Leftovers from the press conference

What did we learn from last night's press conference inside the auxiliary clubhouse at Camden Yards?

Chris Davis has a neatly trimmed beard and an adorable baby girl, Ella, who kept saying "cheese" after someone snapped a photo of her. Not during it, of course. Kids who are a few months shy of their second birthday don't care about timing.

He also has a quotable agent, Scott Boras, who provided the line of the night when asked whether Davis had any other serious suitors besides the Orioles.

"You know," Boras replied, "when you go to a wedding, you never talk about your girlfriends."

I may have read that on a T-shirt or a tattoo. I can't remember which one.

Boras revealed that he flew into Baltimore early in the offseason to meet with managing partner Peter Angelos and executive vice president Dan Duquette. And that he may have hurt his leverage by stating how badly Davis wanted to stay with the Orioles, how everything about the organization fit the first baseman.

Boras chuckled at the recollection. He went against the agent handbook, but he still got $161 million out of the Orioles.

The deal includes $42 million in deferred money. Davis still will be collecting in his 50s.

"Sometimes in these deals, in today's times with interest rates and what you're doing, we have a Maryland tax statute that helps us," Boras said. "When I did (Max) Scherzer's contract ... I've become a tax attorney. You figure these things out about how you can do something that's beneficial for the team and do something that's beneficial to the player because Chris lives in Texas where they have zero interest tax. And then you look at, modernly, what the net present value of these contracts are when you go through them and how you evaluate it.

"They are complicated. They do take time. You're moving money around. You're always negotiating terms and years and how much of the contract is front-loaded. This contract is really not back-loaded. A lot of contracts are back-loaded and there's less deferral. This contract, it's not back-loaded. There's a little more deferral. In each, when you go to work out what the true numbers are, it takes time to evaluate."

As the sides reached the home stretch in negotiations, Boras seemed to deal mainly with Angelos. They worked out the final details on the partial no-trade clause late last Friday, with the Orioles refusing to offer full no-trade protection to Davis.

"I think there's certainly a mutual respect," Boras said. "I just respect Peter's stamina for what he does. He's always at the office, he's always available, he always calls. The same is true for Dan. The majority of this negotiation, I talked to Peter a few times, but it was really dealing with Dan and walking through the process of it."

Boras made it clear that he could have gotten more money from another team, but it became even more apparent last night that Davis never wanted to leave.

"You certainly could have negotiated more dollars for Chris Davis, no doubt about it," Boras said. "The idea for me was his ability to execute in this ballpark, for his talent, the skillset for what he does. You just look at the metrics of what his performance is, it's very, very difficult to leave a setting that you know can provide such comfort, such reward.

"And really for the player himself, you know, I've seen players over the years where they've been in places where it's more difficult for them to perform, and the stress of that and what they go through, and you're really able to provide a little bit of a better footprint to the player about free agency by saying, 'This is something that's extremely important because you know what? You're going to enjoy your career more by playing in a place that just works well for you.' Certainly, that was a part of this negotiation."

I expected Davis to admit that he reached a point over the winter where he didn't think a deal would get done. Instead, he said that he never really felt that way. So, it was more "when" than "if," as Showalter so often says.

"We always had Chris as a primary target to sign," Duquette said. "These deals, they have their own timing. Some take a while, some get done quickly. In this case, things came together late Friday night.

"We had the structure of the deal that we ended up agreeing to, we had a lot of that in place. Then, Mr. Angelos and Scott talked late into the night on Friday and were able to come together with a deal."

The Orioles continue to search for a starting pitcher, whether it's via free agency or trade. However, they don't seem close to getting what they want.

"There are some pitchers out there we like and we've also talked to some other teams about pitching," Duquette said. "The problem in the pitching market is that there are more teams chasing fewer pitchers. There are not enough to go around. That's an age-old problem, but it was very acute this winter.

"We're still looking for additions to our pitching staff. Takes a lot of energy to sign a star player. We're always cognizant of what we need to add to our pitching staff. We haven't found the pitching that we really like at the prices we like. That has been a very, very expensive market this offseason. But I'm confident we'll be able to come up with the pitching that we need to compete.

"We're going to have to get some performances from the pitchers that we have and then continue to add to that."

I couldn't get a clear answer from Duquette on whether the Orioles still have interest in a player such as Pedro Alvarez, who would primarily be used as a designated hitter. He jokingly referred me to Boras, who also represents Alvarez.

In fact, he did it multiple times before peeling off to do another interview.

Mark Trumbo figures to get most of the at-bats as the designated hitter. I was prepared to dismiss Alvarez, but Duquette's playful response made me think that he's still open to negotiating with Boras. Or maybe it's more about Boras wanting to keep open the lines of communication with Duquette. I was stumped.

Meanwhile, Boras believes that Alvarez is better defensively than the stats suggest. His client committed 25 errors at third base in 2014 and 23 at first base last year, but he studied video of each one and found explanations for most that didn't show up in the box scores.

The Orioles could make room for all three players by moving Davis to right field and putting Trumbo or Alvarez at first base, but I still don't see it happening. Showalter has made it pretty clear that Davis signed to play first base. And he's not sticking Trumbo in right.

Boras projects that Alvarez could hit 40 home runs at Camden Yards. The former Pirate has Davis-like power. The lineup would be potent on paper, and Boras certainly would like to continue talking to Duquette about it.

Note: Dylan Bundy threw 20 fastballs off a regular mound during a bullpen session this week. He threw 15 off a half mound at minicamp.