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Travis Shaw Jersey , but it’s not too early to start guessing."One of the constant refrains from Orioles spring training so far has been about the wide-open competitions for a lot of the roster. In contrast to past years where you could know all but a handful of players on the Opening Day roster as soon as players reported to camp, there are a lot of spots that seem to be up for grabs a third of the way into the Grapefruit League schedule.Even the people who will be setting up the roster probably don’t know exactly who will make this team right now. With another big refrain from spring training being that the results don’t matter yet, figuring out the roster makeup is more complicated than just deciding “who looks good” - the important thing for them to figure out is who will be good starting in about three weeks.The expectation is that the Orioles will not be good. There is likely not any combination of players they can put together from this camp to change that trajectory for this season. If O’s fans are lucky, the brain trust will assemble a group that, when bolstered by some mid-season prospect call-ups, ends up somewhere in the realm of “less bad than last year and trending up for the future.”Keeping in mind that it’s all premature at this point, Opening Day is close enough that it’s not outrageous to wonder who’s going to make this squad. What follows are my best guesses, assuming that there are no unfortunate injuries to cloud the picture between now and then.OutfieldLF: DJ StewartCF: Cedric MullinsRF: Austin HaysReserve: Joey RickardIn a fair world, this group would include Yusniel Diaz in the Opening Day outfield instead of Stewart. Diaz, 22, is probably ready to make the leap. However, there’s always the dreaded “keep them down for three weeks to get an extra year of service time” that teams employ with young, soon-to-be-rookies who are poised to make Opening Day rosters. If the O’s wait to call up Diaz, they will control him, barring a rule change, through 2025 instead of 2024 - seven seasons instead of six. General managers cannot resist this, and so Diaz is probably ticketed for Triple-A Norfolk until at least May.The early spring results (which don’t matter but are all we have to go on) have made it look like Hays has bounced back from something of a lost 2018. Plug him in out there and don’t mess around. Stewart should be fine enough until Diaz can join the party.One wild card will be how the new regime views Mullins. His minor league performance as a switch-hitter suggests he’s just much better batting left-handed and facing right-handed pitchers. If you’re going to suck against one type of pitcher, it might as well be lefties because there aren’t as many of them. Still, that tends to mean a platoon player, maybe with Rickard http://www.brewersfanproshop.com/authentic-orlando-arcia-jersey , maybe with Eric Young Jr.Infield1B: Trey Mancini2B: Jonathan VillarSS: Richie Martin3B: Rio RuizUtility: Drew JacksonDH: Chris DavisMaybe the most significant question the Orioles will grapple with in spring training is when they’ve seen enough of Davis. He has done nothing yet to make it seem like any solution has clicked that will get him to bounce back from a bad 2017 and legendarily-bad 2018. I’ll be surprised if they’re ready to cut him loose by Opening Day. The new crew might as well take a last stab to try to salvage him. If he still stinks by June, so long and thanks for fewer dingers than we hoped.GM Mike Elias joined the stream of Monday’s Orioles game and talked about the need to improve on the infield defense from last year. I think that sounds like a sign he’s looking to plug in some of “his guys” there. Martin and Jackson were the Rule 5 picks he added. Ruiz was originally drafted by the Elias-era Astros. Sorry, Renato . The guy who liked you is gone.Another question to be answered is when Mark Trumbo will be ready to play. MASN’s Roch Kubatko wrote over the weekend that Trumbo views March 12 as a “realistic” time to make a spring debut. Can he get to game shape by Opening Day if he starts on March 12? Elias and company don’t need to be in a rush to proclaim him ready.CatchersStarter: Chance SiscoBackup: Austin WynnsThis is what I want to be true. It seemed like Sisco ended up in the doghouse last year and that harmed his confidence. I’d like to see the O’s give him that job back and work on any problems he has at the MLB level. If it doesn’t work out for Sisco behind the dish or at the plate, hey, Adley Rutschman is coming.Starting rotationDylan BundyAlex CobbAndrew CashnerNate KarnsJosh RogersThe Orioles had the worst starting rotation by ERA in all of baseball last year. They also had the worst rotation in 2017, and in 2016... well, they weren’t the worst, but they were 7th-worst. Can the Orioles finally joining the analytics revolution help some of these guys? For the sanity of Birdland, let’s hope there is some improvement, especially from Bundy and Cobb.Maybe it’s aggressive to put Karns in this predicted rotation when he already had a setback after pitching once. I think the O’s signed him because they want him in the rotation for as long as he’s able, so it’s his. Rogers gets the fifth spot to begin the season under the theory that the O’s might decide they don’t want to have an all-right-handed rotation.The 4/5 spots of the rotation figure to cycle a lot. Unlike in past years, it’s likely that an entire Triple-A Norfolk rotation will be on the 40-man roster: Hunter Harvey, David Hess, Luis Ortiz, Yefry Ramirez, Dillon Tate. I didn’t even mention John Means. If Karns gets hurt or one of those other pitchers is looking better than Hess, make a change.BullpenMychal GivensRichard BleierMike Wright Jr.Pedro AraujoTanner ScottMiguel CastroPaul FryJimmy YacabonisUnlike the infield, the bullpen candidates haven’t been bolstered by a bunch of “Elias guys.” He seems content to sort out what Dan Duquette left for him, maybe because the Orioles are just going to be bad so the relievers won’t be pitching many high-leverage innings to begin with. I’ve gone with an eight-man bullpen even though I don’t like eight-man bullpens. Maybe Elias will go with seven to squeeze on an extra bench player, especially if he has Davis/Trumbo creating a logjam on the Opening Day roster and he’s not ready to make final decisions about either one yet. The bullpen includes Givens and Bleier Robin Yount Jersey , the players with past significant MLB success, and some “Eh, might as well” guys like Wright Jr. and Castro who have never quite clicked. Araujo doesn’t have to stay long before satisfying the Rule 5 requirements, which also puts him in the “might as well” category for Opening Day; expect him to be optioned, perhaps never to be seen in MLB again, the day that the O’s are allowed to do so without losing him.Waiting at Triple-A if anyone falters: Branden Kline, Cody Carroll, Evan Phillips, and probably others, depending on how generous you are about assessing the MLB potential of jabronis.**The Opening Day roster is the thing to talk about now because it’s March and Orioles baseball is almost back, but the most important roster they will have all year is probably the one that we will end up seeing in September. If some fresh faces have showed up by then, the future will look a little brighter.What do you think? Do you have other favorites for making the roster? Let us know in the comments below. WASHINGTON (AP) Bryce Harper is still a member of the Washington Nationals, with the two-time defending NL East champions hoping he can lead them on another playoff run after a season-long funk.Washington opted not to trade Harper, who’ll be a free agent after the season, after listening to offers for him. The Nationals didn’t do much else, either, before Tuesday’s trade deadline, shipping out a relief pitcher but otherwise standing pat as the two teams ahead of them in the division – Atlanta and Philadelphia – made moves to upgrade their rosters.General manager Mike Rizzo said he had discussions with other teams about a litany of players and Harper was one of them, with several teams having more than a passing interest. He said the team did its due diligence on Harper and five or six other players, but there wasn’t a deal that made sense.”It would have to be a spectacular set of circumstances for us to move a player of Bryce Harper’s ability level http://www.brewersfanproshop.com/authentic-orlando-arcia-jersey , and we didn’t get anything that met those qualifications,” Rizzo said.Rizzo said after reports surfaced that the team was looking to trade Harper, he told the 25-year-old outfielder Monday night that he wasn’t going anywhere.Harper said he was glad to be staying in Washington.”I think whenever you hear your name or see your name on stuff you always wonder, but I think that’s just the business side of the game,” Harper said. ”It’s part of the game.”Washington’s only move was to send late-inning reliever Brandon Kintzler to the Chicago Cubs for a minor league pitcher, one year after acquiring Kintzler from the Twins.The Nationals open a two-game series against the Mets having gone 10-14 in July, but they’re still within striking distance of the Braves and Phillies. Atlanta added pitchers Kevin Gausman and Darren O’Day from the Orioles Tuesday, and the Phillies picked up former Nationals catcher Wilson Ramos from the Rays.”I think it’s fine,” Harper said of Washington essentially standing pat. ”I think we’ve played some of the worst baseball we can and we’re only 5 games back, and we’re getting our whole team back and hopefully (closer Sean) Doolittle back here pretty soon and (Stephen Strasburg) as well.”A six-time All-Star, Harper is hitting just .220 but has 25 home runs, tied for second in the NL entering Tuesday’s games.”I’m very happy to write Bryce’s name in the lineup still and looking forward to writing it in every day,” manager Dave Martinez said.Rizzo said the Nationals made their deadline move early – acquiring closer Kelvin Herrera from the Royals on June 18. With 57 games left, Rizzo’s inaction delivered a message.”I think it tells the team that we believe in the squad that we have, the 25 guys that are in that clubhouse we’ve felt all along have a chance to win this division,” he said. ”We’re the two-time defending champs, we’ve got the bulls-eye on our back and we’ve got the crown on our head. Until someone takes it away from us, we’re still the champs.”—