It was a glorious day for baseball in Baltimore on Monday and the Orioles got the job done on the field. Luke Jones and Nestor discuss a victorious Opening Day for the Birds and the real concerns of the loss of outfielder Colton Cowser with a broken thumb and concerns about the depth and defense in his lengthy absence.
Nestor Aparicio and Luke Jones discussed the Baltimore Orioles’ victorious opening day, despite the injury to Colton Cowser, who is expected to be out for 6-8 weeks. The Orioles won 2-4, with strong bullpen performance and a 3-2 record. They highlighted the importance of Cowser’s defensive and offensive contributions. The conversation also touched on the team’s pitching depth, the potential of young players like Cade Povich, and the impact of injuries on the lineup. They noted the strong start of Tyler O’Neill and the need for other players to step up in Cowser’s absence.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Orioles, opening day, Colton Cowser, injury, pitching, bullpen, Cedric Mullins, Tyler O’Neill, outfield, platoon, Heston Kerstadt, Adley Rutschman, Baltimore, baseball season, MLB.
SPEAKERS
Nestor Aparicio, Speaker 1, Luke Jones
Nestor Aparicio 00:01
Welcome home. We are W, N, S, T AM, 1570 towns of Baltimore. We are Baltimore positive and sporting our Costas in gear for our beloved, late, great mister Costas who passed this weekend. We’re going to be celebrating his life in two weeks. We’ll be at Costas on the Maryland crab cake tour, but we’re going to be at fadelies first on Wednesday with the magic eight balls with the victorious Baltimore Orioles on opening day, I began my entire season at fadelies on opening day with crab cake. It’s french fries, it’s proper cucumber slaw. I will be offering that to Luke Jones as well as Mark Viviano and Ron Cassie of Baltimore magazine and some other guests. I have one other guest I’m trying to get to faith Lee’s on Wednesday. I know this guy will be with me on Wednesday as well. We might even want to talk at some football or some college basketball or portal or other things like that, and the Orioles heading off into the abyss of Kansas City and Arizona in the week. But first things first, glorious opening day. The sun is shining behind me in the in the script here at Baltimore, positive out on YouTube and our video channel. I got an early start. I went to failies. They moved the game back. It was a unbelievably glorious day to be at the ballpark. It’s like my wife said to me in the morning, go down, show your face, say hello to everybody. Enjoy the start of the season. I feel like I saw every single person I’ve ever known on Monday. I mean, it was like I didn’t see you, but you spent five days in Toronto with me.
Luke Jones 01:35
I was busy writing up the Colton cows or injury, which is really the only, you know, kind of down moment of the day, and you said it weather was beautiful. The rain held off. In fact, it started raining as I was driving out of the city on Monday evening, so, but a great day. Look, you and I have talked to let’s be honest here. Let’s call a spade a spade. You and I have talked a lot about the issues pertaining to the Baltimore Orioles for a long time, but opening day is still one of those events in the city that still means something. Does it mean? What it meant 30 years ago? 40 years ago, 20 years ago? You know that that’s up to the individual, but it’s still special, and you still see people that you haven’t seen in a while. I felt that way, even seeing media members that I haven’t seen since the since last October, so but it was a great day, like you said. I mean, you can’t ask for better weather on March 31 and as I said, from a baseball standpoint, you know, the cows are news starts the day off on a sour note, but the Orioles two, four on innings, a really good bullpen work until Batista in the ninth inning. And, you know, we’ll get into that. But you get a win, you’re three and two, you have a great day. You know, the crowd was good. I thought the energy was good. You know, it’s definitely different, and you could definitely sense, you know, a new sound system, you know, they’ve got the the DJs, the MCs in the ballpark. It’s, it’s different than it was 10 years ago, let alone talking about longer than that. But it was a fun day, and the Orioles certainly gave the home crowd something to be happy about. By the time the final out was recorded with a little bit of angst in that ninth inning after the Orioles had put up a bigger lead in the bottom of the eighth.
Nestor Aparicio 03:27
Let’s talk about cows, or let’s start with, I mean, I’m not going to be Debbie downer here, three and two. I mean, we can go through the cast of number five starters and four innings and capo, which would help me day whether it was big, too big for him. Young in there. I mean, he did, and like you want them all to hang in every night, but Corbin burns isn’t coming out of there every fifth day. Zach Eflin might be to some degree, to the degree he can be. I don’t know when Grayson Rodriguez is going to come out. So we can go down the pitching road of how good can the pitching be, and that was last week’s headline. Can they win a World Series with a cadre of number four and five starters? We’ll find that out that we’re not going to judge that today. Can they be a playoff team with four and five starters? We have been in full agreement that they can, and probably should be, if they hit the ball right, but part of hitting the ball is start taking the cows and the gunner Henderson’s out of the lineup, and just for a couple days here, I guess gunner Henderson will be fine, but you start taking bats out. I mean, I even go back 10 years ago. I don’t need to go back to 1979 and Gary Renee, but 10 years ago, when Mark hakis disappeared, you know, from this operation then and you start taking bigot bats out. And even last year. I mean, the amount of injuries they had last year for younger players as well, who we got them all penciled in, right? That’s what my dad and I did this time of year, right? Westburn, 274, 23 bombs, 91 RBIs. Henderson, you. 294, 38 home runs, 116 RBIs, um, you know Adley rutschman. Don’t know what he’s going to be. Let’s go conservative on him. 268, 19 bombs, 62 RBIs, let’s just pretend he’s Matt weeders, so I start to put those numbers in, but those numbers don’t mean anything when you start to get hurt,
Luke Jones 05:26
yeah, and when you’re talking about someone like Colton kauser, I mean, we all remember what he looked like two years ago when he was caught up in the midst of the summer. Really struggled, right? Didn’t look like he belonged. I think, batted 115 in his first you know, it was a it was more than a cup of coffee. I think it was right around 80 plate appearances, something like, it
Nestor Aparicio 05:48
was like, worse than Jackson holiday, but not as bad as Kobe mayo, which is, it
Luke Jones 05:52
wasn’t as bad as Jackson holiday. When we’re talking about holiday at the very beginning, right about what sends them back. It wasn’t that bad. But similar, you know, of the same cut from the same cloth. Brooks
Nestor Aparicio 06:05
Robinson were here to join us today. He’d say, Well, I remember, back in 56 I had, you know, like
Speaker 1 06:10
it struggled. Everybody struggles, yeah. I
Luke Jones 06:14
mean, whether you’re talking about Jackson holiday at 20 or Coby mayo, I think was 22 cows are I think was 23 but my point is, last year, his first full year in the big leagues, a much better product of second and Rookie of the Year voting, someone who hit 24 home runs, he had 24 doubles, played their best player in April, right? Yeah, played really good defense. I mean, I think don’t get me wrong, it’s not as though this is a devastating blow that completely sinks their offense, but when we’re talking about the pitching being where it is right now, and you mentioned Kate povidge, I think there’s, there could be a good pitcher in there. I like a lot of what I see from Cade Povich in terms of pitch ability. You know, he gets some strikeouts. You know, he misses some bats. He’s not overwhelming with his velo, but he’s got a good mix of pitches. Just has to be more efficient. I mean, you can’t throw 90 plus pitches when you’re in the fifth inning. But going back to cows, or going back to some of these injuries that they’ve been dealing with, you know, Gunner Henderson should be back by the end of the week. I think, you know, I certainly, if he’s not back for Thursday’s finale, I certainly expect him to rejoin the club on this upcoming road trip. You know, I think he’s that close at this point, so that’ll be huge, obviously, but cows are just someone that he’s one of those players that you point to that has already figured it out to some degree to have success in the majors. And now you question, all right, what’s the next step for him? Wasn’t off to a great start. I think it was two for 16. But you know, it’s four games. You know, you’re not overreacting to four games, good or bad, but he’s another one of those players that you point to with all the questions about their pitching. You know the rotation specifically, but also the bullpen. We’ve talked about what, in terms of laying out what you still like about this team, it’s their young position talent. Why? Because one, it’s already been pretty good. And two, you have guys that you’d like to think there’s more meat on the bone in terms of more upside and more potential and guys getting better and well,
Nestor Aparicio 08:14
guys that are 2223 24 if they’re not ascending, I don’t you know, like there has to be an ascension for these guys as number one picks, as all sure that and and they’re all tool guys. They’ve all proven enough to be here. They’ve all proven they can have some success here, including Jackson holiday this week, right this weekend, I should say Right, like doesn’t look like he doesn’t belong, sort of where Golden calzer was. Look man, Elias, Michael, these guys have been doing this a long time. Brandon Hyde, you know, their whole system, their whole program, looks at these guys and they’re thinking the same thing. We’re thinking, My colitis is doing what me and my dad did. He did it back in November and said, What do we think these got? What is their upside, their value? How can we get their potential? But you know, Brian pillock once said to me, those who can or know better than those who won’t,
Luke Jones 09:03
right, or you have guys who, if they’re not available and they’re not on the field, they can’t help you. And that’s what’s unfortunate about cows are here because you’re talking about a fractured thumb, you know. Brandon Hyde said probably six to eight weeks at a minimum, you know. And that sounds about right? And that’s all star game, yeah. I mean, maybe not the all star game, but June, you know, Memorial Day, six
Nestor Aparicio 09:24
to eight weeks, and he’s got to swing the bat and then go hit major league pitching. Well again, when they say six
Luke Jones 09:28
to eight, when they say six to eight weeks, I think that is the fractures,
Nestor Aparicio 09:32
four weeks, two weeks of song, yeah,
Luke Jones 09:35
goes, you know, goes to Sarasota, or wherever he’s going
Nestor Aparicio 09:39
to read. Everything goes right with hands. I mean, we talked about Mark ACUs on the hand and what that like? It’s bad, like, way through it last year. Yeah.
Luke Jones 09:48
I mean, who knows? Uh, although I will say, with each interview they he has made some indicator, you know, just because you brought up Roxanne, I’ll spend 20 seconds on him, and then I’ll get back to cowser. He. Has talked about some swing adjustments he made, having a bat pat that go travels through the strike zone a little more efficiently. You know, talked about getting into some bad habits, which, again, did that stem from an injury? Did that was that pertaining to an injury? I absolutely think that’s very, very possible, if not likely, because, again, it’s how good the guy was through his first two calendar years in the major leagues, and then whatever we saw in the second half just was not even close to that. But with calzer, it’s a tough blow, because I’ve talked about this a lot with the outfield. When you look at their collection of outfielders, Cedric Mullins, and get back to Cedric in a moment, because he had a big day on Monday. But we know, two of the last three years really struggled, really struggled against left handed pitching, so he’s become more of the the strong side of a platoon type situation. And I think, as the Orioles would get into that, you’d look at cows or probably be in the center fielder, because he, you know, he played some center field last year, and he has the ability to do that. So that impacts you. There you have Tyler O’Neill, who feasts on left handed pitching, has been okay against right handed pitching the last few years, but not great. So once again, might be a guy that is going to play most of the time. I mean, the Orioles didn’t give him a three year, you know, $50 million contract to be strictly a platoon guy, but you could certainly lay out an argument for him to not start against every single right handed starter that you encounter. We’ve talked about Heston kerstead, who, you know, this is going to be a big opportunity for him. I don’t necessarily expect him to play every single day now, but he’s going to play much more with Colton cows out of the lineup, so they need him to deliver. That’s why him having that RBI single in the eighth was that was a big moment for him. Well, there
Nestor Aparicio 11:51
was an issue for I mean, that kid’s been up against everything spend a minute, oh yeah. I mean, from the the physical issues he had about being alive and then playing the sport, and then coming back and playing, and then playing and then not playing and playing and being blocked kind of sort of to some degree, and not getting at bats that this is how you get them out on the highway and have them drive right. I mean literally, when injuries happen, it leads to that opportunity for someone like him well, and this is where
Luke Jones 12:23
lots of people have talked about Mike Elias and hoarding prospects and what, what are you doing with these guys that are stuck at triple A? And you know, the last couple years, you could argue at at least at times, that Hess kersta has been stuck at triple A. Now he’s also had some injuries. And you know, it hasn’t been as clear cut as him just having smooth sailing all the way to triple A and then he he’s blocked. But there’s been some of that going on, but, but this is the exact scenario why you don’t just trade away all your prospects, because if you lose Colton cowser, but you also traded Heston kerstat. Now granted, hypothetically, if you traded Heston kerstadt as part of a deal for another starting pitcher, then you might not be, you know, in worse shape. You know, when you look at kind of the net gain, but you didn’t do that. So you have him. He’s going to play more now. He needs to play well. He needs to perform. They’ve brought up Dylan Carlson, who, you know, kind of an interesting reclamation project. You know, he’s, I mean, he’s going to be a reserve outfielder at this point in time off the bench, but go look at how he played a few years ago. I mean this. Go look at his 2021 season, and be reminded that he’s only in his mid 20s. So it’s kind of an interesting player in that regard. They have Ramon Laureano, who was going to play a lot against left handed starters anyway. But what hurts about losing cows, or is I just laid out their entire outfield. You kind of look at most of those guys as platoon split kind of guys, you know, like I said, not, not all of them, to an extreme degree, but cows are was probably the guy out of all that, you know, the out of that group that I had identified as probably going to play every day, or mostly play every day. Maybe he gets a he sits against a garret crochet who the Oreos are going to see Wednesday. But I expect a cowser to be out there potentially. Oh, no. 145 starts. 150 starts, if he stays healthy now it’s going to be double digit. Yeah, it’s a moot point now. So, you know, with him missing so, so something like this, it does hurt, but it is opportunity. And hey, Heston kerstet, it’s go time. You know you’re not a young man. Go look at his age. You know he’s not 22 you know he’s he’s at his mid already, well into his mid 20s. So they need Him, him to perform. And you hope that that’s a sign that you know, what he was able to do late in the game on Monday, after a couple rough at bats, you know, a couple strikeouts in some spots with guys on base, you know, for him to come through there. I thought that was a big moment for his confidence. You hope so, so. But also saying, I’ll go back to Cedric Mullins now. I. You know, you need your you need your vets to step up when you lose one of the guys that you’re kind of projecting to be one of your I don’t know. I mean, cowsers, I think at his best is one of their four best players. I think he’s that kind of guy, you know, one of their top 345, position players, which, you know, says a lot about their entire group, but it also says a lot about him. So it’s disappointing. There’s no doubt. And I think where it really stands out, yes, the offense, but you know, he’s so good defensively, and that’s, you know, that’s disappointing. I mean, they have Mullins. O’Neill’s played a good outfield to this point. O’Neill’s won a couple gold gloves in his career, you know, before the injury. So
Nestor Aparicio 15:40
I think talking about him is the next natural thing. By the way, Luke Jones is here Baltimore, Luke, he’s a press credentialed. I’m not. We’ll be together at fadelies on Wednesday of this week, also next week. We’re going to be at Costas next Friday, and we’ll be talking more and more all month long about baseball. But the O’Neill thing, the injury in my mind, in my mind, and I’ve been watching baseball long, long time. Guys built like him, guys who swing like him, guys who’ve done what he’s done, that on reputation alone. You sign that guy and say that’s the guy that’s going to spend two weeks, two to four weeks, somehow, someway, with a strange something for something, something that’s been his, his history. I don’t know if this is the year that he goes 142 games, but it puts a lot more strain now on that the contract, all of that for the at bats and for him having to be Santander and remain Santander and and God, he’s had a great first week, right? Let’s say that,
Luke Jones 16:44
yeah, he has, I mean, he’s been very good. Had four hits on Monday, you know, had the big opening day, had another home run on opening day for for someone who’s been historic in that regard. But, yeah, that’s another element to this. You know, when, when I mentioned cowser, and how I kind of viewed him as the guy that profiled best as an everyday player in that outfield because of some of the platoon splits and things of that nature with O’Neill I mentioned, okay, he’s not, he’s not incredible against right handed pitching in the way that he has been against left handed pitching. He’s still good. But he’s another guy that you point to and say, yeah, he’s the kind of guy that given his history. You know, he’s only played more than 113 games once in his career. And by the way, when he did in 2021 for the Cardinals, he was eighth and MVP voting. I mean, he was great. 34 homers, 80 RBIs had a 912, Op.
Nestor Aparicio 17:38
To your point, to absolutely your point on Colton cowser Is that the the picture of the season, when you look back in the history of it cannot be complete. When you only play 87 games that the numbers don’t look the same. They don’t add up the same. Being out there. Back to the Billick availability is, you know, is key. It is that when he has that kind of year, you can project him out and see if they put Santa on there, sure, who had all sorts of beefy problems as a kid and being young and all that stuff that I mentioned, that he talked about in Toronto last week as their shining star out on the sky skydome scoreboard last week as I was sitting there on opening day watching BP. The same can be said for O’Neill, as you can say, there’s that year that he had where he was healthy, and that’s what we want to see the next three years. And our program is going to allow him to play 130 to 140 games, right? I mean, not 155 we’re not Cal Ripken anymore, right? But just platoon him out once a week, once a week, he doesn’t make a start, gives him 130 135 starts, if he’s not hurt. You know, day game, night game, double headers, all of that kind of nonsense that goes on. But if Tyler O’Neal plays 140 games this year, this is where they get all wild about this and signing him, man, we keep him on the field for 130 500 you do the math, 42 home runs, right? I mean, like that, it looks like that’s what it would be if you can keep them on the field. Same thing with cows or but we don’t know yet, because we have that ugly year last two years ago, really nice year last year, and now that’s going to be taken away from him a little bit. And I think when you start to stack these things up, what it does to the team, but what it does to the individual player for getting that contract next time out, or saying that guy’s durable, or we can count or consistent or not, to your word, like the Fred Flintstone square, he’s a platoon player. You know, once you’re coined that at 25 or once they say you’re a DH, Heston, you’re 25 and you’re a DH, not a whole lot. Way to go from there, you better hit the ball. Yeah,
Luke Jones 19:42
right, right. But like I said, when you lose cows, or now you’re in a position where can you afford to view O’Neill quite the same way, where it’s easy to say, when you have a healthy cowser And you have a healthy Cedric Mullins and you have a healthy Preston kerstadt, you could say, Okay, I could give Tyler O’Neal OH. A day off every single week, right? I can do that every single week, or I can have him DH twice a week, even though I like his defense. Well. Now you don’t have cows defense or his bat in the lineup. If you’re Brandon Hyde, you’re saying, Okay, I still need to be mindful of Tyler O’Neal. But now what are my alternatives if I do want to give him a rest day? Ramon liriano, Dylan Carlson, right, Heston kerstad, who you hope will hit the defense. We’ll see. You know, I think he’s made some strides defensively, but he’s certainly not Colton Couser or Cedric Mullins in the outfield, or Austin Hayes at his best. Let’s say so you’re
Nestor Aparicio 20:34
starting to mention names now. Hayes Stowers, all of the depth that they had that were these pieces. It starts to stay with the pitching. Right this time last year was means and pradish and on and on and on. Now it’s like, who, what? Carl Gibson, when, you know,
Luke Jones 20:53
yeah, they’ve got to find a way to stay healthy. Yeah. I mean, we’re now at a point where, and we haven’t even mentioned,
Nestor Aparicio 20:59
now, dude, it’s April Fool’s Day, you know, like, be careful. But, I mean, he got a lot of injuries for April Fool’s Day, right? I mean,
Luke Jones 21:07
normally we say haven’t even gotten the tax day, or we haven’t even gotten to Memorial Day. Back
Nestor Aparicio 21:11
on Valentine’s Day, we would have been crying if we would have been told that on April Fool’s day it was gonna look like this. Yeah,
Luke Jones 21:16
yeah. I mean, it’s but hey, they’ve won three of their first five. If they can do that, you stretch that out the 600 winning percentage. It’ll be a fun summer, and you’ll be playing in October in some capacity. But, yeah, it’s like I said, it was such a fun day. But, you know, the cows are injuries tough. I mean, it really is. And again, when you talk about a hand, thumb, wrist, fingers, any of that. I mean, you need your hands and wrists to be 100% right. There’s, you know, you can hit with, you know, a sore ankle of, you know, kind of a knee, dude,
Nestor Aparicio 21:57
I had a blister on my heel in Toronto. I could walk for a day and a half because it hurt every time I walk and hitting, if it’s a digit, it’s really, really difficult to do, yes,
Luke Jones 22:09
and that’s the thing. I mean, when he comes back, is he going to be right? And that’s, that’s, you know, that that’s far down the road at this point, because it’s going to be a couple months. I mean, when they, when the team, says it’s going to be a couple months, you know, at a minimum, it’s going to be a couple months, right? It might be the all star break, like you said, or maybe he’s back by Memorial Day. I said, All Star break.
Nestor Aparicio 22:29
If he comes back on June 28 you’re fully within your means to get after me, but he ain’t coming back on May 28
Luke Jones 22:36
I’d be surprised, right? I mean, just knowing the history of that, and
Nestor Aparicio 22:41
it wasn’t a very bad break. I mean, you know what I mean, especially when they come out and say it’s going to be two months. So, I mean, I’ll take them at word on that, and we’ll see him sometime in late June, as I know,
Luke Jones 22:50
if you see him on Flag Day. So what? That’s mid June? That would be a win Flag Day. But you you know the exact date I said it’s mid June, right? Senior Week, June 12, or something like that. I don’t know,
Nestor Aparicio 23:05
but Jones is here. He’s Baltimore. Finish up on the hitting. We’ll do pitching in another segment. We’ll just, we’ll stay on the field here, because we’re trying to get rushman right. Mullins looks great. I mean, there’s great news here on there, what has happened on the field, and really, I mean, and some, what’s the, you know, something magic happens every night there’s a different star. That’s the magic of a real baseball every night there’s been a different star. And certainly the guy they gave the money to in the off season, the young Canadian guy, that’s that’s been a good story, because I don’t know the fans know a lot about Tyler O’Neill talking about, I think it was more about, Oh, we lost Tony taters. This guy’s been a nice little, you know, version of that for the first week, he’s
Luke Jones 23:44
had a great start to the season, no question. I mean, four hits on on Monday against his former team. You know, you made mention a couple minutes ago about if there were someone in the Orioles outfield that you’d envision an IL stint on, you know, missing a couple weeks here or there. I mean, he had three il stints for for Boston last year. He played 113 games, yet he still had 31 home runs. I mean, that speaks to what kind of ability this guy has. And I think that’s why, you know, the Cardinals, for so many years, were just so frustrated because this guy showed so much potential. I mean, he had an MVP caliber kind of year in 2021 a Gold Glove winner, and 34 home runs. He, you know, he stole 15 bases that year. I mean, this guy’s got, you look at him. I mean, he’s, you know, he very muscular and work special
Nestor Aparicio 24:34
bats from the Yankees. Did he pick one of those up in Tampa? We know if
Luke Jones 24:39
he uses the torpedo bat. But boy, you talk about something that the discourse is,
Nestor Aparicio 24:43
oh, man, did I just? Did I just bring that up too late into the segment? Do we need to do a whole torpedo Valley
Luke Jones 24:48
baseball? It’s now a prerequisite. You have to bring it up in the first three minutes
Nestor Aparicio 24:53
of any Oh, how about if we bring it up over crab cakes at fade Lee’s on Wednesday. Would you know what I torpedo bats on Wednesday? Up. One is, by then, the Yankees will have seven more home runs,
Luke Jones 25:02
right? You know, although the more and more I hear, I think Milwaukee threw a lot of bad pitches in that series as well. I don’t even
Nestor Aparicio 25:10
pick on Nestor Cortez on April Fool’s Day. Come on now, because
Luke Jones 25:13
I was listening, I think it was MLB Network radio and Dave Sims, who is now the play by play radio, the
Nestor Aparicio 25:21
way I walk by Luna del C, I want to give some love to Tony asadi over at LUNA del c, right on Pratt three. Great place to stop before games, I took Dave into his place, and I had Ivan Bates, who’s now the city attorney, and as a guest a couple years ago, and I went by and gave Tony hug, and he also knew mister Costas, so we had a moment with that, and that’s been tough the last couple days. But I saw him. He’s like, You brought the new Yankees announcer in on my into my place. Yeah, Dave’s a friend, so go ahead. But I love Dave. I’ve loved Dave for, oh, years, man, but, but
Luke Jones 25:55
he was asked like I said, it was MLB? No, it was on serious I was listening to one of my state you know, station I enjoy listening to when I want to get caught up around the league baseball. I’m so focused on the Orioles. But he was asked about the torpedo bats. He said, Look, this isn’t really a brand new thing. He said, they’ll walk you through a lot of fat pitches the Yankee hitters over the weekend. So just keep that in mind before we all go nuts about that. It’s
Nestor Aparicio 26:21
been a rough week for Nestor globally. I think, I think Nestor
Luke Jones 26:25
Cortez had a worse week though. I mean, three home runs and three pitches to start your outing. There’s no coming back from that but, but no to bring it back to the Orioles offense. You know, we talked about it over the weekend. I mean, they hit home runs. They hit a lot of home runs on opening day, but Monday, they didn’t hit a home run. They had two four run innings. Cedric Mullins, I think, his two run double in the bottom of the first. When you look at how that game played out, I mean, they were in a position, they were up to nothing. They had runners at second and third, nobody out. And then suddenly it’s looking like is this going to end up being an inning that you thought you had a chance to to open up a lead, and, oh, I said that out loud, watching. And then he strokes one to the right center gap, and, you know, drives in two, and suddenly it’s a four, nothing lead. And you say, All right, that’s, that’s the kind of big inning you like to have, you know, when you have that opportunity. Well, you want that for the kid pitching too. Yeah, no question, no question. And capovich even talked about that, and then in the in the eighth inning, after they had gotten such good bullpen work, you know, you think about what their bullpen was able to do. And as I said, I’m povid. I see potential for him to try to figure this out and become more efficient and be a legit member of this starting rotation. But, boy, they could really stand to have him figure it out sooner than later. But Bowman Dominguez, Aiken, yen, your Cano. I mean, they tossed, what was it? Three and two thirds scoreless innings between them, so it was nice to hang another four spot on the board in the bottom of the eighth because the Orioles weren’t scored runs that, yeah, and because we saw how Batista struggled in the ninth inning. You just think, had been a four, three game, that would have been a much different conversation we’re having the morning after. But good win. Offenses performed for the most part. You know, they had a couple games in Toronto where, you know, they didn’t do a whole lot. That’s baseball also. But they need, they need this team wide effort, you know, they need that to continue. Gunner Henderson should be back here in the coming days, but we know Colton cows are going to be out the next couple months. And you know that that’s the big loss, even with all the other talent that they do have, position
Nestor Aparicio 28:31
wise, torpedo bats and and colossal crap cakes, we’ll be at Faith these on Wednesday, on behalf of the Maryland lottery, have the magic eight ball scratch offs to give away on Wednesday, we have a whole cadre of shows coming up later on in the month, with lots and lots of guests. Mark Viviano is coming this week. My buddy Jamie Costello is going to be at Cocos later on in the month, I ran into all sorts of people on opening day. Thanks for all the kindness. And not too many people yelled nasty stuff at me. Most people were yelling, you know, good things and opening day things, and 75 degree days. And we hope to have more of those. On Wednesday, we will be down at faintly support the Oriole baseball and talking Oriole baseball the NFL owners meetings happen this week. Obviously, the Terps thing was crazy. I got a selfie with Derek Queen DQ. I saw that. Yeah, I was gonna put up the king of Baltimore sports and the but I didn’t do that. I just put, we’re from Baltimore, you know, you know we’re from Baltimore. What
Luke Jones 29:32
I have to since you said that, I wasn’t in the picture, but David Rubenstein was talking to Jim Palmer behind the cage during batting practice, I put up a photo, say Jim Palmer catching up with one of his fans. You mentioning the caption there for Queen? I’m like, I had to share it so
Nestor Aparicio 29:52
it was funny, dude. You know at heart, I grew up in a newspaper office at 15 and. And although we were not a tabloid newspaper on on Calvert street, I certainly not at the news American. At the news American. When I was a kid, everyone in that room thought in terms of it tabloid headlines and us being a tab, because it was always a rumor that that’s what they were going to do with us and make us a tabloid newspaper like they did in Philly. And never happened. But then one of my dearest friends in life, one of my sponsors in life, a guy named Steve Miller, the killer, uh, big New York Rangers fan. I worked with him at the Baltimore Sun, and he left the Baltimore Sun to go to the Miami Herald, and I got an interview down there and some great shrimp cocktail and a free trip down to Biscayne to interview at the Miami Herald in 1989 the great Armando Salguero got my job instead. So I always said to him, dude, they did pretty well. They hired you. They did better than they could have done. Hired me. Then after that, they hired levitard. So they did okay, but Steve went on to work in New York and became the tabloid headline writer, and he was one of the greatest in the world at the at the back page headline. So that’s a great Back Page, headline caption, you know, so let’s work on those this year, because we are, I am the bastard of all sports journalist in Baltimore, locked out of both, and it’s not even an April Fool’s joke. We’re going to talk some pitching when we come back. We’re going to talk torpedo bats at fadelies. Mark Viviano is going to legitimize this program on Wednesday by stopping by faith leads. Stick with us. It’s baseball season. We’ve been doing this a long time. It’s kind of fun when they’re good. I’m Nestor. He’s Luke. We’re Baltimore positive.com. You.
