Happy Monday, Camden Chatters! We made it to the All-Star break and the Orioles played well enough over the weekend to give us warm fuzzies heading into four days off. They swept the Kansas City Royals and finally won four games in a row. Now they get a few days off, except for Adley Rutschman, and hopefully when they return they’ll continue their good run.
The bats came out to play yesterday. Gunnar Henderson had three hits, Samuel Basallo and Leody Taveras homered, and Blaze Alexander reached base three times. Unfortunately, the last time was on a HBP that broke his left hand. Alexander clearly knew it was bad when he got hit, as he picked a fight with pitcher Lucas Erceg after it happened.
Alexander has been one of the best players on the team this year, and he is having a career season. It’s an absolutely rotten turn of events for both the player and the team. Baseball can be cruel. I haven’t seen a timeline on how much time he is expected to miss, but he won’t need surgery. Silver lining?
While the Orioles were busy sweeping the Royals, the draft was also happening. The Orioles took Eric Booth with their first pick, a high school outfielder from Mississippi. Mark was busy this weekend keeping up on the draft so you didn’t have to. You can check out the full draft list here and read a recap of the full draft here.
Orioles’ Blaze Alexander suffers broken hand in victory over Royals – The Baltimore Banner
Not cool.
Here’s how all 30 teams’ prospects fared in the Futures Game – MLB.com
The Futures Game was played over the weekend and the Orioles had two participants, Ike Irish and Joseph Dzierwa. Dzierwa only got to face one batter, which was a ripoff.
2026 MLB Draft Recap: Day 1 – FanGraphs
FanGraphs has blurbs on the first three picks the Orioles made: Eric Booth, Ty Head, and Dominic Voegele. They are especially high on Ty Head, with a pre-draft rank of 16th.
Is today your birthday? Happy birthday! You have three Orioles birthday buddies. Pat Rapp (59) had a 10-year career that included 30 starts with the Orioles in 2000. Fritz Dorish (b. 1921, d. 2000) was a relief pitcher for the Orioles in 1955.
And Mark Brown turns 67 years old today. But before you get too excited, it’s not the Mark Brown that brings you top-notch Orioles content every day. It’s former Oriole Mark Brown, who appeared in nine games with the 1984 Orioles. That’s not many games, but I’m willing to bet that it’s more Major League games than anyone with YOUR name has ever played in!
On this day in 1962, the Orioles defeated Cleveland 10-3. Boog Powell and Brooks Robinson homered, and Charlie Lau hit four doubles. Steve Barber pitched 6.2 innings and earned the win.
In 1991, the Orioles pitched a combined no-hitter in a 2-0 win over the A’s. Bob Milacki, Mike Flanagan, Mark Williamson, and Gregg Olson. Milacki had to leave the game when he was hit in the hand by a line drive. The Orioles scored their runs on an RBI single by Chris Hoiles and a Mike Devereaux home run.
In 2019, the Orioles traded pitcher Andrew Cashner to the Red Sox for two minor leaguers. Cashner had been pretty good for the Orioles but was terrible for the Red Sox. That’s what I like to see.
In 2022, the Orioles beat the Cubs 7-1. It was the team’s 10th win in a row. The win took the team from a 35-44 record to a 45-44 record and moved them 23 games out of first place to 17.5 games out. They remained in last place, but that was a whole lotta fun.
And on this day last year, the Orioles closed out the first half with an 11-1 loss to the Marlins. Former Oriole Kyle Stowers hit three home runs and knocked in six runs.
