After taking the first two games at Fenway Park by scores of 7-1 and a comeback win by 7-5 last night, the Orioles can sweep this series with a win tonight over the Boston Red Sox.

It's a matchup of the second- and third-place teams in the American League East. The Orioles (7-4) are in second, two games behind the New York Yankees (10-3), while Boston (7-5) is in third place, 2 1/2 games behind the division leaders.

The Orioles are the first team this year to take a series from Boston, which went 2-0-1 in three series on the West Coast to start the year. The Red Sox were 6-1 their previous seven games heading into this series.

The Orioles have not lost a series against an AL East opponent since losing two of three to the Yankees April 7-9, 2023. Baltimore has not dropped a series in the division in 15 straight sets, improving to 11-0-4 during that time. That is the longest such run in team history, per the Elias Sports Bureau.

Five of the Orioles' seven wins this season have been in comeback fashion. Last night they trailed 5-0 after five innings. Baltimore's 53 comeback wins since the start of last season are the most in the major leagues. Their 89 come-from-behind victories since the start of 2022 are second-most, behind the Dodgers (90).

The Orioles and Pittsburgh Pirates play the second game of their three-game series this afternoon after the Orioles won 5-2 on Friday to begin the weekend.

The Orioles (5-2) won their first road game of the year and now are 3-0 in series-opening games.

As of this morning, they are in third place in the American League East, 1/2-game behind both New York and Boston at 6-2.

If the Orioles win one of the next two games, they will have three series wins to start the season. The last two O’s teams to do that were in 2009 and 2016.

Orioles pitchers are doing a solid job thus far. Their team ERA of 3.14 ranks seventh-best in the AL and eighth overall in the majors. Baltimore’s bullpen ERA is 2.38, which ranks sixth-best in the AL and seventh overall in the big leagues. Over the last five games, the O’s bullpen has allowed two earned runs over 16 2/3 innings.

BOWIE, Md. – After missing almost three of his first four seasons in pro baseball, Double-A Bowie pitcher Kyle Brnovich hopes for health this year just so he can be back on the mound consistently.

After the Los Angeles Angels drafted Brnovich out of Elon University in round eight of the 2019 draft, the organization shut him down. The following year, the pandemic hit baseball and the world, and there was no minor league season. So two seasons into his pro career, Brnovich had zero innings.

After that first year, he was one of four pitchers the O’s acquired for right-hander Dylan Bundy along with Zach Peek, Isaac Mattson and Kyle Bradish.

So yeah, this trade has worked out for Baltimore, and Peek and Brnovich begin this season with Bowie hoping to make that deal look even better.

Both pitchers are coming back from Tommy John surgery. Brnovich had his procedure on May 12, 2022 and returned June 26, 2023 to pitch in a Florida Complex League game. Peek had surgery in August 2022 and was back last August.

If they can get this game in through the raindrops today in Baltimore, the Orioles and Royals are set to play the third and deciding game of this three-game series. It also ends the O's first homestand of the 2024 season.

The Orioles produced a walk-off win on Monday night, 6-4, on Jordan Westburg's two-run homer in the ninth. They were held to three hits last night in a 3-1 loss. The O's went 12-8 in rubber match games in 2023.

The Orioles have scored 11, 13 and six runs in their three wins on 33 hits with eight doubles, a triple and six homers, and have gone 11-for-27 with runners in scoring position. In the two losses they scored one and one run, going 6-for-60 as a team and 2-for-9 with RISP. 

Right-hander Corbin Burnes makes his second start for the club. On Opening Day he gave up a two-out, solo homer to the Angels' Mike Trout and then retired the last 16 batters he faced. The Angels went just 1-for-19 against him with 11 strikeouts and no walks. 

His 11 strikeouts tied Mike Mussina from 1998 for the second-most by an O's pitcher on Opening Day. Lefty Dave McNally set that mark with 13 strikeouts at Cleveland on April 7, 1970.

The Orioles and Kansas City Royals may be forced to dodge some raindrops the next few days, but they are scheduled to begin a three-game series tonight at Camden Yards.

The Orioles (2-1) are a game and a half back of the 4-0 New York Yankees for the American League East lead. They opened the season with wins by 11-3 and 13-4 scores over the Los Angeles Angels before they were held to three hits in Sunday's 4-1 loss.

Kansas City scored big in its third game after losing the first two to Minnesota by 4-1 and 5-1 scores before Sunday's 11-0 win.

The Orioles rank fourth in the AL in team batting average (.267) and OBP (.347). They are third in slugging (.475) and third in OPS (.823) behind only Texas (.891) and Cleveland (.832).

The O's will travel to Kansas City for three games from April 19-21. The Birds went 5-1 against the Royals last year; they took two out of three at Kauffman Stadium from May 2-4 before completing a three-game sweep in Baltimore from June 9-11.

Gunnar Henderson hit .197 last April. That is not happening this year.

He is 4-for-10 to start the new year, with a triple, homer and four RBIs. His three-game OPS is 1.438.

And here is the part that should worry opposing pitchers: He is getting more and more comfortable batting leadoff, as he has done the first three games and will do again tonight versus Kansas City.

“It’s growing on me. I don’t mind it now,” Henderson said before tonight’s game. “I was always hitting in the two or three hole minor leagues, and then when I got up here started hitting leadoff, and it has been growing on me.

“Just think I’m getting more comfortable with it. Just having to be ready, get out there a little earlier on the road. Just be aware of the time before the game. On the road you have to hit first and get out there earlier and be ready.”

Like the Orioles, the club's Triple-A Norfolk affiliate is off to a 2-1 start, but unlike the O's the Tides are off today. Norfolk has scored 29 runs to rank second in the 20-team International League and leads the league with a .964 team OPS.

The Orioles' other three full-season affiliates - at Double-A Bowie, High-A Aberdeen and Single-A Delmarva - open their seasons on Friday. Today we have the break-camp rosters for each club.

Bowie, managed by Roberto Mercado, has eight of the O’s top-30-ranked players as determined by MLBPipeline.com, and three in the top 10, with No. 2 Samuel Basallo at catcher, No. 7 outfielder Dylan Beavers and No. 10 pitcher Seth Johnson.

Aberdeen, managed by Felipe Rojas Alou Jr., features six top-30 prospects while Delmarva, managed by Collin Woody, has four top-30 prospects on its roster. The highest-rated prospect on the IronBirds is outfielder Enrique Bradfield Jr., ranked No. 5 by MLBPipeline. For the Shorebirds, its outfielder Braylin Tavera, at No. 13.

Rosters can be changed or tweaked between now and Opening Night, when Bowie will host Reading, Aberdeen is at Jersey Shore and Delmarva is at Fredericksburg.

The Orioles' 2024 season, their 71^st season in Baltimore, begins this afternoon at Oriole Park. They start a three-game series hosting the Los Angeles Angels.

The Orioles, who are 45-25 all-time in season-opening games, have won 10 of their last 13. They won at Boston on Opening Day last year. The O's are 46-24 in home openers. 

The Orioles open a season at home for the first time since March 29, 2018 versus Minnesota (2,191 days). The O's won that game, 3-2, on an 11th-inning walk-off home run by Adam Jones. The Orioles were originally scheduled to open the 2020 and 2022 seasons at home.

The Orioles are 2-3 in the last five Opening Day games. They won eight in a row from 2011-2018.

The Orioles went 101-61 last season to win the American League East for the first time since 2014 and advance to the playoffs for the first time since 2016. The Angels went 73-89 each of the last two years. They finished fourth in the AL West in 2023 and have had eight straight losing seasons since winning 85 games in 2015.

There is always excitement for Opening Day and that is being felt today in Baltimore. But it’s more than one-day excitement here and players say they feel it from the local fans.

Birdland as a whole and fans in Baltimore and beyond are fired up for the 2024 season, eager to see if the Orioles can repeat as American League East champs.

“Positivity is really high right now,” outfielder Austin Hays said this morning in the clubhouse. “There is a different buzz in the city. Social media, just anywhere you go. You go to the grocery store right now and there a lot of people excited for the season to start. It is really great to feel that positivity from the city behind us.”

As the Orioles begin their 71^st season today, Hays said the organization is very healthy and talented, from the majors to the farm.

“I think the most impressive thing about our spring training is when you didn’t have our starters, you had a lot of guys not on the road and young guys that hadn’t seen a whole lot. But there just wasn’t a huge gap between your starters and maybe your B squad or whatever people like to call it.

After a 2023 season when they won a franchise-record 90 games, in addition to the International League championship and the Triple-A championship game, the O’s Norfolk Tides affiliate will begin defense of those titles Friday night at home versus the Durham Bulls.

Norfolk’s break-camp roster – which is subject to change before first pitch Friday – was released this afternoon and features three top-100 prospects and eight players currently ranked among the O’s top 22 prospects via the Baseball America top 30.

The Tides will begin this season playing for a few games without manager Buck Britton, who will be out on paternity leave to begin the year. O’s Florida Complex League manager Christian Frias will serve as acting manager in Britton’s absence. Britton is expected back at some point next week.

Jackson Holliday heads the 2024 Tides roster. Baseball America and MLBPipeline.com both rank Holliday - who played 22 games to end last year with the Tides, counting the playoffs - as the No. 1 prospect. Joining him on the Tides is Coby Mayo (No. 25, according to Baseball America, and No. 30 by MLBPipeline.com's reckoning) and Heston Kjerstad (No. 41 per Baseball America and No. 32 according to MLBPipeline.com).

Among Orioles prospects, Baseball America puts Mayo at No. 3 and Kjerstad at No. 5. The Tides' break-camp roster also includes from the Baseball America top 30 this group: Connor Norby (No. 6), Chayce McDermott (No. 8), Cade Povich (No. 9), Kyle Stowers (No. 16) and Justin Armbruester (No. 22).

He can easily fly under the radar despite a 6-foot-8 frame. As a reliever it is harder to get noticed. But fully healthy during the 2023 season, right-hander Keagan Gillies did get noticed with some impressive stats and a big strikeout percentage.

Now 26, the Orioles’ 15^th-round draft pick out of Tulane in 2021 is rated as the club’s No. 30 prospect by Baseball America.

This after a season when he went a combined 5-1 with a 2.43 ERA for High-A Aberdeen and Double-A Bowie. Over 40 2/3 innings, he allowed just 19 hits with 14 walks and 61 strikeouts.

He posted an 0.81 WHIP, allowing a .137 batting average against, and fanned 13.5 batters per nine innings with a 39.8 K percentage.

That can get your attention.

When it comes to the Orioles, we have seen it happen in recent years, we have seen it happen last year and we have a historical perspective of it as well.

It is that a young player, even those ranked as No. 1 prospects in the sport, can and often do struggle at the outset of their major league careers.

Two words come to mind - patience and expectations. Patience to give the young player time to settle in and feel comfortable at the big league level and to start to put up numbers. And expectations which must be managed early on for that player. It’s OK to have high expectations, we should for top prospects, but it is also ok to give them time to realize the expectations. Often a lot of time.

Adley Rutschman and Gunnar Henderson are now emerging stars on the Orioles and already considered among the top players in the game. They have at least a couple of things in common in that both shot up to No. 1 in prospect rankings and both had some early career struggles.

Hard to believe it now, but Rutschman, who had his MLB debut on May 21, 2022, was 13-for-74 after his first 20 games with 18 strikeouts and no RBIs. That is zero RBIs. He was batting .176/.256/.257/.513 at that point. Over 113 games on the 2022 season he would hit .254/.362/.445/.806 and finished second for the Rookie of the Year award and 12^th in the MVP voting.

This spring the announcement of the Orioles' Opening Day starter seemed to come earlier than it has most years. But why wait? There were no surprises when manager Brandon Hyde told reporters Sunday in camp that right-hander Corbin Burnes will be first up March 28 versus the Los Angeles Angels.

The Orioles acquired their new ace Feb. 1, and he will indeed pitch the first game of their 2024 season, and many more this year, they hope.

During a lengthy one-on-one interview last Friday in the Baltimore clubhouse, I asked Burnes what kind of club he sees from his new teammates.

“It’s a great young group,” said Burnes, 29, the 2021 National League Cy Young Award winner. “I think the best part about this group is they are so young. It’s a team that had guys that were in their first or second year in the big leagues last year, and so getting that experience at the big league level is unmatched. Even guys that only played 15-20 games, you just can’t replicate that anywhere else.

“So, coming into this year, guys have a year or two of that experience. You learn how to play at this level, you learn how to prepare and bounce back each day to be at your best. The fact this group is so young and hungry to keep competing versus being an older group that’s done it for so many years, these guys are still trying to figure out their spot in the game. That’s exciting. They are going to play their butts off. A team that won 101 games last year and could be even better now.”

After spending about a week at spring training, one impression that struck me is how hard some players worked over the winter to get better. And it’s not just the hard work they put in, but that much of it is very specific, very targeted, and there is a clear plan at work. 

It is one of many things this organization is doing well right now. They take good players and make many of them better. Heck, they have taken some little-known players and some that once looked like longshots to make and/or help the team and turned them into All-Stars.

That has happened over the last few years for relievers Félix Bautista and Yennier Cano. Both were 2023 All-Stars for the Orioles.

Bautista’s first pro year was 2012 with Miami. The Marlins released him in 2016. On Aug. 4, 2016 the Orioles signed him. Through 2018 on their watch he never got out of rookie ball. In 2019 and 2021, he walked nearly six batters per nine innings on the farm. That same pitcher had a 3.5 walk rate and 1.85 ERA in 2022 and 2023. In the big leagues.

Cano in 2022 gave up 23 runs in 18 major league innings. A year later he started the season lights-out with the Orioles, was an All-Star and had a 2.11 ERA.

SARASOTA, Fla. – The Orioles’ No. 1 ranked farm system has been on display pretty much every day this spring training in Florida with young players and prospects excelling in the Birds’ Grapefruit League games - helping the club to an 11-2 record.

The O’s farm will have another chance to shine, this one on national television on March 14 at 7:05 p.m. when MLB Network televises their Spring Breakout game in Bradenton against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

The first annual four-day event, from March 14-17 in Florida and Arizona, features teams playing each other in seven-inning games featuring each organization’s top prospects.

The O’s have a roster of 24 for that game featuring 16 of their top 30 prospects via MLBPipeline.com, seven of their top 10 and three that get top 100 recognition.

They are infielder Jackson Holliday, the No. 1 prospect in baseball, catcher Samuel Basallo ranked as the O’s No. 2 prospect and No. 17 in the MLBPipeline top 100 and infielder Coby Mayo, rated as the O’s No. 4 and No. 30 in the top 100.

SARASOTA, Fla – A lot has been going well for the Orioles during spring training 2024 as they've gotten off to a 9-1 start. But today something went wrong in the last of the first inning when starting center fielder Cedric Mullins walked off the field with a trainer as the Orioles faced the Minnesota Twins at Ed Smith Stadium.

During the game, the club announced Mullins left due to right hamstring discomfort.

For the Orioles, the good news is that manager Brandon Hyde said after the game that Mullins left as a precaution and they feel this will be a minor setback.

“I think he was doing it (coming out), really, as a precautionary measure," said Hyde. "Just felt a little sore and the right thing - I’m glad he did it - was (to) say something and come out of the game.

Asked whether Mullins would need to get magnetic resonance imaging done, Hyde replied: “No. Just got treatment inside. We’ll see how he is in the morning.

SARASOTA, Fla. – After missing the team’s first 10 games – and their 9-1 start – Gunnar Henderson will make his spring training debut today as the Orioles host a Minnesota Twins split squad at 1:05 p.m. He's playing shortstop and batting third.

Henderson has been rehabbing a sore left oblique, an issue that came up late in his winter workouts at home while long-tossing. The Orioles have been careful to nurse that along, and now the 2023 American League Rookie of the Year is ready to take the field.

“He’s doing great,” manager Brandon Hyde said this morning. “(Has) taken some live at-bats a couple of days ago and had kind of a normal workday yesterday and is cleared and ready to go.”

Hyde is not worried about Henderson feeling any pressure to produce or exceed his ’23 stats.

“Gunnar is so driven that sometimes you have to slow him down a little bit. He has got incredible makeup, unbelievable worker and plays the game as hard as anybody. You know you want him to enjoy it a little bit, but he is so easy to coach and so fun to watch play.”

SARASOTA, Fla. – The timetable for lefty John Means has not changed. He began spring training a month behind the other pitchers after he had an extended winter rest period. This followed his missing the American League Division Series with elbow soreness.

But Means is continuing to throw in Florida and his next step, he said today, will be live bullpen sessions coming in the next week or two.

But he is not likely to pitch in any spring training games, which run through March 24. And he is still expected to begin the regular season on the injured list. 

“Means, maybe, probably not,” manager Brandon Hyde said this morning when asked specifically whether Means will pitch before the spring games end.

Said Means, who went 1-2 with a 2.66 ERA in four starts last September: “I’m going to be doing some live BPs here coming up. We’ll see where it goes from there. We’re getting there.”

SARASOTA, Fla. – The Orioles currently hold the best record for the Grapefruit and Cactus leagues combined at 7-1 and have won four in a row.

They try to keep a streak alive today when they host the New York Yankees at 1:05 p.m. at Ed Smith Stadium. The game will be televised live on MASN.

This is the first of just two spring games between these American League East rivals, a year after the Orioles won 101 games and the Yankees won 82.

Center fielder Cedric Mullins, who is 2-for-7 this spring, will lead off, followed by catcher Adley Rutschman and Ryan Mountcastle, who returns to the field at first base after he served as DH Friday in North Port.

Coby Mayo, who is batting .417 (5-for-12) is starting at third base and batting sixth.

SARASOTA, Fla. - When Pittsburgh Pirates right-hander Paul Skenes, the No. 1 overall selection in the 2023 MLB Draft, faced the Orioles' Jackson Holliday, the No. 1 overall pick in 2022, on Thursday in Sarasota, it was a nice appetizer for a game coming later this month. 

Skenes, the LSU product, retired Holliday on the second pitch of the at-bat. He touched 102 mph during his scoreless inning versus the Orioles on Thursday. He threw 100 against Holliday.

On March 14 in Bradenton, the top O’s prospects will play the top Pirates prospects as part of a new series of games this year called “Spring Breakout.” Each club will have at least one game where it can send out its top prospects to play those from another club. That night we could see Skenes-Holliday part two.

The O’s-Pirates game that night will be the second part of a doubleheader at Bradenton’s LECOM Park that will begin with the regular Grapefruit League game between the O's and Pirates at 3:05 p.m. The prospects-only game will follow at 7:05 p.m., and that game will be televised live on MLB Network.

The roster reveal will be a live TV event, too, and that is happening March 7 at 11 a.m. on MLB Network.