Last season, O's minor league player of the year Joe Mahoney, a first baseman, did start a few games in left field for the Double-A Bowie Baysox. Next year, Mahoney will be back at first base, but the number of games he plays as an outfielder should increase also. "I didn't mind it and they said they may put me out there once or twice a week (next season). The more versatile you can be, the more valuable you are," Mahoney said. There are a few good reasons for Mahoney to try his hand in...

For the second year in a row, Nationals pitcher Craig Stammen took time to serve the Washington D.C. community before packing up to visit his family in Ohio for the Thanksgiving holiday. On Monday, Stammen and Nationals front office staff volunteered at Food and Friends, a nonprofit organization in NE Washington D.C. to prepare holiday meals for people living with HIV/AIDS and other life-challenging illnesses. Together as a team, they packaged pre-cooked turkeys and yams for Thanksgiving...

RHP Juan Jaime claimed off outright waivers by Diamondbacks The Washington Nationals today selected the contracts of right-handed pitchers Adam Carr and Cole Kimball and first baseman Chris Marrero. Additionally, right-handed pitcher Juan Jaime was claimed off outright waivers by the Arizona Diamondbacks. Nationals Executive Vice President and General Manager Mike Rizzo made the announcements. Carr went 6-2 with 14 saves and a 2.75 ERA in 52 relief appearances last season with Harrisburg of...

The Orioles today announced that they have added left-handed pitcher Zach Britton, infielder Joe Mahoney and outfielder Matt Angle to their 40-man Major League roster. Britton, 22, was named the 2010 Jim Palmer Award winner as the Orioles' top minor league pitcher after going 10-7 with a 2.70 ERA in 26 starts between Double-A Bowie and Triple-A Norfolk. He allowed 139 hits in 153.1 innings pitched, while striking out 124 and walking 51. Britton, the Orioles' 3rd round pick in the 2006 draft,...

Giants first baseman Aubrey Huff, who didn't have a lot of suitors when he filed for free agency last year, placed seventh in the voting for the National League's Most Valuable Player. Reds first baseman Joey Votto received 31 of a possible 32 first-place votes to easily win the award. One writer gave Cardinals first baseman Albert Pujols the other first-place vote and chose Votto second. Phillies outfielder Jayson Werth, a first-round draft pick by the Orioles in 1997, finished...

The Scottsdale Scorpions rolled to their first ever Arizona fall league title Saturday 3-2 over the Peoria Javelinas with a complete baseball team anchored by a strong pitching staff. Nats prospect Sammy Solis and five others held the Javelinas to one earned run over nine innings and the defense, despite some early errors, came up with some huge plays in the end to save the game. Another Nats prospect, pitcher Cole Kimball, notched the save with a dominating ninth frame. "Just playing in...

I'm not expecting much to happen this week because of the Thanksgiving holiday. Not that our heads have been spinning from all the activity up to this point. We might get an announcement on the coaching staff, but how many times can I pull back the football and watch you flip in the air and land on your back before I start to feel the pangs of guilt? The Pirates reportedly will hire Ray Searage as their pitching coach, so the Orioles won't lose Rick Adair to them. The Mets named Terry...

It looks like Major League Baseball is on its way to expanding the playoffs from eight to 10 teams. MLB's special 14-man, on-field committee, a group that includes Andy MacPhail and Frank Robinson, will meet on the topic at the upcoming winter meetings. Under the plan, there would be two wild-card teams in each league. When I first heard of this talk of expanding the playoffs, my first reaction was negative. Were the powers that be in the game going to mess with something that is working...

It's a sleepy Sunday in the Kubatko household, mainly because I didn't get home from the Maryland-FSU game until 2 a.m. That tailgate traffic leaving the stadium is brutal, and I wasn't even tailgating. Maryland officials wouldn't let me fire up the grill in the press box. I'm not going to reveal my breakout spring training player at this early date, but you have to wonder whether Kam Mickolio is just teasing us with that 0.75 ERA in the Arizona Fall League, which he posted before...

The Scottsdale Scorpions won the 2010 Arizona Fall League title with a 3-2 win over Peoria Javelinas with Nationals prospects making impacts throughout the game. Sammy Solis won the game, Cole Kimball pitched a 1-2-3 ninth inning for the save, Bryce Harper had the go-ahead RBI single and Stephen Lombardozzi smacked an RBI double to plate the eventual winning run. Solis pitched four solid innings with Kimball getting a strike out and a pair of weak infield grounders to save it. Kimball was...