Position battle: Orioles second base

The oft-injured Brian Roberts, who for years the Baltimore Orioles would turn to at the second base position when healthy, is no longer with the team; he's with the New York Yankees trying to fill Robinson Cano's shoes. While the footprint Roberts leaves behind in Baltimore is much smaller than Cano's, there's still a need for someone to step up and claim the everyday role.

 

Here are the candidates:

 

Ryan Flaherty, age 27, bats left
Jemile Weeks, age 27, bats both
Jonathan Schoop, age 22, bats right

 

Flaherty: He hasn't done much with his bat thus far in his big league career, having hit just .221 in 162 games over the past two seasons. However, his versatility -- he's already played seven different positions with the Orioles -- is sure to keep him on the roster in some capacity.

 

Weeks: Came to the team from Oakland in the Jim Johnson trade. After a promising rookie campaign in 2011 (.303 average, 22 steals), poor play and injuries the past two seasons made him expendable to the Athletics.

 

Schoop: Started four times in a September cup of coffee in 2013, and had two multi-hit games. The prospect missed several months of action due to a fractured back suffered in May, and nobody would blame Baltimore if they decided to send him back to the minors to get a little more seasoning.

 

Latest update: According to Dan Connolly of the Baltimore Sun, "Schoop's inclusion in the second base competition initially seemed to be a simple courtesy to the organization's top position player; it seemed inevitable that he'd begin the regular season at Triple-A Norfolk, where he played just 70 games last year because of a stress fracture in his lower back that cost him more than two months of the season... But manager Buck Showalter maintains that Schoop has a chance to break camp with the major league club, given how well he has played so far."

 

Current leader: Schoop. It would have been Flaherty, but as Connolly also reports, while Manny Machado is not yet not ruling out being ready for Opening Day, the third baseman says he's neither optimistic or discouraged. He's "just dealing with a tightness in knee that was inevitable." It's looking more and more like Flaherty will be needed at third base, freeing up Schoop to start in the Orioles infield, at least until Machado returns. 

 

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