Good morning, Camden Chatters.
While Orioles fans wait for the next starting pitching shoe to drop — if it ever does — the O’s are staying busy tinkering with the fringes of the 40-man roster. Yesterday the Birds claimed Jhonkensy Noel, the slugger known as “Big Christmas” for his large frame and Yule-themed surname, off waivers from the Guardians. To make roster room, the Orioles DFA’d righty George Soriano, whom they’d claimed in November.
OK, don’t print the playoff tickets just yet. In fact there’s
a decent chance that we’ll never see Noel play in an Orioles uniform, and that he’ll be the next roster flotsam to be removed when the O’s need to free up another 40-man spot. Such is the life of an offseason waiver claim. Noel is a right-handed first baseman/outfielder, of which the Orioles already have too many. If he sees any significant time with the Birds this year, it will probably mean that something has gone wrong for the team.
Still, Noel is a bit more intriguing than your garden-variety, no-name waiver fodder. He’s just 24 years old and has two seasons of MLB experience. The hulking Dominican is known for his prodigious power but total lack of plate discipline. He can contribute if he’s launching home runs often enough, as he did in 2024 when he posted a 115 OPS+ despite a .218 AVG and .288 OBP, thanks to 13 dingers in 67 games. Noel even hit a home run in his first major league at-bat. And if you guessed that it came against the Orioles, congratulations, you win a cookie. It was a 413-foot blast off Grayson Rodriguez on June 26, 2024.
Noel also made some October magic that year. In Game 3 of the ALCS against the Yankees, Noel crushed a dramatic, pinch-hit, two-run homer with two outs in the ninth to rescue the Guardians from the brink of defeat. They eventually won in 11 innings, their only victory of the series. That was, though, one of just two hits for Noel in 21 at-bats that postseason.
The 2025 season was a miserable one for Big Christmas. His power dried up, with just six homers in 153 PAs for Cleveland. He struck out 52 times and walked just four. MLB pitchers were able to exploit Noel’s poor plate approach, and with his future as a major league caliber player in doubt, the Guardians cut ties with him last week. Now the Orioles will take a chance, likely hoping to sneak him through waivers and assign him to Triple-A as minor league depth.
Or maybe another team will pluck him away on waivers again in a matter of days or weeks, and we’ll have no reason to ever think about him again. It could go either way, really.
Links
Ken Rosenthal has a non-update update about the Orioles, writing that their rotation is “not necessarily complete” and they “could” add another starter. That tight-lipped O’s front office really doesn’t give writers many juicy rumors to report.
26 Orioles predictions for the 2026 season – MLB.com
Jake Rill offers a bunch of predictions about the upcoming O’s season, and to say that they are relentlessly optimistic would be an understatement. But hey, I certainly hope most of these come true.
A dozen mailbag leftovers for breakfast – School of Roch
Taxi catchers, spring training updates, and kidnapping Paul Skenes. It’s Roch Kubatko’s latest mailbag.
After his remarkable MVO season, what can Trevor Rogers do for an encore? – Steve Melewski
I’m going to say that Rogers’ encore will not involve him posting a 1.81 ERA again. I guess I’m just a cynic like that.
Will Povich or Young have a brighter Orioles’ career? | MAILBAG – BaltimoreBaseball.com
Can I choose none of the above?
Orioles birthdays and history
Is today your birthday? Happy birthday! You share your day with four ex-Orioles: right-handers Kevin Gausman (35) and Brian Bass (44), lefty Norm Charlton (63), and the late outfielder Lenny Green, who was both born and died on January 6 (b. 1933, d. 2019).
On this date in 2004, the Orioles signed longtime Braves backstop Javy López to a three-year, $22.5 million deal, landing the top catcher on the free agent market. The 32-year-old López was coming off of a career year with Atlanta in which he crushed 43 homers and collected 109 RBIs. Javy didn’t reach those heights with the Orioles, but he did have a strong first season — 23 homers and an .872 OPS — before steadily declining in the final two years.
In 2011, the O’s signed All-Star first baseman Derrek Lee for one season. The 35-year-old was just two seasons removed from a 35-homer, .972 OPS season with the Cubs, but he had little left in the tank for the Birds, posting a below-average 91 OPS+ in 85 games before the O’s traded him to the Pirates.
And on this day in 2017, the O’s pawned off the useless contract of righty Yovani Gallardo, who gone 6-8 with a 5.42 ERA in his only year in Baltimore, to the Mariners in exchange for outfielder Seth Smith. Smith had a largely forgettable 2017 season for the O’s before retiring.
