MacPhail on the addition of Adrian Rosario

Here are some comments from Andy MacPhail on Adrian Rosario, the right-handed pitcher the O's took from the Milwaukee organization in this morning's Rule 5 draft: "Big bodied, lack of experience, good arm kid that captured the imagination of our guys. He has a chance to grow into something, whether he is ready or not, we'll find out. Didn't feel like we could miss the opportunity to take a chance on him. "Interestingly enough, Milwaukee took one of our guys and we took one of theirs. That's a dynamic frankly we didn't anticipate. Interesting to see how the spring plays out." Could Rosario make it on the O's roster the entire season? "If we didn't think he was promising enough, obviously when we take a guy down at that level (A ball), it's a real good arm and a very projectable body. Sometimes guys can come very quickly. You'll see in spring training, he really looks the role and he's got good stuff. Whether he is ready for this or not, we'll find out in spring training. But it's such a cheap gamble, you might as well." MacPhail's take on losing Pat Egan and Pedro Beato in the draft: "We kind of anticipated this, right-handed relievers have a better chance (to go) than right-handed starters. The drafting is the easy part, it's the keeping that becomes the big issue. In any year, you might have one or two guys that stick, that is just what the odds are. If the guy is the second pick by a club, he even is probably behind the first guy they picked." MacPhail talked further about the O's losing the pair of what is means to have some opens spots still on his 40-man roster for later: "You're keeping a roster spot for proven major leaguers and seeing as those roster spots get to be more precious as the winter goes on, then you become sort of in the driver's seat to get the last bit of that right-handed relief corps. So being able to bring a guy in with a major league deal that is a free agent is a lot more attractive to him than having to eat a minor league deal with major league terms." After losing four relievers in two trades, is the bullpen depth getting thin in the organization? "That is the one thing we seem to have an abundance of, I mean there are more guys that we thought were potentially in the mix (to be drafted). That is a currency we seem to have no small supply of."



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