Another Orioles Trade, A Re-Signing & Rule V Draft Results

The Orioles completed their second trade of the Winter Meetings, this time acquiring JJ Hardy, Brendan Harris & cash from the Twins in return for relievers Jim Hoey & Brett Jacobson.

 

Hoey pitched for the Orioles in 2006 & '07 and was recently re-added to the 40-man roster to protect him from the Rule V draft.

Jacobson was traded to the Orioles from the Tigers for Aubrey Huff in late 2009. He had a solid year at single A Frederick, but is 24 years old and has yet to play in AA.

The Orioles also re-signed their past and possibly future closer, Koji Uehara, to a one year deal with a vesting option for a second season. I haven't heard what Koji needs to do to get the second year to vest, but I like it. The team is protected if he breaks down like he did over his first 1.5 seasons in Baltimore and we get two years of awesome Koji if he is lights-out like he was for the last half of the 2010 season.

The Rule V draft also went down this morning. I know that it doesn't matter for many fans whose teams are successful on the field, but for the teams that are re-building, it can be a painless and nearly risk-free way to add talent to the organization. It's also a good indication of how other teams view your farm system, as certain teams constantly have their players taken which shows that they have more talent than they can protect. This season the Orioles had four players taken, which is as high of number that I can remember being picked from the system. They also selected four players from other organizations.

In the first round, the Brewers snagged Pat Egan, who finished 2010 with AAA Norfolk. Egan has steadily risen through the O's organization and I will remember him for being exceptionally tall, something like 6'10".

Pedro Beato was selected by the Mets in the second round of the Major League phase. He finished the 2010 season as Bowie's closer and was an Orioles supplemental first round pick, I believe in 2005.

Both Egan & Beato must stay on the Brewers' & Mets' Major League 25 man roster for the entire season or they will be heading back to the Orioles organization. In the minor league phases of the Rule V, the O's lost pitcher Brent Allar, who I have an autograph of but never got it scanned, to the Marlins and catcher Daschenko Ricardo, who I honestly have never heard of, to the Giants.

The Orioles selected Brewers' relief pitcher, Adrian Rosario in the Major League phase of the draft. In the Minor League phases the O's took 2B Dale Mollenhauser & RHP Jacob Rasner from the White Sox and LHP Casey Rasner from the Cubs.

All-in-all, this past week has been one of the most active and exciting in recent Orioles history. We still need a first baseman and some relief pitchers, so I would expect that a few more moves will be made in the coming weeks.

4/10 Baysox Game Autographs

I have shown off a few of the autographs that I got at this Baysox game but here are the rest of them.


This is my first autographed card of Eddie, who blew through the O's Minor League system last year. He started the season with lo-A Delmarva, was promoted to hi-A Frederick midway through the year and ended up in AA Bowie by the end of the season. The amazing part is that his ERA went DOWN with each promotion, from 1.86, to 0.55 to 0.00. I didn't have this Shorebirds team set until the end of the year and didn't see the Baysox play again after I bought it, so this was my first shot to get Eddie to sign it. Eddie was very personable and seems like a good signer.



Pat followed a similar, if slightly less successful, path as Eddie's last year. He also played for Delmarva, Frederick and Bowie. And he is extremely tall; listed at 6'8". I think the O's like tall pitchers IE Mickolio, Hendrickson, Egan...

Miggy signed his 09 Baysox team set card. I've said it before and will say it again, I really dig the orange border on these cards.

Now, the 09 Keys team set, I don't like so much. Never have the players wear black uniforms on picture day and then shoot close-ups of them! They have to squeeze in their signature or sign over the black!

Bascom's last name stretched into his face to avoid the black.

The Carolina League Top Prospects set also used the Keys' team set pictures.



You see what I mean about these signatures fading into the black. They look even worse in person; the scanner actually brightens them up a bit. There's barely any light space on the cards.


Whereas the Keys' giveaway team set utilized white uniforms and action shots. Major upgrade! That's how a Minor League team set should look, or at least more-so like this.

Tyler was nice enough to also sign his 07 Ironbirds card for me.

So I went to a Keys Game Pt. 1

Last Friday, as a somewhat last minute decision, Kalina and I went to a Keys game, only our third of the season. We are both a little disappointed in that number and have resolved to make it to at least two more games this season.

It was a team set giveaway night and with the addition of the team set's they are selling and the assorted Keys' player cards I already had, it was destined to be a big night for autographs. And I was not let down; due to the large amount of autos I was able to get, I am splitting them into two posts.

While I am a big fan of Ryan Adam's Bowman Heritage card there on the right, I was not a fan of his defense in this game. He committed 2 errors in one inning on back-to-back chances.

Matt shows off the 2009 team set card on the left and the 2009 team set giveaway card on the right.

Pedro Beato was nice enough to take a picture with me and signed multiple cards too. I'm hoping that one day he will live up to his supplemental first round draft selection in 2006 I believe. He has been in Frederick for at least the past 2 seasons.




Kraig's signature is kind of all over the place isn't it?


Brett was shipped to Delmarva a few days after we saw him pitch in Frederick. When he came in I said to Kalina "this guy pitches like Ryan Rodriguez." That doesn't bode well for Brett.


Zach is a pretty highly regarded prospect that I have yet to see pitch.



Dave Cash signed for me once again. Last time he did that, he had the game winning hit. This time, he did not play.


Not much to say about Wally.


Last time I saw Pat, he was in Bowie. He is extremely tall (listed at 6'8'').


Joe signed for me after the game, which was nice.


Ped-Flo! I think he has the same walkup song as Melmo too.


Sean Gleason is another guy who I last saw in Bowie. These are from the Bowie team set that he hadn't yet seen so he took the time to turn it over and check his stats on the back, which he says were wrong. I offered one of these to him but he had already signed them and said he would get one from someone else.


Caleb Joseph is a really good catching prospect who might be blocked by Wieters one day but seems like a really cool guy. Oh, and he also has a blog about his experiences in baseball. It's very readable and has some cool insights that most fans wouldn't know about.


Billy caught Friday's game and seemed to work pretty well with Rick Zagone.