Andy Macphail

After more than a week of speculation since the end of the season, Andy MacPhail is indeed stepping down as the Orioles' president of baseball operations after four-plus years at the helm, according to a club source. MacPhail is leaving the Orioles to tend to family and personal obligations, the source said. UPDATE: The Orioles on Saturday announced MacPhail's departure in a news release. "On behalf of the Orioles organization, I thank Andy for his service to the club over the last four and a half seasons," Orioles owner Peter Angelos said in a statement.

For a guy who apparently is not going to move into the general manager's office this fall, Buck Showalter already is acting a lot like a general manager. He spent part of the past week viewing prospects at the instructional league in Florida, sat down for a dinner conversation to gauge the future of injured second baseman Brian Roberts and has become the main sounding board for owner Peter Angelos. A sources has confirmed to The Baltimore Sun he is not going to take the position, but it's fair to assume that he'll have a big say in who does.

June 20, 2007 - Orioles announce his hiring as president of baseball operations. The son of former Orioles general manager and Hall of Fame executive Lee MacPhail, Andy returns to the city where he lived as a boy from 1958 to 1965. Aug. 22, 2007 - Decides to remove interim tag from manager Dave Trembley, MacPhail's first noteworthy personnel move. After the news conference, the Orioles promptly lose the first game of a doubleheader, 30-3, to the Texas Rangers, the most lopsided defeat in club history.

It should be with some strangely mixed feelings that Orioles fans bid farewell to departing president of baseball operations Andy MacPhail this week. It's not often that you get to combine gratitude with near-total frustration. MacPhail arrived here 51 months ago to fix an organization that had wandered so far from the old Oriole Way that half its fan base had wandered away with it. He inherited a team mired in a string of nine straight losing seasons, a team so deeply dysfunctional that it had spent nearly two decades in the futile pursuit of something as simple as an adequate spring training facility.

I spent Wednesday on the roof of a downtown building sipping rotgut coffee and staring through powerful binoculars at the Warehouse, looking for puffs of smoke that signaled another regime change for the Orioles. By 2 in the afternoon, though, a horrible thought seized me: Maybe there was no one in the Warehouse. Maybe the Orioles had pulled a Bob Irsay with the Mayflower vans and didn't tell us. Or maybe the place was evacuated because of, I don't know, an asbestos scare or something.

The big question swirling around the Orioles right now is what happens with the club's top executive post and, subsequently, its manager. There was no more clarity on the situation Friday. The belief remains that president of baseball operations Andy MacPhail will step down, but that club owner Peter Angelos wants MacPhail to stay, at least in some capacity. Since an official decision involving that spot has not been revealed, there's been no movement on the flip side: Whether manager Buck Showalter would assume president/general manager duties or remain in the dugout.

This week brought some of the best moments of the Orioles' 2011 season. On Monday, they beat a detested foe, the Red Sox, in a home game -- and in doing so forced Boston, recently the clear leader in the American League wild card race, into a tie with the Tampa Bay Rays for that spot. Designated hitter and future Hall-of-Famer Vladimir Guerrero, with a single in the sixth inning, became the all-time hit leader among players from the Dominican Republic. And Robert Andino, who has been filling in for the ailing Brian Roberts at second base, capped a surprisingly productive season with a thrilling inside-the-park home run. Then, at the stroke of midnight Wednesday, they bested that feat with a come-from-behind victory in the bottom of the ninth, ending the Red Sox' playoff hopes.

Each morning, Monday through Friday, I'll hook you up with reading material to skim through as you slug down coffee and slack off at the start of your workday -- that way I'll have an excuse to do the same at the start of mine.   Running it back: The Orioles lost to the Red Sox , 8-7, on Tuesday night, but they have a chance to keep them out of the playoffs in Wednesday night's season finale. " You already know we ain't going to quit ," Adam Jones said.

His contract set to expire at the end of October, Orioles president of baseball operations Andy MacPhail is expected to step down from his position after Wednesday's season finale, perhaps as soon as Thursday . Under his general management, the Orioles won 68 games in 2008, 64 in 2009 and 66 in 2010. MacPhail, who took over control of the front office during the 2007 season, said in the past that 2011 should be evaluated on wins and losses. If they beat the Boston Red Sox on Wednesday night, the 2011 squad will finish 69-93.

The Orioles will all but complete their September roster expansion before Tuesday night's game at Yankee Stadium, bringing back Chris Davis from the 15-day disabled list and calling up four more players from the minor leagues. President of baseball operations Andy MacPhail confirmed that Davis will rejoin the team after rehabbing his sore shoulder. The Orioles will call up Clay Rapada , Josh Bell , Jeremy Accardo and Pedro Florimon, Jr. Florimon apparently was a late addition when veteran infielder Cesar Izturis suffered another setback in his recovery from a severe groin injury.