{"id":1433,"date":"2010-06-10T02:43:08","date_gmt":"2010-06-10T02:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beta.mbtn.net\/?p=1433"},"modified":"2013-12-11T02:46:39","modified_gmt":"2013-12-11T02:46:39","slug":"know-your-os","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/?p=1433","title":{"rendered":"Know Your O’s"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"We’re packing up and heading down to Charm City for the weekend to celebrate my birthday and wedding anniversary, and intend to catch Sunday’s Mets-Orioles game at Camden Yards with family down there. If you happen to run into a clown wearing Mets road jersey\u00a0No. 70<\/strong>, it might very well be me. In preparation, I contacted my friend\u00a0Kevin\u00a0<\/strong>in Maryland, whose writing projects include\u00a0NumerOlogy<\/strong>, an mbtn-like review of Orioles history by uniform number (the url is giving my browser trouble right now, so I hesitate to pass it along until I know the problem is fixed); a site celebrating\u00a0various Orioles baseball cards<\/strong><\/a>; and an ambitous collecting project known as\u00a0The Great 1965 Topps Project<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong>\u00a0(The\u00a0Johnny Lewis<\/a>\u00a0card shown here hails from that iconic set. If any of you can help Kevin complete his his ’65 series via trade, please let him know at the site).<\/p>\n

So Kevin knows his stuff, and though his team is having a rough go of it this year, he was a good sport in fielding the following series of questions which hopefully gets you up for the weekend series or at least hungry for steamed blue crabs with plenty of Old Bay (the seasoning<\/a>, not the disappointing Met free agent). Take it away, Kevin!<\/p>\n

MBTN:\u00a0 Juan Samuel once entered in the middle of a Mets season and ruined it. How’s he done for the O’s so far?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Kevin: Ugh. Juan was our third base coach for the past few years, a job that he was quite suited for\u2026as long as the primary goal of a third base coach is getting\u00a0Melvin Mora<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0thrown out at the plate by 20 feet. From what I\u2019ve seen and read in the week since \u201cWindmill\u201d took over for\u00a0Dave Trembley<\/strong>\u00a0as interim manager, he\u2019s making all of the same mistakes as his predecessor: bizarre hit-and-runs, a revolving door approach to the bullpen, batting Julio Lugo leadoff (as opposed to literally anyone else). If there\u2019s a silver lining to the team\u2019s continued failures, it\u2019s that there\u2019s little chance of Samuel being retained as manager. Speaking of ex-Mets though, I hear\u00a0Bobby V<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0is interviewing with the Orioles\u2026<\/p>\n

(ed note: This makes me happy for Bobby and sorry for myself, but is a lot better than his replacing\u00a0Joe Girardi<\/strong>).<\/em><\/p>\n

MBTN: Looks like\u00a0R.A. Dickey<\/a>\u00a0will start Friday and\u00a0Hisanori Takahashi<\/a>\u00a0goes Saturday. How do the O’s hit knuckleballers and lefty junk throwers, respectively?<\/strong><\/p>\n

This one\u2019s easy: they don\u2019t hit knuckleballers, lefty junk throwers, righty junk throwers, ambidextrous pitchers, flamethrowers, sinkerballers, sidearmers, submariners, or even batting practice pitchers. The O\u2019s have scored 193 runs in 58 games (3.3 per game). They\u2019ve been shut out five times, scored a single run 13 times, two runs eight times, and three runs 10 times. Not exactly a formula for winning baseball.<\/p>\n

MBTN: Why is\u00a0Ty Wigginton<\/a>\u00a0your best player? Don’t you have Markakis and Jones and Weiters and Tejada and Scott?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"Kevin: I\u2019m a big fan of Wiggy, from his whimsical name to his hilarious physical appearance to the fact that he\u2019s been the only guy on the team who has been productive for most of the year. As fun as it\u2019s been watching Ty challenge for the league lead in homers, I wish he had a little help.<\/p>\n

Most of the young guys have taken a step backwards for one reason or another. It seems like\u00a0Nolan Reimold<\/strong>\u00a0never fully recovered from offseason ankle surgery, and now he\u2019s at Norfolk trying to figure things out.\u00a0Adam Jones<\/strong>\u00a0was never a patient hitter to begin with, and without any protection in the lineup opposing pitchers are happy to give him junk to swing through. I have the most faith in\u00a0Wieters<\/strong>, who Trembley gave a pretty heavy workload in the early going. Samuel has pledged to give him more time off, and he\u2019s working on shortening his swing for better results. On Tuesday he had his first three-hit game of the season, so he may be turning it around. As far as the vets, I’m afraid\u00a0Tejada\u00a0<\/strong>is getting old and missing his vitamin B-12 and\u00a0Scott\u00a0<\/strong>is the very definition of streaky.\u00a0Markakis\u00a0<\/strong>is still getting on base, but again pitchers aren’t challenging him because the rest of the lineup stinks. Other than that, things are great.
\nMBTN:\u00a0The Mets saw Matusz at least once this spring and couldn’t touch him. Guthrie scares me too. Why don’t these fellows have more wins?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Kevin: As impressive as Matusz has looked at times, he\u2019s still a rookie. He\u2019s had a couple rocky starts and he\u2019s essentially learning on the job. But his chief failing is that he can\u2019t drive in runs for himself. The same goes for Guthrie. After a nightmarish 2009 season, Guts is back to his familiar role as the de facto hard luck ace. Look at his last start against Boston, when he retired 16 batters in a row but let up two runs in the seventh inning. That was enough to pin him with the loss, along with another bullpen implosion. Are you sensing some themes?<\/p>\n

MBTN: The Mets lose most of their games on the road by failing to score enough early then coughing up their slim lead in the 8th and 9th. Which Orioles relief pitcher(s) will come away with the win(s)?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I doubt that any Oriole reliever is stealing a win this weekend, but\u00a0Will Ohman<\/strong>\u00a0is as likely as anyone. He\u2019s been a rare scrap-heap success for\u00a0Andy MacPhail<\/strong>, a once-effective lefty specialist who was derailed by injury and had to make the club out of spring training on a minor league deal. He didn\u2019t give up an earned run until Memorial Day weekend. Of course he\u2019s appeared in roughly 90 games already this year, and hasn\u2019t looked so good in the past week. Also keep an eye out for second-year pitcher\u00a0David Hernandez<\/strong>. He was overmatched at times in the rotation, but he throws hard and has looked better since being moved to the back end of the bullpen.<\/p>\n

MBTN: It’s my birthday\/anniversary weekend, and we’re staying at the Hilton Garden on the Inner Harbor. Where do we:
\na) watch World Cup games?
\nb) Get good steamed crabs?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Happy birthday and anniversary! For watching soccer, I know the Hilton has a nifty little bar called the Diamond Tavern. If you\u2019re looking for a pub, there\u2019s the James Joyce on President Street and Captain Larry\u2019s on E. Fort Avenue. Both are within two miles of the ballpark. For crabs, LP Steamers (also on E. Fort) comes highly recommended.<\/p>\n

(ed note: We have tentative plans for crabs at Obryki’s)<\/em><\/p>\n

MBTN:\u00a0Was\u00a0Lee Mazzilli<\/a>\u00a0a good manager? He was once a hero here but can’t even get work as a broadcaster anymore.<\/strong><\/p>\n

To put it bluntly, no. The Birds have had their share of crummy managers (and crummy teams) over the past 13 years, but Mazzilli was the only one that I can remember who lost the support of the team. The front office supposedly hired him because he talked a good game, but rumor had it that he did zilch in the way of game preparation and wasn\u2019t much of a communicator.<\/p>\n

MBTN: What’s the most frequently issued number in O’s history?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a three-way tie between 23 (think\u00a0Chris Hoiles<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Tippy Martinez<\/strong>), 37 (Stu Miller\u00a0<\/strong>and a whole lot of nothin\u2019), and 39 (Eddie Watt<\/strong>\u00a0and more nothin\u2019). By my count, each of those has been worn by 30 different guys.<\/p>\n

Once again, I’d like to say, ‘Thanks, Hon’ to Kevin for sharing his knowledge of the enemy!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We’re packing up and heading down to Charm City for the weekend to celebrate my birthday and wedding anniversary, and intend to catch Sunday’s Mets-Orioles game at Camden Yards with family down there. If you happen to run into a clown wearing Mets road jersey\u00a0No. 70, it might very well be me. In preparation, I … Continue reading “Know Your O’s”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[496,265,240,73],"class_list":["post-1433","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-johnny-lewis","tag-juan-samuel","tag-lee-mazzilli","tag-ty-wigginton"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1433"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1435,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433\/revisions\/1435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbtn.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}