Ah, the first pitching matchups of the year. Even if today’s game doesn’t happen, these will stay the same because it’s the first series of the season and what have you.
Monday, April 6th
CC Sabathia (NR) vs Jeremy Guthrie (NR)
Jeremy Guthrie is the only known not terrible entity in the 2009 Orioles rotation. While he wouldn’t be a #1 on a team with any pitching at all, he is a pretty solid pitcher. CC Sabathia is a tall fat dude who put in a lot of innings over the last two years. He started out slowly last year and I wouldn’t be surprised if that happened again. I am eagerly anticipating people screaming that he is a a super bust contract five minutes into this start.
Wednesday, April 8th
Chien-Ming Wang (NR) vs Koji Uehara (NR)
Chien-Ming Wang didn’t look so hot in Spring Training after pitching for the first time after his foot injury. His success relies, as always, on not walking a lot of guys and groundouts. The worrying signs in Spring Training were that his groundball numbers were not as high as you expect. I don’t really put much weight into those numbers, but he’s been on a long layoff and it might take him some time to get back into the groove. Koji Uehara will be making his first MLB start. An effective pitcher for most of his NPB career, Uehara signed with the Orioles as they were one of only two teams that really seemed interested in giving him a shot in the rotation. I figure he will be about league average for Baltimore, maybe a little worse or better. He has some injury concerns.
Thursday, April 9th
A.J. Burnett (NR) vs Alfredo Simon (NR)
AJ Burnett will probably have some freak injury as he is walking to the mound to do his warmup pitches. I don’t even know who Alfredo Simon is but his minor league numbers on The Baseball Cube are not very enticing. Orioles pitching rules.
