The Orioles finally got their roster settled yesterday while the Diamondbacks took batting practice. It wasn’t just minutes before first pitch.

Not that the process was simple.

We can’t have that.

They wanted to put Ryan Mountcastle on the 60-day injured list to make room for infielder/outfielder Weston Wilson on the 40-man roster. Wilson had his contract selected from Triple-A Norfolk. But the commissioner’s office needed to approve it and Major League Baseball moves at a snail’s pace.

The usual order is placement on the 10- or 15-day IL, depending on whether it’s a position player or pitcher, followed later by a transfer to the 60-day.

Mountcastle has a long road ahead of him after fracturing the fourth metatarsal in his left foot. He isn’t coming back when he’s eligible.

“The most common one is the fifth metatarsal fracture, and that’s a little bit more serious because the blood flow isn’t great to the fifth,” said Dr. Gene Shirokobrod, a doctor of physical therapy who’s owner and CEO of RECHARGE in Columbia. “The fourth is generally a straight-forward healing process because there’s a ton of blood flow there, which is good because blood carries oxygen and oxygen you need for a healing environment.

“The biggest risk in the fourth fracture, which I’m sure has been looked at and ruled out, is something called the ‘Lisfranc’ injury, which is a fracture and displacement of the fourth metatarsal. So as long as that’s ruled out and it’s not a Lisfranc injury, a fourth metatarsal injury usually doesn’t require a cast. It’s just a walking boot.”

That’s about it for the good news.

“But it’s a minimum of six weeks, most likely eight weeks, and that’s just talking about healing. So the fracture to heal up and callus over. And then return to sport typically takes another similar time period,” Shirokobrod said.

“So all in all, if we’re looking at return to the field, with an injury rehab assignment, probably conservatively 10 weeks, realistically somewhere 12-to-14 weeks.”

The Orioles don’t live by timetables, but the period is expanded for an athlete. An accountant, for example, could return to a desk much faster. A teacher to a classroom.

“Because of the way baseball is, you have to create so much torque on the foot and plant and cut,” Shirokobrod said.

Mountcastle’s luck doesn’t show any signs of improving.

It’s actually getting worse. And there are no easy explanations for it.

Why did he begin to experience vertigo symptoms in 2023? Why did a dive into second base in 2024 cause him to sprain his wrist? Why did a successful steal of home last year injure his hamstring?

Why did the Orioles move back the left field wall in 2022 and make it much hard to hit home runs?

They corrected that overreaction but couldn’t save him from the injuries.

The broken foot didn’t occur because of an errant pitch or a slip. He stumbled because of the fracture, not the other way around.

“You think about the foot when you walk, it’s constantly adjusting to the ground in front of you,” Shirokobrod said. “So because he’s in a cleat and his foot is a little compressed, having just a weird roll or a weird force go through the foot can cause something like that. I have no idea what the level of the fracture was. It could have been a crack, it could have been displaced. It could have been more of, bad place, bad time, bad direction type of thing. It makes sense for something like that, for sure.”

Jackson Holliday did some fielding work and took batting practice yesterday while Triple-A Norfolk was off. His injury rehab assignment ends Wednesday, but manager Craig Albernaz said the second baseman won’t play for the Orioles this week.

Holliday is dealing with some lingering soreness after having a broken right hamate bone removed in February.

“Those are really, really annoying,” Shirokobrod said. “You have to kind of think of it this way: Jackson Holliday, who’s in his early 20s, he’s had 20-some years of his brain mapping out where that bone is and remembering it. So it’s like living in the same house forever and ever, and then you remove one of the chairs, and the house is still the same, but it just doesn’t feel right, so you just have to live in it for a little while. And it’s the same thing. It’s a bit of reconstructing those neuropathways from the brain down. It generally takes a little while.

“If he wasn’t a baseball player and he didn’t the bat and the ball and the constant jolting go through his hand, he’d probably be a little bit quicker. We tell people when they’re recovering from something like that, their recovery, just healing, was double that. So recovery of a broken hamate, just like a broke metatarsal, a broken bone, you’re looking at six-to-eight weeks, and then you’re looking at six-to-eight weeks of relearning afterwards. It’ll probably bother him on and off for another couple months.”

*Having 13 players on the injured list and a manager drilled in the face by a line drive didn’t prevent the Orioles from rallying for a 9-7 win over the Diamondbacks.

The Orioles were victorious for the first time when trailing by six or more runs in the sixth inning or later since May 27, 2022 in Boston. They’ve won six of seven.

“I think that just goes to show the type of team we have,” said Jeremiah Jackson, who had an infield single, grand slam and solo homer after nailing Albernaz with his liner into the dugout. “I don’t think we dwell too much in the past, whether it’s good or bad. We kinda have this Day One mentality every day, and that’s kind of just something that Alby has pushed since the beginning of spring training. And I think when you have that type of mentality, it’s easy to bounce back from the not-so-good game.”

“I think that whole situation tonight,” said bench coach Donnie Ecker, “it speaks to the competitive character of the players, and it really speaks to what Alby has been leading here and kind of modeling in terms of the culture we want to create.

“I think if you’re in (clubhouse), the boys, they know what they did. And I think the important part, whether we lose by five, win by five, or a game like tonight, the thing that stands out about that locker room is that we will find ways to get better tomorrow and we’ll shower, we’ll start back over tomorrow at scratch and we’ll figure out how to how to affect winning tomorrow.”

Pete Alonso, who belted a go-ahead, two-run homer in the seventh, might have most impressed by Jackson’s infield hit because he came right after the Albernaz incident.

“Absolute big time from J.J.,” Alonso said. “The best at-bat of the night, everyone’s going to talk about the homers, but after what happened, I know it was kind of like a swinging bunt, but to be able to recenter and refocus after the ball hit Craig, that takes a lot of stones to do that. And he recentered himself and he got on base. That’s a really tough, gritty at-bat.”

The Orioles won it for Albernaz. And they’ll try to do it again tonight.

“He’s special,” Jackson said. “We love playing behind him. We love playing for him. He’s awesome, so it’s been a lot of fun to be with him, and he’s definitely set a good tone in here and in the dugout, and it makes it fun to go out there and battle for him.”