Myriad Orioles Thoughts: Some pitchers reporting; Spring Training Primer returns; new writing hire; radio show musings

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Four of the best words in the English language will be used today throughout Florida and Arizona: Pitchers and catchers report.

This year, a fifth probably needs to be added: “Some” pitchers and catchers report.

The offseason is officially over – or maybe it won’t be official until all teams have undergone workouts.

Anyway, it’s basically over. And so many players – including a ton of pitchers – are still looking for jobs.

Here’s a partial list of starters that are available:

Jake Arrieta, Trevor Cahill, Andrew Cashner, Alex Cobb, R.A. Dickey, Scott Feldman, Jaime Garcia, A.J. Griffin, Jeremy Hellickson, Drew Hutchison, Ubaldo Jimenez, John Lackey, Francisco Liriano, Lance Lynn, Wade Miley, Chris Tillman ad Jason Vargas.

That group includes four men who combined to make 86 of the Orioles’ 162 starts last year – for a rotation that posted the worst ERA in franchise history.

Obviously, those guys didn’t have good years. But some of those in the group above did. And all listed were, at one time, solid major league arms. I still believe the Orioles sign two of the group above. But, yes, the Orioles better do it fairly quickly to have them ready for the first week of the regular season.

So, some pitchers and catchers are reporting today or this week. And some are still waiting for that phone call that tells them where they should report.

Dubroff back for Spring Training Primer

The Orioles’ pitchers and catchers aren’t the only ones reporting to Sarasota, Fla., this week. A lot of the media is, too.

A lot, but not all. I’ll be doing my annual trek to Orioles’ camp – amazing to me that this will be my 18th spring covering the team – at the end of the month for a little more than a week.

But we’ll still have everyday coverage here at BaltimoreBaseball.com. I’ll continue to post blogs, columns, analysis, news, podcasts and anything else that we can muster.

When I’m not in Florida, we’ve made sure you’ll still be getting daily dispatches from Sarasota. For the second straight spring, Rich Dubroff, the Orioles’ beatwriter for Pressboxonline.com, will be pinch-hitting here as well as doing his regular, daily gig for Pressbox.

Each weekday during spring training – starting Wednesday morning (Feb. 14 for all you Valentine’s Day baseball fans — Dubroff will be filing his “Spring Training Primer” that will tell you what went on, what to look forward to and who to watch in Sarasota.

It’s a good way to keep up with the comings and goings of the team, and we’re glad to have Rich providing that copy for us again in 2018.

Announcing a new BaltimoreBaseball.com writer

We are heading into our third season here at the site, where we take pride in covering baseball from local high schools all the way to the Orioles.

Last year, we started a weekly in-season look at college baseball in Maryland – there are 15, four-year schools that have programs in the state. We are continuing that coverage this year as Mike Mills is joining us and will be leading our college coverage.

Starting in a few weeks, we’ll provide you with a college baseball feature every Thursday throughout the season. The package will also include players of the week and a look ahead at a particular matchup to watch – whether it is in Frostburg, Salisbury, Baltimore, Annapolis or College Park, to name a few locales.

Mills is a local guy, an Archbishop Curley graduate and a current junior at Towson University. (Add Mills in with Dean Jones Jr., and Curley alums now outnumber Calvert Hall grads 2 to 1 at this site. I’m not proud of that.)

If you want to reach out to Mike and suggest story ideas or have a question about our college coverage, his email address is Mike@BaltimoreBaseball.com. You can also see links to his stories on Twitter at @MMills_27.

I’m happy to report we are maintaining the rest of our excellent content providers for 2018: myself and Paul Folkemer on Orioles’ coverage; Dean Jones Jr., on the minors; Sean Naylor on high schools and other features; Joy Absalon providing photography and Adam Pohl contributing the weekly Minor League Podcast.

Thanks again all for checking out the site.

Radio musings

We aired our weekly radio program, The Baltimore Baseball Show, on WOYK 1350 AM in York on Monday night and Dubroff was my guest this week. We talked about the Orioles’ roster, and whether he thinks – like I do – that the Orioles will sign a veteran starting pitcher or two. Eventually anyway.

You can click below to listen to the full 30-minute program, go to the station’s website for the show’s archives or download it and past episodes from iTunes.