The Orioles had the highlight of the weekend. No, not Chris Davis pitching, but this:

[Not sure where this originated, but I discovered it via Ryan Hudson]

The Orioles should be feeling really good. Prior to the season the usual trio of the Yankees, Red Sox, and Rays were considered the contenders for the American League East, with the Blue Jays perhaps as the upcoming outsider. Baltimore was understandably thought of as being, well, a terrible team looking at an ugly season as they start a long rebuilding process. As of this writing, the Orioles are all alone atop the toughest division in baseball, one-half game ahead of Tampa Bay.

[Awkward fist pump]

I doubt all but the most devout Orioles believers think this will last, but it is a nice place to be. However, it does raise questions of if and when the Orioles should start to shop some of their attractive pieces for prospects that might be around for the next potential contender in Baltimore. For today’s case in point, let’s look at shortstop J.J. Hardy.

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During the off-season, the one prospect question I never seem to have an answer for in chats is, “give me a sleeper prospect for the upcoming season.” For me, sleeper prospects are discussed throughout the season as a player’s performance is perceived as far more impressive than the prospect chatter surrounding said player.

In 2011, a few sleeper favorites included Rangers Christian Villanueva, Xander Bogaerts, Brandon Jacobs and Nathan Eovaldi who made the jump from unheralded prospects to top-100 performers in a season’s time. However, sleepers in general were few and far between during the 2011 season as so few stones go left unturned with the amount of prospect and rankings information flowing freely on the Internet.

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The Baltimore Orioles are off to a hot start, and are currently leading the American League East by a game over Tampa Bay and New York. It almost certainly will not last — raise your hand if you think the Orioles’ pitching staff will end the year with their current 3.60 ERA — but at least it is a short period of fun for the fans. It is not simply that some Baltimore pitchers have gotten off to good starts. The Orioles currently have three hitters with a seasonal wOBA of around .450: outfielders Adam Jones (.447) and Nolan Reimold (.457), and also former future franchise savior Matt Wieters (.447). Jones and Reimold are surprises, of course, but this is exactly what one would expect from the rookie catcher after his domination of the minors.

Oh, wait, Wieters is actually in his fourth year in the majors. His current .308/.413/.641 slash line might be a bit higher than what was expected of him in his 2009 rookie debut, but without singling anyone out, it is not that much higher that some had him projected back then. We all know that 2012 is a small sample, but is there a sense in which Matt Wieters might finally be “arriving?” Only if you are one of those people who did not realize that he was an excellent player prior to this season.

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Fernando Rodney has three saves and a win so far this season. Fernando Rodney has gotten eight outs so far this season. As strange as it may first seem for a late-inning reliever to have four decisions with so few batters faced, it’s business as usual in Tampa Bay. Here’s a box score that is fairly typical for the Rays:

It certainly appears that the Rays are micro-managing their bullpen. Perhaps the aim is to gain the platoon advantage in as many situations as possible — teams do that all the time. But which ones are doing it most often?

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Last week, I missed out on Dylan Bundy’s pro debut, as I just couldn’t make the two-hour drive to Asheville work with my schedule. But, tonight, Bundy was even closer, pitching just over an hour away in Kannapolis, and I wasn’t going to miss him twice in a span of six days. So, I jumped on I-85 and took in a game with the other 100 or so people who decided to brave the sudden cold front that rolled into NC today.

It took me about an hour to get there. Due to his three-inning limit, Bundy was only in the game for about 30 minutes, and he was actually on the mound for less than 10. It was still well worth the drive.

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Dylan Bundy’s Orioles debut for the Delmarva Shorebirds versus the Asheville Tourists, a Rockies affiliate, marked the start of a fourth season for me scouting prospects in the South Atlantic League. In previous years, highly ranked pitching prospects have come and gone, bringing with them reportedly unhittable “stuff.” In most cases, those arms never live up to advanced billing as the prospect hype does not match performance on the field. With Dylan Bundy, his ability may have been undersold, as exemplified by the lack of major media at his first professional start.

Video after the jump

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Rain. The archenemy of baseball fans across the country, inclement weather has the ability to throw a scouting trip into flux. As a rule, I never commit to an overnight trip when rain is in the forecast, but made an exception for Orioles uber-prospect Dylan Bundy as it was the only time this season the young right-hander was scheduled to throw within 200 miles of my home outside of Atlanta.

the trip started innocently enough, driving three hours on small highways and back roads leading into the mountains. At Podunk Produce, the sun was shining and baskets of tomatoes sat outside patiently awaiting a short drive to a local dinner table close by. Chunky Girl Stables came and went leaving me wondering just how chunky a girl could be and still comfortably mount a stallion or mare.

It was a beautiful Thursday afternoon as batting practice crept closer and the miles continued to inch towards 200.

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Read the methodology behind the ratings here. Remember that the grading scale is 20-80, with 50 representing league average.

Baltimore’s 2011 Ranking: #16

2012 Outlook: – 31 (29th)

The Orioles would be a long shot to be a contender in any division in baseball, as their young pitching hasn’t emerged as they had hoped and they’ve struggled to find good complementary offensive pieces to surround their best young players. As such, this a team that is going to give up a lot of runs and not score enough to compensate. When you add in the level of competition they face in the American League East, it would take something close to the largest miracle in sports history for the Orioles to win their division this season. The addition of a second wild card spot does make it more possible for the Orioles to hope they can play in October again at some point, but that point is not this year. The talent level just isn’t in place to compete with good Major League teams, and in a division with three of the seven best teams in baseball ahead of them, they should consider a 75 win season a success.

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The Orioles are reportedly looking to trade “third baseman” Mark Reynolds and reliever Kevin Gregg. You think so, doctor? It would be strange if the team really waited until this late to start shopping these two veterans, who are rather pointless on a team that is at the beginning of what looks to be a long rebuilding process. To be fair, while the rumor is just coming out now, they may have been shopping these guys for a while. Gregg is a pretty generic reliever (other than having that oh-so-valuable “closer experience”), but Reynolds is an interesting case. His problems making contact with both the bat and glove make him a flawed player, but his monstrous power makes him playable in the right situation. But are there any teams on which that situation exists?

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So far this spring, SP Yu Darvish has pitched 9 innings while walking 7 and striking out 10. Rangers fans, like any typical fan would, are beginning to laugh nervously. It is only human tendency, of course, to make too much out of Spring Training. We have been trapped in a baseball-less winter for nigh-on twelve or eighteen months or something up until this month, so when we finally get some more of that sweet, leather-tossing action, it’s only natural we freak out when someone goes 0 for 3 or a pitcher allows 2 home runs.

The best solution to this March Mania is to refer to the wealth of statistics behind the player and remind oneself that, more often than not, the last few years will tell us much more than the present spring. Well, for Darvish, it’s not as easy. So here, today, right now, I offer that March Mania solution for all NPB imports (I’m looking at you, SP Wei-Yin Chen, SP Tsuyoshi Wada, and OF Norichika Aoki):

Presenting the 2011 NPB stats for hitters and pitchers:
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