I walked through the clubhouse this morning and saw Luke Hughes and Matt Macri packing their bags and shaking hands. That usually means a player has been cut, although we haven’t heard an official announcement yet.

It’s overcast down here with occasional drizzle, but we’re expecting to play. Will add the lineups here when they become available.

I want to address the Wilson Ramos situation. Ramos was impressive in batting practice down here and showed the skills to be a good catcher. But there was no way he had even a slight chance of making the team. Ramos hasn’t seen one pitch in Double-A yet - and it took him a chunk of the season at Class A Fort Myers to get going.

Ramos was struggling in late May when I asked Jim Rantz, the director or minor leagues, what his problem was.

“He’s made a discovery,” Rantz said. “It’s called a curveball.”

Ramos hit two homers the next week - and edged his batting average up to .224. I asked Rantz for an explanation, and he joked that  the best way to solve the curveball, “is to swing at the fastball.”

This spring, I talked to Ramos about his power hitting.

“If I’m waiting for a fastball and he throws a fastball, no problem,” he said.

He’ll be tested at Class AA New Britain. Not only will he see breaking pitches but breaking pitches for strikes. He’ll have to learn how to hit the curveball.

Update: Hughes, Macri and Luis Matos have been cut from camp. Reliever Pat Neshek was supposed to play catch for the first time since surgery on the 18th, but that has been pushed back to Apr. 1. Not a setback, just no reason to rusch Lineup since he’s out until 2010 anyway.

 Lineups

Orioles: 1. Felix Pie, CF. 2. Ryan Freel, LF. 3. Scott Moore, 3B. 4. Oscar Salazar, 1B. 5. Luke Scott, DH. 6.  Luis Montanez, Rf. 7. Robby Hammock, C. 8. Jolbert Cabrera, SS. 9. Donnie Murphy, 2B. Pitching: Guthrie.

Twins: 1. Tolbert, CF. 2. Casilla, 2B. 3. Kubel, DH. 4. Morneau, 1B. 5. Crede, 3B. 6. Cuddyer, RF. 7. Young, LF. 8. Redmond, C. 9. Punto, SS. Pitching: Franchise, followed by Guerrier, Breslow, Ayala, Crain and Jones.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 23rd, 2009 at 7:19 am and is filed under Game threads, preseason. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.