The primary purpose of any trip to spring training is to, you know, watch baseball players doing baseball things on baseball fields, all while soaking up the warm South Florida sun while all your friends back north are wearing parkas and shoveling snow. But there is more to a spring training trip than baseball. After all, you do have to eat. And baseball only takes up a portion of your day. So today we offer Part 2 of our Nats Fans' Guide to Spring Training, focusing on everything outside The...

Some days, many of them actually, one of the best things about having this baseball blog is reading the interesting opinions of the readers here. Yesterday was clearly one of those days. The topic was the Jeff Passan column about the economic system in Major League Baseball, whether it is broken and/or in need of a major overhaul. If you haven't read the column, it's long, but well done and worth your time. If you haven't read some of the 200 or so responses from readers yesterday, that is...

Orioles manager Buck Showalter spent about an hour yesterday meeting with executive vice president Dan Duquette and also talked to managing partner Peter Angelos before heading back to Dallas this weekend for his grandson's christening. The push continues to locate starting pitching, the primary need by a mile, along with a left-handed hitter, left-handed reliever, utility player and veteran catcher. Lots of teams are laying back and waiting for agents to lower their demands or rival...

Manager Buck Showalter, appearing tonight on the "Orioles Hot Stove Show" on 105.7 The Fan, said Double-A Bowie outfielder DJ Stewart will be in major league camp next month. Stewart will be included on the list of invites. It's a nice reward for Stewart, a first-round pick in 2015 out of Florida State University, after he batted .278/.378/481 with 26 doubles, two triples, 21 home runs and 79 RBIs in 126 games. He also stole 20 bases in 24 attempts. A left-handed hitting corner outfielder...

The Washington Nationals agreed to terms on a two-year contract with infielder/outfielder Howie Kendrick on Thursday. Nationals President of Baseball Operations and General Manager Mike Rizzo made the announcement. Kendrick, 34, returns to Washington after hitting .293 with eight doubles, two triples, seven home runs, 25 RBI, 11 walks and 24 runs scored in 52 games for the Nationals. He was acquired from Philadelphia on July 28, just days before the 2017 non-waiver trade deadline. He hit .315...

Individual game tickets for the 2018 season at Oriole Park at Camden Yards will go on sale Thursday, January 25, at 2:00 p.m. ET. Tickets will be available online at www.orioles.com/tickets, by phone at 1-888-848-BIRD, and on-site at Oriole Park and the Orioles Official Team Store at the York Galleria in York, Pa. The box office at Oriole Park will be open Monday through Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Sundays from noon to 5:00 p.m. The Orioles Official Team Store at the York Galleria...

It's the offseason, and even though players try their best to rest and decompress, they don't get too far away from baseball. Take Orioles second baseman Jonathan Schoop, for example. Coming off a career year in which he slashed .293/.338/.503 with career highs of 32 home runs and 105 RBIs, Schoop has been busy readying himself for next season in his native Curaçao. But there's only so much time for workouts and preparation. And part of Schoop's offseason has been spent in his native...

Continuing insight from Arizona Fall League play and the impact that experience will have on some of the top prospects in the Nationals organization, we turn to a couple of the position players, third baseman Kelvin Gutierrez and center fielder Daniel Johnson. Mesa Solar Sox pitching coach Michael Tejera said Gutierrez bounced back from getting his hand spiked early on in AFL play to finish strong. "Kelvin had his routine and he was working very hard on it," Tejera said. "His hand got...

It may be tough to envision right now, what with white stuff coating the ground and wind chills still in the teens this morning, but spring training is fast approaching. In fact, it's only four weeks away. Yes, in a mere 29 days there will be actual Nationals pitchers and actual Nationals catchers wearing actual practice uniforms and participating in actual drills in West Palm Beach, Fla., the first official workout of 2018. I'll be there, obviously. But I know some of you plan to be there as...

The column published Tuesday by Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports was interesting and thought-provoking. It was about the economic system in place in baseball due to the brutally slow-to-move free agent market right now in the game. Click here to read the column. It is worth your time. I applaud the effort, research and time that went into this, but I will say that I don't see the system as broken or in need of a major overhaul. To me, baseball seems rather financially healthy with revenues in the...