Good morning, Camden Chatters.
After five weeks and more than 30 exhibition games, we can officially call it a wrap on Orioles spring training for 2026. The Birds played their final tune-up game yesterday with a 2-0 shutout win at Nationals Park in which two of their projected starting pitchers, Shane Baz and Chris Bassitt, combined for seven scoreless innings. Baz racked up five strikeouts in five innings in his first game appearance since March 4, while Bassitt retired all six batters he faced to cap
his excellent spring. Yennier Cano and Dietrich Enns, both of whom appear certain to make the Opening Day bullpen, worked a perfect inning apiece to finish the Orioles’ exhibition slate.
That’s it for the warm-up. Practice time is over. The next time the Orioles take the field will be in two days for their regular season opener against the Twins at Camden Yards. From here on out, the games all count. Hopefully that’ll be a good thing.
Even with Opening Day so tantalizingly close, the O’s still have a lot of work to do to whittle down their roster to 26. After releasing veteran infielder Thairo Estrada and reassigning Maverick Handley and Jhonkensy “Big Christmas” Noel to the minors yesterday, the Orioles still have 39 players hanging around. We know a few of them will be going on the injured list — including Jordan Westburg, Jackson Holliday, Andrew Kittredge, and Luís Vázquez — but there are some tougher decisions to be made as well. The bubble players have completed their auditions and now the O’s need to decide which ones will make the cut.
Of course, even those who don’t make the Opening Day roster will likely show up for the Birds at some point this year. It’s a 162-game season and the Orioles are going to need a lot of help to get through it. Ideally, it won’t require 70 players like last year.
Take a two-day breather, Orioles fans, and then settle in for the six-month (maybe seven-month?) marathon. On Thursday afternoon, it all begins.
Links
2026 Positional Power Rankings: Bullpen (No. 16-30)
The bad news is that FanGraphs ranks the Orioles’ bullpen in the bottom half of the league. The good news is that they’re #16. So I guess they’re the best of the worst?
Would Orioles send Cowser to minors? | MAILBAG – BaltimoreBaseball.com
I hope it won’t come to that, but yeesh, Cowser looked bad in spring training. He did hit a nice Eutaw Street dinger in Sunday’s exhibition, though. Colton is so back!
Vázquez (broken thumb) among late injuries as O’s wrap spring – MLB.com
Jake Rill has more on the injury to Vázquez, who was hit by a pitch at the worst possible time when he was a strong candidate to make the roster. It probably clinches a spot for Jeremiah Jackson, though the lack of a defensive caddy for Coby Mayo makes me wince a little.
As RHP Zach Eflin’s arm slot dropped his ERA increased – Steve Melewski
It turns out that not having a bad back is helping Eflin become a better pitcher. Funny how that works!
The Orioles’ and Nationals’ new managers are BFFs who have known each other for over a decade, and now they’ll be jockeying for mid-Atlantic bragging rights. I think Albernaz is going to win that battle, which is not to say I’m convinced the Orioles will be good.
Orioles birthdays and history
Is today your birthday? Happy birthday! Two former Orioles were born on this day, but you have to go way back to the early days of the franchise to find them. The late left-hander Dick Kryhoski (b. 1925, d. 2007) was a member of the inaugural 1954 Orioles, and the late righty Saul Rogovin (b. 1922, d. 1995) pitched 14 games the following year, 1955.
On this date in 2014, in an end-of-spring-training trade, the Orioles acquired infielder Steve Lombardozzi — who grew up in Maryland — from the Tigers for veteran shortstop Álex González. Lombardozzi was part of the Birds’ Opening Day roster for that fantastic 2014 season, but played just 20 games and was gone by May. González, a 15-year veteran, played only nine games for the Tigers before retiring, so it was a pretty pointless trade on both sides.
