Good morning, Camden Chatters.
The post-winter meetings offseason has been a bit of a snooze so far. After the excitement that was the Pete Alonso signing last week, not much has happened for the Orioles or any other team in the few days since. We’ve seen a couple of less-heralded signings — Tyler Rogers to the Blue Jays, Ha-Seong Kim to the Braves — but the biggest dominoes have yet to fall after Alonso came off the market.
It seems like everyone expects the Orioles to make another huge splash, specifically
in the pitching market. It’s still pretty wild to think that the baseball world is now looking at the O’s as huge spenders who could commandeer the MLB offseason, like they’re the Dodgers all of a sudden. It’s almost considered a foregone conclusion that the O’s will have their pick of the upper-echelon starting pitchers remaining, be it Framber Valdez or Ranger Suárez or Tatsuya Imai.
But let’s slow our roll on that. Even though the Alonso signing has seemingly set the Orioles in an aggressive, free-spending direction, nothing is set in stone. There will be plenty of suitors for those top-tier hurlers, including teams that can outspend the Orioles if they so choose. I’m certainly more optimistic than ever before about the Orioles’ chances of signing a marquee pitcher, but remember that this is a franchise that historically hasn’t done such things. The Alonso signing proved that the O’s can spend big on a slugger. Now they need to prove that they can do it with a pitcher, too.
If the O’s miss out on Valdez, Suárez, and Imai, but end up with, say, a second-tier free agent like Zac Gallen plus a trade acquisition like Edward Cabrera, would that be enough to address the Orioles’ rotation issues? Or will anything less than the big names be a failure? There’s a lot of offseason to go, so it might be a while before we need to answer that question.
Links
If Alonso is Frank Robinson, does that mean the Orioles will win two World Series while he’s here? Heck, I won’t be greedy. I’ll settle for one.
Still more to talk about after Alonso signing – School of Roch
Alonso’s introductory press conference is providing days’ worth of content for O’s beat writers, and I am here for it. I don’t want to stop thinking about how awesome it is that Pete Alonso is an Oriole.
Pete Alonso Signs With Orioles — Polar Bear Becomes Polar Bird – FanGraphs
This is a fantasy baseball-focused article that examines how Alonso’s offensive numbers might get a boost by moving from Citi Field to Camden Yards. In short: he’ll probably hit more dingers. Yes, please.
Orioles birthdays and history
Is today your birthday? Happy birthday! The late Orioles Hall of Famer Mike Flanagan (b. 1951, d. 2011) would have turned 74 today. The lefty spent 15 of his 18 major league seasons in Baltimore, winning 141 games — fifth-most in franchise history — and earned the AL Cy Young Award in 1979. He later served as an Orioles pitching coach, general manager, and broadcaster.
Other ex-Orioles born on Dec. 16 include one-game knuckleballer Mickey Jannis (38), right-hander Chris Britton (43), and Hall of Fame-adjacent infielder Billy Ripken (61).
The O’s have made a bunch of free agent signings on this date in history. Just last year, they signed the reigning NPB MVP, Tomoyuki Sugano, to a one-year contract. The 35-year-old was making the leap to MLB after a distinguished 12-season career in Japan, and it went…fine, I guess. Sugano was one of just two O’s pitchers to make 30 starts in 2025 and posted a mediocre but not abysmal 4.64 ERA, though he coughed up a league-worst 33 home runs. He’s currently a free agent.
Past Orioles signings on this date include first baseman/outfielder Jeff Conine (1999), shortstop César Izturis (2008), outfielder Hyun Soo Kim (2015), and catcher Welington Castillo (2016).
