Oriole #1058- Yefry Ramirez

Since I'm about 25 Oriole debuts behind schedule, with potentially two more occurring over this weekend, I've decided to skip ahead a bit. It's much easier to write about more recent debuts than to recall those that happened a year ago. Ideally, I will circle back around to catch up on all of them, but I make no guarantees.

Up today is Oriole #1058, Yefry (pronounced Jeffrery) Ramirez, who made his O's and MLB debut on June 13th against the Red Sox. He was given the tall order to face one of baseball's best hitting lineups and was matched up against Chris Sale, one of the best pitchers in the game, but he was able to keep his head above water. He pitched a respectable 4.1 innings, gave up 3 earned runs, and struck out 6. With the way the 2018 Orioles season is going, he presented himself quite well.

Yefry was sent back to AAA Norfolk after the spot start, but was recalled again prior to yesterday's game against the Mariners. This time he entered the game as a long reliever, and pitched 5 shutout innings. It was an impressive effort, and he seems to be working his way into the future plans of the O's.

The Orioles brought Yefry into their system last summer when they purchased him from the Yankees. He had a 15-3 record at the AA level last year, split between the Trenton Thunder and Bowie Baysox, and seems to have a knack for winning, even if his "stuff" doesn't seem to blow anyone away. It seems like he has an MLB future as a long reliever or back of the rotation starter.

Yefry was kind enough to sign these cards for me at Spring Training this year and one of these Old Man Cards will slide right into my collection. One of my favorite benefits of getting autographs in Sarasota is how it prepares me and my collection for these types of debuts. Semi-unexpected, and I never know which one of the dozens of fringy players will make their way to Baltimore at some point. Thanks as always to my dad for helping me be prepared to get Yefry's auto with his great OMCs. We make a good team! Now if only that could rub off on the Orioles.

Oriole #999- Mychal Givens

Wow, I hope that none of you read my post from last week speculating about who the one thousandth Oriole might be, seeing as how I listed ten potential candidates to make their Orioles debut, and not a single one of them was Oriole #999 Mychal Givens. Partially, this is because I chose to focus on the potential debuts of players at the AAA level to somewhat limit the pool of candidates (outside of Bowie Baysox pitcher Tim Berry, who was on the 40 man roster). Additionally, Givens hadn't been invited to the Orioles big league Spring Training, generally an indicator at the time about a player's general standing in the organization. HOWEVER, Givens is a name that Buck Showalter has mentioned multiple times this year in assorted interviews and once Buck has an eye on you, it generally means positive things about your future.

Givens has a pretty interesting history in the O's farm system, as he was drafted in the 2nd round of the 2009 draft, and the Orioles decided to have him play shortstop. Apparently, coming out of high school, many other teams like his arm better as a pitcher and thought he had a brighter future on the mound than at short, but the O's thought otherwise.

After three relatively unremarkable seasons in the field and at the plate, the Orioles finally conceded that Givens might do better as a pitcher and moved him to the mound in 2013. Success didn't come right away, but apparently once someone changed his mechanics to throw from a three quarters arm slot, his velocity and results improved.

This past Saturday, the Orioles selected Mychal's contract from AA Bowie and added him to the 25 & 40 man rosters. After watching three games from the bullpen, he got to make his Orioles & MLB debut in last night's game against the Red Sox in Boston. He needed only 11 pitches (8 of which were strikes) to retire the "heart" of the Sawx batting order, including two ground-outs and a four pitch strike out of Mike Napoli.

Mychal was optioned back to AA Bowie prior to today's game to make space of the roster for Miguel Gonzalez, but he sure showed some promise in his debut. Especially since he is now on the 40 man roster, I wouldn't be surprised to see him back in Baltimore sometime soon.

And for the record, I'm pretty sure that I have a personalized autograph of his Bowman Orioles card at the top of this post. I'm pretty sure he signed and personalized both a copy of that card and the Shorebirds card for me at the same time, but all of my stuff is pretty unorganized these days. Regardless, congrats on your debut Mychal!

Oriole #997- Cesar Cabral

We are getting closer and closer to the magical number for Oriole #1000; who will it be? Since I posed the question back in April, six players from the Tides have made their debuts, and now we are just three away. Maybe it's time to revisit the question. But today's focus is on the 997th player to appear in a game for the O's, Cesar Cabral.

Now most of you probably are probably aware that I don't much care for having signed Yankees cards in my collection, but for the time being, this is Cesar's only card in major sets. And, I certainly prioritize having any sort of autograph over my dislike of signed Yanks cards, so for now, this is in my collection.

Cesar has quite the interesting transaction history, most of it occurring with the teams of the AL East. He was originally signed as an amateur free agent by the Red Sox back in 2005; the Rays then selected him in the 2010 Rule V draft. Over the course of 2 weeks during spring training 2011, he was picked up on waivers by the Blue Jays, then the Rays again, and eventually returned to the Red Sox. After the 2011 season, he was again taken in the Rule V draft, this time by the Royals, and then was purchased by the Yankees. Got all that?

He eventually made his MLB debut with the Yankees in September 2013, and would pitch a total of twelve games with the Evil Empire over the '13-14 seasons, ending up with a 7.71 ERA over 4.2 IP, so he's definitely a LOOGY (lefty one one guy).

The Orioles signed him to a minor league contract this past January, and he actually never even pitched for the big league club during spring training, so it's a pretty impressive feat for him to be off the radar in March and now pitching for the team in June. But that is what having a 0.00 ERA and 25 K's split between 21 games at AA Bowie(2) and then AAA Norfolk(19) will do for a guy. And he's been good with the O's so far too, with two hitless/scoreless appearances totaling an inning of work.

Keep up the good work Cesar!

Oriole #985- Quintin Berry

Since I'm still waiting for my autographs to arrive for Orioles 983 & 984, I'm skipping to the 985th player to appear in a game today. That man is Quintin Berry.

Unlike the two guys I'm skipping, Quintin was thankfully with the team in Spring Training, so I had an autograph of his prepared to slide right into my collection. Once again, my Old Man's Oriole Card is right there with Quintin's first, and likely only, O's card. He was actually a pretty great signer in Sarasota, so I actually have a few of his autographs for trade as well. 

I showed off these autographs in a few posts back in March and April, and at the time, I mentioned that the Orioles might be able to use Quintin for his prowess on the basepaths, which is exactly what they have done so far. After a steal today, he is now 25-25 in stolen bases in his MLB career. Pretty impressive.

After playing for the Tigers and Red Sox in 2012 and '13 respectively, the O's signed him to a deal this past off-season. He had a good season at AAA Norfolk and definitely earned the promotion. He has appeared in five games for the Orioles so far, all as a defensive replacement or pinch runner, so that's pretty obviously his role with the team.

Oh, and he and Adam Jones are boys, as they attended Morse High School together in San Diego, and remain good friends. I imagine that factored in to his addition to the Oriole organization, but I'm all about it if he can help the team win a few games!