Yesterday, the Orioles signed quite a number of players – seventeen in total – to contracts for the 2012. It’s no big thing, just some housekeeping and business to get out of the way.
From the Baltimore Sun: The Orioles renewed the contract of star catcher Matt Wieters on Saturday and announced they have agreed to terms with 17 other players who are under club reserve and were not eligible for salary arbitration. That completes the team’s 2012 contract signings.
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The list of players who recently agreed to terms includes: Ryan Adams, Jake Arrieta, Josh Bell, Jason Berken, Zach Britton, Chris Davis, Oliver Drake, Ryan Flaherty, Tommy Hunter, Joe Mahoney, Troy Patton, Zach Phillips, Nolan Reimold, Alfredo Simon, Pedro Strop, Taylor Teagarden and Chris Tillman. Wieters, who is one of the club’s cornerstone players, is represented by super agent Scott Boras. No terms were released. He earned $452,500 in 2011.
Finally, Yoenis Cespedes – who the Orioles were looking at to sign – played his first Spring Training game for the Oakland Athletics.
Although the stats don’t won’t go into Cespedes’ career record, he left quite an impression. The Cuban slugger had a home run and an RBI-single to lead his team to a 6-3 victory over the Cincinnati Reds.
I thought the Orioles should have taken a risk on Cespedes despite the questions about his ability, money, and how he would do in the majors.
However, if he can become a productive power hitter for the A’s, they will have gotten quite the bargain on the market.
