Orioles manager Buck Showalter chose Danny Valencia over Henry Urrutia as his designated hitter for tonight's game against the Royals. Urrutia had three hits last night, but Valencia is 11-for-20 with seven RBIs lifetime against Royals left-hander Bruce Chen. Taylor Teagarden is behind the plate tonight. Matt Wieters will sit despite being 9-for-21 with two doubles, a home run, two RBIs, two walks and five runs scored during a five-game hitting streak. The Orioles are playing the fifth of...

The Nationals will stick with their same lineup (minus the pitcher) for game two of this four-game series with the Pirates. Bryce Harper will lead off and Denard Span will hit seventh. Wilson Ramos is again behind the plate for the Nats. Taylor Jordan will get his fifth big league start tonight, still in search of his first win despite positing an impressive 3.32 ERA thus far. Jordan is coming off the best outing of his major league career thus far, when he allowed just two runs on eight...

A quick look at some news and notes from around the Orioles' minor leagues: Since June 8, Triple-A Norfolk's LJ Hoes has hit safely in 31 of 38 games, batting an International League-best .373 with two home runs and 16 RBIs. Over that span, Hoes has registered more walks (25) than strikeouts (19), while posting a league-best .467 on-base percentage. For the season, the 23-year-old ranks among league leaders in OBP (third, .408), runs scored (fourth, 60), hits (fourth, 109) and batting...

Orioles outfielder Nolan Reimold is resting comfortably, or as much as humanly possible while propped up in bed and wearing a neck brace, following corrective surgery this morning to fuse two vertebrae at the Florida Spine Institute in Clearwater, Fla. Reimold isn't permitted to talk, but he provided information in a text message that was passed along to me this afternoon. The pseudarthrosis, or false fusion, was causing irritation and compressing the nerve. Dr. Robert Kowalski, a...

A few teams have expressed interest in outfielder Chris Dickerson and the Orioles are continuing attempts to trade him, according to a club official. Dickerson was designated for assignment on Friday to make room for outfielder Henry Urrutia on the 25- and 40-man rosters. The Orioles have until the weekend to trade Dickerson or get him through waivers. He figures to be claimed if multiple teams are involved in discussions with executive vice president Dan Duquette. Dickerson batted...

Outfielder Ryan Braun has been suspended for the rest of the Brewers' hopeless season for his involvement with an anti-aging clinic in Florida. That's bad enough for baseball, but what really makes everyone mad is how Braun tried to lie his way through it all. I can't believe he said he wanted to apologize to anyone he "may have disappointed." Really? Braun is arrogant and deceitful. He has not apologized in a sincere manner. He's still looking for a way to beat the rap. He still...

The Orioles, along with the Orioles Wives, Oriole Advocates, WJZ-TV and MASN personalities, Von Paris Moving and Storage and the Maryland Food Bank, will hold their 27th annual Food and Funds Drive at Oriole Park at Camden Yards this weekend, July 26-28, during the series against the Boston Red Sox. Members of these groups will collect non-perishable food items and monetary donations from fans at each ballpark entrance from the time gates open until the middle of the 2nd inning during games...

For much of the last two months or so, Davey Johnson has been peppered with questions about why the Nationals have been struggling so mightily. Early on in that period, Johnson didn't really have much of an answer, other than that the offense largely wasn't doing its job. That part is obvious, of course, but there are other factors at play. Overall, the Nats just aren't performing quite to the level that they did last season, mostly across the board. The starting pitching largely has...

A few days' rest seems to have gone a long way for Matt Wieters. The Orioles catcher entered the All-Star break having hit .232/.291/.408 in 88 games played in the "first half" of the season. Since the All-Star break, Wieters is 8-for-17 with two walks, two strikeouts a run scored and two RBIs. Last season, we saw a similar trend from Wieters, who hit .247/.327/.431 in the first half and .251/.331/.440 after the break. Part of Wieters' struggles this season have been his declining numbers...

Reggie Jackson famously described his presence on the Yankees and other teams as "the straw that stirs the drink." In his 1984 autobiography, he said, "if the other ingredients were there ... if the mix was just about right, I could make the difference." The Washington Nationals desperately need that kind of presence in their lineup. It has been showing all along, but Davey Johnson kept saying that when everyone was healthy, everything would be OK. Everyone is healthy, the mix is about...