when they lose, they are an exciting team to watch.  I’m glad the Os had them for 6 games early this year, and maybe they will be back to something resembling fill strength when they play the rest of the AL East teams.

It’s hard to comment objectively about the Red Sox.  After all, they did sweep the O’s in week one, so anything I say will sound like “sour grapes.  They just don’t look like they are about to run away with it yet, but I think Manny will hit better than .205 and average more than 2 RBIs in 11 games.

I haven’t seen much of the Blue Jays, and I’m not a big believer in trying to judge much from box scores.

It’s been fun so far, and it looks like it will only get better.  Cabrera starts tomorrow, and it can only be entertaining.  Luckily, the Yankees get a much needed day off.

It seems to me that teams with losing records should start their seasons against weak teams, and get a lot of time off in April when the weather is cold, and you need to protect your pitching staff. If nothing else, it would give you a chance to rest your bullpen.

It would be nice to have your home opening series against a team that not only has finished last in their division for years, but is predicted to do so again this year.  It would be especially nice if they had only won, let’s say for example, 56 games last year.

I’m sure MLB takes all of this into consideration when they make the schedule. After all, they want a competitive season and a more or less level playing field.

So let’s see – which team gets to not only have their home opening series against the team with the worse record in baseball for the last 2 years, but also gets 5 days off in April to rest up from the battle?

Is it the lowly Orioles?  How about the Tigers or the Mariners or the Devil Rays, or even the Rangers or the Blue Jays? Nope – it is the poor Yankees.  Guess they need all the help they can get.

There are several things going on here in MLBlogdom that cry out for comment, but after taking a deep breath, I have decided to write about what I really care about – the game.

Having a day to reflect, the Orioles outfield looks like it is in the same situation that second base was a couple of years ago.  Back then, both Brian Roberts and Jerry Hairston were O’s second basemen. Hairston always looked like he was the leading candidate, but a couple of fluke injuries kept Roberts around. Neither one was great – both were adequate.  When both were healthy, it was like they were both always looking over their shoulders, wondering what would happen if they went 0 for 4 that day.  They were great friends, and even live near each other and train together in the off season. That obviously didn’t make it any easier.

Last year, the Os traded Hairston to the Cubs as part of a deal for Sammy Sosa.  Roberts was now the second baseman.  I don’t know what would have happened if they had traded Roberts instead, but staying here as “The Man” certainly seemed to work for him.  When it didn’t matter if he went 0 for 4, he didn’t.  He knew that no matter what happened on any given day, he would be back in the starting lineup tomorrow.  He had an All Star season.

The O’s outfield looks the same way.  In my role as amateur manager, I would pick 3 guys, tell them that they are my starting outfield, and go with them. Let them hit against both right hand and left hand starting pitching. Give them each a day off every week or so just to rest them, but let them know they will be back in their position the next day.

I’m glad I don’t have to make the decision, if for no other reason than the fact I’m not qualified to do so, but someone should. Gibbons owns right field.  Pick 2 others and give them the jobs. Don’t tell them that it is their job to lose. Tell them that it is their job.  It’s a long season. The others will get a chance to play.

Baseball is not an 0 for 4 sport.  In the heat of the moment, I forgot that yesterday. Last year Mora started 0 for twentysomething.  In his rookie year, Cal Ripken was 1 for a month.  The last time the Yankees started 1 and 4, they went on to win 114 games.  I reserve the right to revisit my decision in May.

I don't remember if I posted this sometime in the past, and even I won't read all of my old stuff just to find out, but......

At one of the Orioles/Nationals games in Spring Training last year, when Sammy Sosa was introducec, the young man in the seat next to me jumped to his feet, stood on the seat and yelled "Sosa - you S***!  You don't deserve to wear the uniform!"

Sosa fouled off the first pitch.  It went on top of the pressbox, and came back down directly into the young man's hands.  Coincidence?  I think not.  I think the baseball gods have a sense of humor.  BTW - he looked at me, and I looked at him.  After a while I said "You really can't keep that ball."  I thought he would give it to my daughter, but he choose to throw it back on the field.

It has been a busy week for the part of my family that lives in Baltimore.  As a group, we have been to 11 baseball games (3 of us at 1 game counts as 3), a lacrosse game, a track meet, and a High School Band event. The part of the family that lives in California is in Honduras walking through the jungle, so I doubt if he has seen much except snakes and other nasty creatures.

We just got back from the Os-Red Sox game.  In spite of the results, and the fact that it was REALLY cold, we had a good time.

Normally, I try to have coherent thoughts on my postings, but today they may just be a collection of random thoughts.

Just for the fun of it, I tried an experiment. I took along a laptop to try to Blog in real time. Unfortunately, all I could see on the screen was my reflection, so that didn’t work. Maybe I’ll try it again on a rainy day.

The Club Level at Camden Yards only has footlong hotdogs, but they had no footlong hotdog buns.  They were using crusty sub rolls.  Yuck.

Boog’s Barbeque on the Club Level had no beef. All they sell is beef, ham, and turkey. Seems like bad planning not to have beef.  Almost as bad as not having hotdog buns.

BTW – in some parts of the country they are hotdog rolls. In some parts of the country, subs are heros, or hoagies or Poor Boys or grinders. Please insert the proper term….

The Orioles have played 6 games.  In 3 of them, they scored a total of 2 runs (0 runs-1 run-1 run). Does it seem like a good idea to anyone out there, when you have 6 guys competing for outfield positions, that you start 2 guys who are hitting .188 and .100? And then, in the 6^th inning, with a man on first and third and no outs, you let them both bat?  And to add insult to injury, they displayed the wrong stats for one of them every time he came to bat.

I don’t know what it sounded like on TV, but a miraculous thing happened. As I’m sure everyone knows, Camden Yards is really Fenway Park South whenever the Red Sox are in town. On a good day, the split is 50/50.  Today, early in the game, came the expected chant of “Let’s Go Red Sox.” For a change, the O’s fans booed it down.  It happened again, then again, then again. Finally, a mighty noise came from the crowd. From where I was sitting, at first it was unclear, but it became louder and louder and more distinct. Thousands of people, wearing Orioles gear and Red Sox gear, joined as one to raise their voices to the sky and from their lips to God’s ear came the sound of “YANKEES S***, YANKEES S***.” It was almost a religious experience.  My newfound Red Sox friends and I formed a bond that can only come from having a common enemy.

My wife noticed a couple holding a camera, and asked if they would like her to take a picture of them together.  He was wearing Orioles gear.  She was wearing Red Sox gear. The camera didn’t break.

One of my new Red Sox buddies confided in me that, in spite of the fact that he was wearing a Red Sox jersey and baseball cap, he was really a Yankee fan. He just thinks it’s wrong to wear Yankee stuff to a Red Sox/Os game.

My Bowie Baysox are 3-1.  I know they are “my” Bowie Baysox because the announcer tells me so before every game.

The Orioles have now started a “Joke of the Day.”  Today’s joke, delivered by Bruce Chen, was “What do you call a bear with no teeth?”……”A Gummy Bear.”

In spite of the fact that I really, really wanted to, I still couldn’t yell the “O” in the National Anthem.

Oh well, even random thoughts take time, and I had a dream last night that I was a muffler.  I woke up exhausted.  (OK – another Bruce Chen joke.)

There are only a handful of people who really know what has been going on in the negotiations, and none of them are you or me.  I only know what I read and hear, and I have reason to believe that sometimes the media doesn’t get things exactly right.  For example, last month my son’s apartment burned down.  He was interviewed by the local news, but when they aired the interview they got both his first and last name wrong.  If I hadn’t seen the flames in the background, I would have wondered if there really was a fire.  Having said that, I will assume that they have it pretty close this time.

There are two very important parts of any contract: the money and the “Terms and Conditions.”  They don’t seem too far apart on the money, but the Terms and Conditions look like the deal breaker.  Mora wants a “No Trade” clause, and the Os don’t appear to want to give him one.

Issues like “he wants to play here”, “he is a great member of the community”, and “it will make Tejada happy”, are basically irrelevant.  I want to play here, but they won’t let me.  Bea Gaddy was a great member of the community, but no one offered her $8-10 Million a year to provide Thanksgiving dinner to hundreds of needy people.  Buy Tejada a puppy.  The only issue is – do the Orioles want to lock up between $24 and $27 Million for three years on what will then be a 35 year old third baseman?

I hate to keep referencing my own posts, but in January I posted “The Plan”, in which I said that I think the Os have several players at the minor league level on the verge of being major leaguers.  They don’t want to sign a free agent, or make a trade for, someone they have to sign to a long term, expensive, contract that will limit their options for developing, and promoting, the younger players.  Evidently, “The Plan” also applies to existing players.  As much as I would hate to see it, maybe keeping Mora for 4 more years isn’t part of “The Plan.”

But wait!  They signed Millar and Conine and they are both old guys.  They signed them to short term, relatively cheap contracts.  If they both don’t play here next year, at least the Os won’t be saddled with over $20 Million that they still owe them.

Oh yeah, but there is nobody in the minors waiting to play third base!  I realize he’s a shortstop, but Brandon Fahey looked great at Bowie last year, had an excellent Spring Training with the Os, and looks pretty good at Ottawa so far.  OK, to be fair, he’s only played one game.

But the Orioles always do this kind of thing by not locking up great players and the players leave and that’s why the Os don’t win!  Looks like a short list to me.  I don’t think keeping Mussina would have resulted in a couple of World Championships and, so far, I don’t miss B.J Ryan.  BTW – I heard the other day that the Os are still paying both Mussina and Brady Anderson because of deferred payments in their contracts.  Now that seems like bad planning to me.

I miss Larry Bigbie.  I miss Eric Byrnes.  I really miss B.J. Surhoff.  I would miss Melvin Mora and I really hope he stays.  "Pay the Man?"  If I had $30 Million lying around, I would sign him and donate his contract to the Orioles, but even I wouldn’t give him a No Trade clause.