Scott Garceau: O's Unexpected Delivery
We shouldn't be surprised that the Orioles are in the thick of the American League East race as we near the mid-point of the 2015 season. Buck's Birds have been one of baseball's winningest teams over the past three and a half seasons and they have a good shot to play post-season baseball for the third teams in four years.
The destination will be determined in October but the journey is the daily grind that attracts us to the boys of summer. This season's journey has included major contributions from stars Adam Jones, and Manny Machado (would you trade Manny for any third baseman in baseball?). It's a recovering Chris Davis who's raised his .196 batting average of '14 by almost 40 points and is on pace for 34 home runs and nearly 100 RBI.
Matt Wieters and J.J. Hardy have returned from injuries to bring back their Gold Glove defense, timely hitting and rock solid leadership and the bullpen lead by Darren O'Day and Zach Britton (21 of 22 in save chances) is one of the best in baseball. All of the above have a track record and their contributions while appreciated by the fans in Birdland don't come as a surprise.
Fans live for those surprises, will this be the year the phenom puts it all together? Will the aging veteran find the fountain of youth for one more magic summer? How 'bout the veteran backup who finally gets his opportunity and takes off (see Steve Pierce '14). Each team and summer has these stories here are three from the Orioles summer of 2015.
Jimmy Parades — He started hitting in spring training and he hasn't stopped. What a God-send! This is a guy who's challenged defensively and came into this season as a .242 career hitter with a whopping 5 home runs in 430 at bats. He's currently 5th in hitting in the American League and leads the Orioles with a .311 average. He became the first Orioles hitter to drive in 20 runs in his first 25 games since 1986. He's hit 8 homers and 5 of the 8 have been go ahead home runs. Parades has been Paradise for Buck Showalter.
Ubaldo Jimenez — Let's be honest here, Jimenez was horrible in 2014 and most Oriole fans weren't thrilled to see him as part of the 2015 rotation. A good spring and a rich contract won him a spot and he's delivered so far. His numbers are solid, a 6-3 record with a 3.40 ERA and he leads the Orioles with 82K's. Sure he still has his moments but this is far from the guy who needed a GPS system to find home plate a year ago. The Orioles are 8-6 in his starts and he's second on the team with 6 quality starts. Ubaldo a favorite with his teammates is becoming a favorite with the fans.
Chaz Roe — Raise your hand if you knew what a Chaz Roe was before this season. I thought so. The 28 year old right-hander has been around. Colorado, Seattle, Arizona, Texas, Miami, NY Yankees, Pittsburgh and here he is dealing in Baltimore. And I mean dealing, the Orioles signed him last December and he debuted with Baltimore on May 24th. He has been terrific in the Orioles bullpen; he inherited 11 base runners none scored.
He's 2-0 with an ERA of 0.93 and a lights-out WHIP of 0.88. in his 19 innings he's struck out 21 and walked only 6. Prior to the O's his MLB career consisted of only 22 innings in Arizona in 2013 and 2 innings with the Yankees last summer. He's bounced through 8 organizations but it looks like Chaz Roe has found a summer home in the Orioles bullpen.
Parades, Jimenez, Roe all major contributors to the Orioles first half, who knew!
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