Can the Orioles Win A Series?

I'm likely a certified idiot for continuing to follow the Orioles "action" so closely in yet another losing season, but I can't be any other way. The O's are an awful team, but they're MY awful team. And with a win against the Twins tonight or tomorrow, they have a chance to win their first series since they took two games from the Reds at Camden Yards way back in late June. That's right everyone, the Birds haven't won a series in two months. You see how I suffer? At the end of that Reds series, the O's were 35-40, only five games under .500, which is my realistic goal for the team every year. They are now 49-77, 28 games below .500 and virtually guaranteed another losing campaign.

To (possibly) send the team some good Mojo to get that series win monkey off their backs, here are some pictures of former O's who have played for the Twins. How can this possibly help the team win? I have no idea, but I'm doing it anyway.

Ray Miller managed the Twins and later the Orioles, but is best remembered for the 20+ seasons he spent at the pitching coach for the O's and Pirates.

I know that this is an Orioles Crown card, but it clearly pictures John wearing a "TC" Twins hat. In fairness, John only appeared in 6 games with the Orioles during the 1984, and I guess that no one with the team brought a camera to any of those games.

 

However, Mark Brown pitched in 9 games for the O's during the '84 season, but was featured in the Crown set wearing at least an Orioles hat. So I guess Mark showed up for picture day but John was absent that day, or something like that. 

Mark isn't a good TTM signer so I'm still trying to track down a copy of his signed Crown card. It actually took me a long time to get any autograph of Mark, so I'm happy to at least have this signed card.

 

To wrap things up, here is Hector Carrasco. He never was featured on an Orioles card either, and he pitched in 40 games for the team in 2003, poor guy. This Twins autographed card replaced this signed Reds card, mainly because the autograph stands out much better on this card. 

Alright O's, let's get the W tonight to get that series win! And then we might be able to dream about a sweep, but I think I'm getting too far ahead of myself.

Hector Carrasco

Hector Carrasco 2003

I had a lot of "fun" trying to track down Hector this season as he bounced around the Atlantic League. Paul of Paul's Random Stuff tried to help me keep track of which team Hector was on but I missed out on getting him to sign TTM with both the Newark Bears and Long Island Ducks. As you can see from the picture in this card, Hector is a good signer, both in the mid 90's when this card came out and still is to this day. The only problem is that he lives in the Dominican Republic in the offseason and doesn't have a listed address there.

So after my failed TTM attempts, I traded a SCN user for this card. There's quite a bit going on with the card and it's not one that I would've chosen to get signed, but beggars can't be choosers. He doesn't have an Orioles card so I'm just happy to have the autograph on any card at this point.

Hector pitched for the O's in 2003 and went 2-6 with a 4.93 ERA over 40 relief appearances. He has been in the Major or Minor League systems of fifteen different franchises over the past 20 years, and that doesn't include Independent League teams. So to say he has been all over the place might be an understatement.

I hope Hector pitches somewhere in the US again next season so I can try one more time to get a personalized autograph from him.