This has been a quiet winter for the rebuilding Orioles, but they’re now showing interest in a familiar free agent. They’ve discussed a minor league contract for infielder Tim Beckham, Roch Kubatko of MASNSports.com reports.
There’s history between Baltimore and Beckham, a former No. 1 overall pick of the Rays who played with the Orioles from 2017-18. Beckham was successful in the first of those seasons in Baltimore, stumbled during the latter and then signed a major league contract worth $1.75MM with the Mariners last winter. That deal didn’t work out great for either side, however.
Even though Beckham got off to a strong start in a Mariners uniform, his production and playing time dipped as the season progressed. The 29-year-old wound up posting a .237/.293/.461 line with 15 home runs in 328 plate appearances before MLB issued him an 80-game suspension for performance-enhancing drugs in early August.
Beckham has already served a sizable portion of his ban, but that wasn’t enough to prevent the Mariners from non-tendering him earlier this offseason. The suspension has also likely stopped him from landing a guaranteed deal this offseason. If he does head back to Baltimore, though, Beckham could eventually grab an infield role on a last-place team that’s projected to start Jose Iglesias at shortstop, Hanser Alberto at second base and Rio Ruiz at third.
judging by the number of comments , no one is interested in the Orioles
A Yankees post yesterday got 18 comments. I guess nobody cares about them either.
I sure don’t. :)
No comments were needed on that A+ signing by the Yankees.
I seem to get him confused with Gordon Beckham. Maybe because they have the same last name or maybe because they were both drafted in 2008 and they both became busts.
Though I’m actually surprised Tim is only going to turn 30 years old in a few days.
Oh yeah, both huge busts
The 2008 draft may go down as one of the worst in history.
When drafting Eric Hosmer in the top ten looks like a slam-dunk decision, you know it’s rough.
Oh please. You have a future HOF (Posey) two decent MLB regulars- Hosmer and Alvarez, plus Odorizzi, Gerrit Cole, Aaron Hicks…
Sure a lot of busts too. But worst ever is pretty out there
Well, you don’t give Hosmer enough credit but posey is in that top 10 and he is prob HOF worthy. Also, I think Cole was drafted the first time in that draft… so maybe he may technically not come with that class, but he’s the richest pitcher in the history of baseball right? Kinda a stretch to link him to that draft but whatever
Don’t forget Craig Kimbrel, Brandon Crawford, Charlie Blackmon, Jason Castro, Alex Avila, Jason Kipnis. Plenty of serviceable guys. We should all know there are plenty of players from round 1-round 40.
Feels like common sense just slapped you… see what I did there?
suspended and bad? why would they want him?
… it’s the Orioles
The Orioles.
Isn’t he married to one of the Spice Girls? J/k
They’d be better off signing Puig.
Not much of a glove there guys!
Remember when this guy was picked before Posey?
Dumpster diving.
Dumpster fire.
Gosh the Orioles are really awful. It seems like their plan is to sign the most marginal players possible to the cheap contracts, hope a couple of them play at least at Replacement level quality so that their ballpark isn’t entirely empty.
Meanwhile wait for the Chris Davis contract to run out and use top three draft picks for a few years on the best college player available and hope they become stars.
They better become players in the Dominican and Carribean markets because they badly need an infusion of talent.
That’s it. Year 2 of a 4-5 year rebuild. They have improved the farm system, lowered payroll commitments, expanded analytics, and increased international presence. Now they hope that in a few years the high draft picks payoff and they can spend around them to build a sustainable winner. It sucks to deal with the rebuild but better than hanging around in mediocrity. Look at a team like the Angels that have bloated payroll, average middle draft picks every year, and despite having the best player in baseball just hover around .500. The Angels may be more fun to watch game in and game out over the course of the season but they aren’t going any further then the O’s in the end. At least the Orioles have an actual plan now and are following through
On a minor league deal with no guarantees who cares if they sign him, roster filler anyway.
Not like he’s blocking the next Cal Ripken Jr. (Though at this point the Orioles would settle for the next Bill Ripken if they could develop one)
I hope they re-sign Chris Davis to another massive contract. He’s a prime example of the pay-for-performance option (although I know that won’t happen)
Why do I feel that I have seen this movie before?
You know a player that is doping can’t play in the big leagues. Hopefully this won’t become a habit for Beckham, but I don’t think the guy can play on a big league roster anymore.
Orioles have a 3-4 year plan in place and are following threw with it o don’t mind players like Beckham right now until you develop and bring up some of your pitching.When that’s ready the. We make a splash in free agency but until then let’s see who’s worth keeping around.