Late Innings

With the non-waiver trading deadline coming and going, we can now look forward to see what players could potentially be moved (through waivers) in August. Baltimore has a slew of potential players, from Aubrey Huff to Melvin Mora to some of the older bullpen arms. It shouldn’t take much to pull those players from the roster, heck after today’s rant Mora probably punched his ticket out of town. Mora’s defense albeit is solid, but his power evaporated, he is nothing more than a singles-hitter, when that does happen.

With the veterans coming off the roster, this will mean more playing time for their young rising stars. That is the usual suspects that people know: Matt Wieters, Nolan Reimold, Nick Markakis and Adam Jones. One player left out of the mix however is reserve outfielder Felix Pie.

Baltimore fans shouldn’t be too quick to run Pie out of Charm City.

Pie, acquired from the Cubs during the offseason for Garret Olson and a relief pitching prospect, won the starting outfield job after camp broke, however didn’t exactly hit the ground running, batting .157/.246./.216 in April. By that point Reimold took over the full-time job, and Pie was the subject of much scorn from Baltimore fans.

With Pie on the bench however, he was the subject of numerous trade rumors. Pie is out of options, and there’s no way that Andy MacPhail could slip him through waivers unexposed. The team dealt away Oscar Salazar for relief help to keep him on the roster. While many Baltimore fans have been calling for Pie’s head, his performance after his dreadful month of April has been clearly rewarding, as per Pinto, he’s been a very solid .300/.347/.457 since then.

Manager Dave Trembley has been struggling to find him at bats, but he’s been settling in nicely as the team’s #2 hitter, getting on base two more times in today’s slugfest. While people when thinking of young Orioles on the rise tend to forget that Pie is still around, he’s clearly starting to make more noise. He projects as a solid #2 hitter in the future… now the only problem is to figure out how to get enough at bats to him, Jones, Markakis, and Reimold. Also Luke Scott is still in the picture as well. For the Orioles, this problem is a good problem to have.