SARASOTA, Fla. – Zack Britton stood behind the row of bullpen mounds Tuesday morning with another former Orioles pitcher, Ben McDonald, and watched the side sessions. He went indoors earlier with a fungo bat in hand to retrieve his glove, unsure whether he might actually use it.

This is Britton’s first experience as a guest instructor, and the enjoyment is amplified with older brother Buck in camp as the new major league coach. The former All-Star closer is settling into a new role and admiring the Orioles’ progress since they traded him to the Yankees at the 2018 deadline and began their rebuild.

“It’s been great, I think just getting around everybody again, getting back in the organization,” he said earlier today. “A lot of memories here, a lot of good ones. Nice to meet a lot of the new front office people, a lot of the new coaches. Fun to see my brother out here interacting with the guys.”

Britton spent 7 ½ of his 12 major league seasons with the Orioles after they drafted him in the third round in 2006. They turned him into a closer and watched him earn back-to-back All-Star selections, his peak season in 2016 with 47 saves in 47 chances, a 0.54 ERA and 0.836 WHIP in 69 appearances, and a fourth-place finish in Cy Young voting. It was one of the finest performances by a reliever in baseball history.

The Orioles played in the Wild Card Game in Toronto, didn’t use Britton in an 11-inning, walk-off loss, and began tearing down the team in the summer of ’18. They didn’t return to the postseason until 2023, the same year that Britton was first out of baseball.

SARASOTA, Fla. – Gary Sánchez’s experience catching Japanese pitchers won’t necessarily give him regular starts on days that Tomoyuki Sugano is on the mound.

Maybe it evolves that way.

Sánchez was behind the plate yesterday for Sugano’s bullpen session, and he’s caught Masahiro Tanaka with the Yankees and Yu Darvish with the Padres.

“Post-bullpen, Gary and I sat on the mound and kind of talked about his experience with Tanaka and some of the other guys that he’s caught,” said pitching coach Drew French. “The versatility that they have and what their preferences are and how they talk about themselves, and I definitely think there are some parallels from his prior years in the game with what Tomo features.”

So what about becoming Sugano’s personal backstop?

SARASOTA, Fla. – There aren’t many prospects in baseball with an 80 grade tool. 

The grading scale, ranging from 20 to 80, evaluates five different tools for position players: Hit (evaluating contact), power, run (evaluating overall speed offensively and defensively), arm and field. 

MLB Pipeline’s highest graded position player, Roman Anthony, doesn’t have a single grade above a 60. Nor does Walker Jenkins, Pipeline’s third overall prospect in their top 100. 

Coby Mayo’s prodigious power has a 70 grade according to Pipeline’s scouts. As do the power tools of some recent top draft picks like Jac Caglianone and Charlie Condon. 

It’s very rare to find a perfect grade of an 80. Enrique Bradfield Jr., according to some outlets, has two: run and field. 

SARASOTA, Fla. – Orioles pitching coach Drew French was eager to begin working with Tomoyuki Sugano even before the Japanese right-hander agreed to a $13 million contract. The deal became official and French approached interpreter Yuto Sakurai with a favor. Simple in nature but hugely meaningful.

“I said I need to start learning his language a little bit,” French said. “I’ve done some things to try to help myself, but ultimately woke up the next day and forgot them.”

French had a specific translation request. He wanted to know how to say, “good job.” It’s like he anticipated what would happen during the first bullpen session.

“Ultimately, that’s the phrase I went with today,” French said, “and hopefully tomorrow I can learn another one.”

Might I suggest “great job?”

SARASOTA, Fla. – Tomoyuki Sugano can work through a lineup and jet lag with similar ease.

The first bullpen session for Sugano this morning lived up to the tremendous hype. He threw 35 pitches and exhibited his usual pinpoint control. Only the slider was omitted from a repertoire that consisted of a four-seam fastball, cutter, splitter, sinker and curveball.

“It’s everything that was advertised when we started vetting him in free agency,” said pitching coach Drew French. “That’s what our scouts said and our org loves... We think at times it’s going to be 80 command. It’s really, really good. Definitely sides of the plate, he understands horizontal game, and how he mixed his pitches. It was just nice to finally be in person and see him do his work.”

Sugano was late to camp while obtaining his visa in Tokyo, his arrival delayed until Saturday, and he requested that his debut in the 'pen be pushed back from yesterday. He was totally worth the wait.

“I was happy to have good command in today’s session, so that was good,” he said via interpreter Yuto Sakurai.

SARASOTA, Fla. – The Orioles are hoping to catch Albert Suárez in a bottle.

They signed pitcher Rodolfo Martinez to a minor league contract on Nov. 1, the magnitude of it pretty much lost on the baseball world. He hadn’t been with an affiliated team since 2019 in the Giants system, with his travels taking him to the Dominican Republic, Mexico and Japan.

Sounds kind of familiar, except Suárez signed with the Orioles in September 2023 after pitching in Japan and Korea, his last affiliated ball was 2018 and he appeared in 40 major league games with the Giants from 2016-17.

“I was in San Francisco before the pandemic and then they sent us home for two weeks while everything was supposed to get cleared out, but as we all know, that didn’t happen,” Martinez said. “The Giants cleared house and they didn’t want me there anymore.”

The most important similarity would be for Martinez to have the same success as Suárez, who made 24 starts and eight relief appearances for the Orioles last season after reporting to camp as a non-roster invitee and registered a 3.70 ERA in 133 2/3 innings. He was in come-to-the-rescue mode as rotation injuries piled up, and he could provide length out of the bullpen.

SARASOTA, Fla. – Scott McGregor won big games for the Orioles, including his shutout against the Phillies to clinch the 1983 World Series. He served in a variety of roles upon his retirement, including rehab pitching coordinator for eight seasons before his dismissal in 2019. He had worked as a pitching coach in the minors and fill-in bullpen coach for the Orioles. He’s seen a lot.

His eyes presently are locked onto pitchers and players at the spring training complex with his return as a guest instructor.

“When I was let go, Mike (Elias) said, ‘Listen, we know what you’ve done for the organization and we’ll always let you come back as a visiting guy,’ so it’s been good,” McGregor recalled yesterday. “These guys are the ones that I coached before. I’m very good with them and they like seeing me and I like seeing them. It’s fun to stay in touch.

“I’m just really impressed with what’s going on with the whole Elias regime and with Hyder (Brandon Hyde) and them. They’ve done a great job. So, you’ve just got to win a playoff game.”

Maybe this year.

SARASOTA, Fla. – Jordan Westburg is intense. Fans like intense. 

Would his friends and family describe him that way?

“Probably,” Westburg laughed. “I can be intense, you know? I’m not gonna dodge those allegations. But I do think there’s a lighter side, there’s a less serious side to me off the field especially. But here, I’m kind of very business-like, very matter of fact.” 

Westburg was all business in 2024. Flying under the radar entering the year, the third baseman put together an All-Star campaign. Westy posted a .792 OPS in his 107 games, but rather than boasting about the positives, he would point to the fact that his total wasn’t closer to 160. 

“I learned a lot last year from getting to play more,” Westburg said. “I was very bummed that I didn’t get a full season. I’m looking forward to trying to stay healthy this year and get a full season and see what we can piece together” 

SARASOTA, Fla. – Tommy Joseph noticed it right away.

After spending the 2024 season as assistant hitting coach in Seattle, Joseph accepted the same job with the Orioles and immediately was struck by the positive atmosphere and tight bonds formed among players who genuinely care about each other. They’re teammates but also friends. They have the same goals and each other’s backs.

The hitting philosophies are almost universal, with Joseph saying, “You try to score more runs as the other team. You’ve just got to find as many ways to do that as you can every day.”

And then, there’s this:

“In terms of the environment and the culture, just being here a couple days, you can tell it’s very special. They’ve built something very special and the players really bought in on everything here," he said.

SARASOTA, Fla. – Zack Britton reports to Orioles spring training in two days to serve as a guest instructor. His older brother is excited to see him again. They have lots to talk about beyond their families.

Buck Britton spent the last three seasons as Triple-A Norfolk manager before the Orioles promoted him this winter to major league coach. He began coaching in 2017 with Single-A Delmarva, managed the Shorebirds for one year and held the job for three with Double-A Bowie.

The call to the majors never arrived while playing from 2008-16 after the Orioles drafted him in the 35^th round. Zack, meanwhile, went from third-round pick and failed starter to two-time All-Star closer who converted all 47 save chances in 2016.

“He was super fired up for me,” Buck said this morning.

“It will be cool. We got to spend some time on the field together in Triple-A when we were playing, but he was a little more serious back then. He’s unemployed, by the way. I’m the guy who’s still hanging on here. But it will be fun. I’ll get to tell stories, probably lie a little bit about them, but in my favor. I just want to see him hit a fungo because I don’t know if he can handle that.”

Heston Kjerstad’s reputation is that of a powerful slugger from the left side of the plate.

So would you believe me if I told you that he and Jackson Holliday had the exact same career minor league batting average? Or that Kjerstad’s .387 on-base percentage was just three points below Adley Rutschman’s down on the farm? The Arkansas product has proved himself to be a well-rounded force at the plate, and an OPS close to .750 in limited action in the big leagues is a sign of better things to come. Manager Brandon Hyde and general manager Mike Elias seem to think so, too. 

“He’s put up huge Triple-A numbers, and there’s opportunity now,” Hyde told reporters down in Sarasota.

“I think he’s kind of earned the right to get a lot of at-bats in the corner outfield and in the DH spot, specifically against right-handed pitching,” added Elias. 

As Elias said, Kjerstad has earned at-bats in the big leagues. But there are only so many swings and roster spots to go around. 

SARASOTA, Fla. – Heston Kjerstad sat quietly at his locker yesterday morning, staring at his phone with legs stretched out and empty chairs on both sides of him. An isolated figure. Pretty much how he likes it.

Kjerstad isn’t anti-social. He just doesn’t command a lot of attention in a clubhouse with some extremely high-profile young players.

The bat, however, can get loud.

The Orioles want to hear it a lot this season. No more breakdowns in his quest to become a regular contributor at the major league level. No injuries or illnesses. No interruptions and options. It’s time to find out what they have in Kjerstad beyond sick power and potential.

Executive vice president/general manager Mike Elias told the media last week that this is a “big opportunity” for Kjerstad and the second-overall pick in the 2020 draft “earned the right to get a lot of at-bats in the corner outfield and in the DH spot, specifically against right-handed pitching.”

The Orioles outfield is crowded. 

Three everyday starters occupy patches of grass in left, center, and right field. As the 4th outfielder, how can one of the best prospects in the game prove himself without consistent at-bats? 

If this conversation about Heston Kjerstad sounds familiar, it’s because I wasn’t talking about Heston Kjerstad. It’s the conversation that many of us were having at this time last year surrounding Colton Cowser.  

Austin Hays was fresh off an All-Star campaign in 2023. Cedric Mullins hadn’t relinquished his grasp on his center field role since his breakout season in 2021. Anthony Santander had played over 300 games in 2022 and 2023, combining for 61 home runs and a .785 OPS. The starting outfield was set in proverbial stone.  

If Colton Cowser was going to prove himself at the big league level, he was going to have to earn his playing time.  

SARASOTA, Fla. – Cedric Mullins is the last man standing, and running, among the trio of young outfielders who made their way from the minors to Camden Yards.

Austin Hays was traded to the Phillies last summer and he signed with the Reds as a free agent. Anthony Santander received a five-year deal with the Blue Jays.

Mullins is approaching his own free agency as he prepares for his eighth season in the majors. The Orioles drafted him in 2015.

“On the personal side, there’s a lot of focus involved, of course, but on the team side of things, it’s business as usual,” Mullins said. “We go about it day by day, looking to improve the team.”

Santander’s big personality is conspicuous by its absence in the clubhouse. However, the Orioles will be in Toronto for a four-game opening series, so the reunion isn’t too far down the runway.

SARASOTA, Fla. – The Mountain is moving in the right direction.

Félix Bautista is throwing in the bullpen and his surgically repaired elbow is responding favorably to the workload. He hasn’t experienced any setbacks, nothing that makes him doubt his availability on March 27 at Rogers Centre in Toronto.

“I feel really good right now, thank God,” Bautista said this morning via interpreter Brandon Quinones in his first media scrum since last spring training. “Marching on, everything is going according to plan, and that remains the goal to be ready for Opening Day.”

Bautista hasn’t unleashed a pitch since Aug. 25, 2023 against the Rockies at Camden Yards. He walked off the mound with two outs and two strikes, a 102.3 mph fastball not hinting at a physical issue but his reaction to it and departure setting off alarms.

Surgery followed two months later, leading to a prolonged and lonely rest and rehab schedule. He sat out the 2024 season, while the Orioles returned to the playoffs and were swept by the Royals in the Wild Card round.

SARASOTA, Fla. – Grayson Rodriguez’s big strike in the offseason happened on a hunting trip in Mexico, where he shot a ram and now waits for it to clear customs and arrive in the United States.

Rodriguez hasn’t managed to buy Corbin Burnes’ fishing boat but could make his pitch when the team is in Phoenix.

These are the topics that bring a smile to Rodriguez’s face, the more playful side that is buried during those moments when he’s got to be all business. And not the kind that purchases water crafts.

Orioles pitchers and catchers held their first workout yesterday at the Ed Smith Stadium complex. Rodriguez hasn’t appeared in a game since July 31 due to another lat/teres strain that he couldn’t rehab in time to make the Wild Card roster. He didn’t make it past bullpen sessions and watched his teammates get swept by the Royals.

“Feeling good,” he said yesterday. “Last year at the end of the year there was a chance that I was gonna come back and throw. It’s kind of what I was trying to do. Ultimately, it didn’t work out, but the first week that I got home I was fully cleared from the doctors to move on and do my offseason program and everything, and didn’t have a problem.”

SARASOTA, Fla. – Heston Kjerstad arrived early at Orioles spring training, well ahead of the report date for position players. He’s fighting for a roster spot in a crowded outfield, and if he doesn’t make the club, it won’t be for lack of an opportunity.

Kjerstad had his 2024 season ruined by a concussion, a Clay Holmes 96.8 mph sinker to the helmet on July 13 causing benches and bullpens to empty. He was limited to 39 games, with momentum destroyed from a .314/.417/.529 first half. He went 9-for-48 after the break.

Spring training stats are important in some cases, but they apparently won’t apply to Kjerstad.

“I don’t know that he needs to tear the cover off the ball in the Grapefruit League,” executive vice president/general manager Mike Elias said earlier today. “We’ve seen him do that already. He’s played pretty well in a limited opportunity at the major league level. He’s played really well in the minors, and he’s going on 26 and this is a big opportunity for him.

“I think he’s kind of earned the right to get a lot of at-bats in the corner outfield and in the DH spot, specifically against right-handed pitching. But long term, this guy when we took him, one of the best hitters in college baseball and he can hit left-handed pitching. But the big leagues are tough and that’s why we’re putting together a team that has some right-handed options, as well.”

The Orioles today announced that they have invited nine former players to serve as guest coaches at major league Spring Training in Sarasota, Fla. The list includes Zack Britton, Al Bumbry, J.J. Hardy, Adam Jones, Nick Markakis, Ben McDonald, Scott McGregor, Brian Roberts, and John Shelby. Bumbry, Hardy, Markakis, McGregor, and Roberts are members of the Orioles Hall of Fame, and Jones is a Special Advisor to the General Manager and Community Ambassador. Together, the guest coaches have 14 All-Star selections, 10 Gold Gloves, and three Silver Slugger Awards. A complete list of guest coaches and dates is below:

Guest Coach                       Dates

Scott McGregor                February 12-22                  

Ben McDonald                 February 18-22

The Orioles have made the following roster move:

• OF Daz Cameron has cleared outright waivers and accepted an assignment to Triple-A Norfolk. He has been invited to major league Spring Training.

Pitchers and catchers have officially reported to spring training! And in just a short while, the full Orioles squad will report to Ed Smith Stadium in Sarasota. 

Annie Klaff and I, the hosts of the MASN Orioles podcast “The Bird’s Nest,” will be joining them to put a camera in their faces, a practice that players and coaches have surely been lamentably deprived of all offseason. We’ll be providing lots of content on our MASN Orioles social pages, and I hope you’ll follow along. 

On this week’s episode of “The Bird’s Nest,” Annie and I discussed the top storylines that we’ll be keeping an eye on. For a more in-depth analysis of these topics, you can check out the full podcast here.

How will the new free agent signings fit?

Of course, the free agents that the Orioles acquired this offseason will have huge impacts on the field. At spring training, we will get glimpses of what that may be, but we’ll need to wait for 1 of 162 to start to get a better idea. Instead, this first stretch of play offers us an opportunity to have a glimpse inside the clubhouse. Will veterans like Charlie Morton and Tyler O’Neill be immediate vocal leaders? Or will they lead by their example rather than words? How will they mesh with the well-established young core that has had spots reserved in the locker room for many seasons? These are all questions that we will begin to get answers to.