Indians

The Orioles' lineup for Friday night's game against the Indians has some interesting wrinkles. Wilson Betemit, who made his 12th error Thursday, has switched from third to first base while Robert Andino, the club's best defensive third baseman, starts there Friday. Mark Reynolds is sitting; Chris Davis is DHing and Ryan Flaherty is in right. The other interesting thing: Matt Wieters is batting seventh for the first time this season. He has had eight starts at cleanup, 58 at 5th and one start batting 6th. The Orioles are in a collective offensive slump, but Wieters has actually had at least one hit in six of his last eight games.

The budget package proposed by Baltimore County Executive Kevin Kamenetz this week includes $5.6 million to finish a Perry Hall park that officials say has languished for years. Improvements to Gough Park, a 17-acre site at the intersection of the intersection of Honeygo Boulevard and East Joppa Road, will include a new gymnasium. The county bought the land in 2000, but "the land has sat idle," said County Councilman David Marks, a Republican who lives in Perry Hall. With continuing development in Perry Hall, Marks said the site will provide residents with a "green space in a growing community.

There was bound to be a day under manager Buck Showalter when the Orioles showed little spark and were shut down by a pitcher whom they figured to do more against. Still, Thursday night screamed of a missed opportunity to win five straight games for the first time all season, sweep their first three-game series in Cleveland since 1987 and take another step toward securing their first winning road trip in 2010. Veteran starter Kevin Millwood mostly did his part, allowing three runs over seven innings to continue the fine run by a resurgent rotation.

Mark Reynolds, who spent the past two seasons as a starting corner infielder with the Orioles, has agreed to terms on a one-year deal worth $6 million plus incentives with the Cleveland Indians, according to an industry source. Reynolds, 29, hit .221 with 23 homers and 69 RBIs in 135 games last year after a 2011 season in which he hit a team-leading 37 homers in 155 games. The Orioles held an $11 million option on Reynolds for 2013 that the club declined this offseason, preferring instead to buy it out for $500,000.

Albert Belle will stay in the Cleveland Indians' lineup while th American League decides how to punish him for hitting a fan with a baseball.Belle, who spent 10 weeks in an alcohol-rehabilitation program last summer, threw a ball at a heckler in the left-field stands Saturday, hitting him in the chest. The heckler, Jeff Pillar of Cleveland, had jokingly invited Belle to a keg party.Indians president Hank Peters said he would leave it up to manager John McNamara to decide whether Belle plays while the league investigates.

University of Minnesota athletic director Rick Bay was named yesterday to succeed the retiring Hank Peters as president of the Cleveland Indians.Bay, 48, will become executive vice president of the Indians on Oct. 1, then will become president when Peters, 67, retires Jan. 1.John Hart, 42, director of baseball operations for the Indians, will become general manager and vice president of baseball operations, Peters said at a news conference.* PADRES: Right fielder Tony Gwynn, who was chasing his fifth NL batting title, underwent arthroscopic surgery on his left knee and likely will be lost for the rest of the season, team doctor Jan Fronek said.

The Orioles can't have it either way. The first couple weeks of the season, they found that everything revolved around pitching. The last three days, they found that pitching isn't everything.The high-scoring Cleveland Indians managed just seven runs in three games at Camden Yards over the weekend, but yesterday's soggy 3-1 victory gave them the series and left the Orioles to wonder just what it's going to take to get off the floor in the American League East.Seven runs. That's less than the Indians averaged per game when they arrived in town, but it still was good enough to take two of three games from a team that was expected to be one of the strongest teams in baseball's toughest division.

At Jacobs Field, ClevelandDay .. .. .. .. .Time .. ..TV .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..StartersTonight .. .. ...7:05 .. .HTS .. .. .. ..Scott Kamieniecki (9-5, 4.06).. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..vs. Orel Hershiser (13-5, 4.54)Tomorrow .. .. ..7:05 .. .13, 50 .. .. ..Rick Krivda (3-0, 6.75).. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..vs. Chad Ogea (6-8, 5.57)Indians updateThe underachieving Indians were virtually handed the AL Central race when the Chicago White Sox disarmed shortly before the July 31 trade deadline.

All of a sudden it's as though the Orioles and New York Yankees aren't even in the same division. And not just because of the 3 1/2 games that separate them in the American League East.The probability of a strike, and the uncertainty of its consequences, substantially increases the importance of what happens before the work stoppage takes place. Assuming there will be a settlement, which could be a major assumption, the division races could be dramatically altered by the games that would be left unplayed.

With the Cleveland Indians coming in tomorrow night to begin a weekend series with the Orioles, we are reminded of one of sport's most important truths:It all starts at the top.That's right -- success begins not on the playing field or in the dugout or on the coaching lines; it starts at the ownership level.The Indians are easily the most glaring example of this in baseball, a conclusion author Terry Pluto develops well in his book "The Curse of Rocky Colavito," subtitled "A Loving Look at a 30-year Slump."

Could we be headed for an Indian summer ? An Indian summer is defined as an unseasonably warm period (above 70 degrees) in mid-October to early November that occurs after first frost. An Indian summer can happen several times during the autumn. Temperatures for Saturday will be right around normal with a high of 68 and low about 46. They will remain normal at 66 and 45 for Sunday with clear skies. On Monday temperatures will start reaching the low 70s, and by mid-week will hit 75 with sunny skies.

This weekend, an hour and a half north of Baltimore in Carlisle, Pa., a group of experts will convene for a symposium on the first federally operated Native American boarding school in the U.S. The lessons learned from this piece of U.S. history still resonate today when we think about current federal education policies and practices. I teach a graduate course on the history of education to local teachers at Loyola University Maryland, and we spend a good deal of time learning about this historical phenomenon.

The Orioles reunited with veteran reliever J.C. Romero Monday, acquiring the left-hander in a trade with the Cleveland Indians in exchange for minor league infielder Carlos Rojas, the team announced. Romero was initially signed by the Orioles to a minor league contract in May after he was released by the Cardinals. Romero was 1-0 with a 2.51 ERA and and 13 strikeouts in 14 1/3 innings over 17 appearances for Triple-A Norfolk until he was given a right to opt out of his contract.

CLEVELAND - Orioles manager Buck Showalter, a master of detail, watches baseball games in pieces, individual snapshots, and not in one stream. So, to him, a play that might not have been made in the third or a blown call in the sixth is equally important as a late-inning gaffe that everyone notices. In fact, one of Showalter's biggest pet peeves is dwelling on one moment in a baseball game that is filled with various wrinkles and nuances. Case in point: The Orioles' 3-1 loss to the Cleveland Indians on Monday that snapped their five-game winning streak and prohibited them from their first four-game sweep in Cleveland since 1971.

CLEVELAND - After getting another quality outing from a starting pitcher - for the fifth consecutive game - the Orioles turned Sunday's game over to their shutdown bullpen. And for one of the few times this season, the Orioles had to hold on tightly. Maybe cross their fingers and close their eyes, too, before finishing off their 4-3 victory over the Cleveland Indians. “It wasn't really the way we drew it up, but it seemed to work out,” Orioles closer Jim Johnson said. “We got the win, so it doesn't really matter.” With the Orioles leading 4-0 in the ninth, the Indians rallied for three runs and put the tying runner on second and the winning run on first before Johnson struck out Asdrubal Cabrera to end the game.

CLEVELAND - The Orioles have been victims of the big inning recently, when everything seemingly collapses around the starting pitcher. On Friday, the Orioles finally saw it from a different vantage point. They pounded the Cleveland Indians, 10-2, Friday night for their second most lopsided victory of the season. It included a six-run third against veteran right-hander Derek Lowe - the most runs the Orioles have scored since getting seven in an inning May 5 against Boston. “It's rare that we get four, five, six runs an inning.

CLEVELAND -- About 2 1/2 hours before every game at Jacobs Field, the Cleveland Indians' rubber bands are unleashed.Fitting, because the Indians are not your average team, so these are not your average rubber bands.They are huge.They are red.And they are used by the winningest team in major-league baseball to stretch hamstrings, backs, thighs, arms and nearly every other muscle that a player might pull while playing."They're just a part of the flexibility program that we installed in spring training," said Fernando Montes, the Indians' strength and conditioning coach.

CLEVELAND -- One former Oriole has helped cost another his job.The Cleveland Indians removed Gregg Olson from their roster yesterday after he had appeared in three games, none in the past two weeks.The biggest reason the Indians don't need Olson is that Jose Mesa remains a flawless closer. He leads the majors with 23 saves and hasn't blown a save opportunity."I wasn't surprised," Olson said. "There's no place for me to pitch here." Olson hopes to talk with other teams. "If nothing pans out, I'll try again next year," he said.

CLEVELAND - Orioles right-hander Chris Tillman took the mound at Progressive Field on Saturday night with two big league starts under his belt this season - one a two-hit gem and the other an absolute disaster in which he could only manage two outs. The question was which Tillman would show against the Cleveland Indians. The answer in the Orioles' 3-1 victory was a whole lot closer to the guy who dominated the Seattle Mariners than the one who got shelled in Minnesota. “It was big,” said Tillman, who allowed one run in 6 2/3 innings Saturday.

As the Oriolespacked up for their final road trip of a surprising first half, the lingering question is what to make of this club? Is it the second-place squad in the American League East that just acquired a likely Hall of Famer for a pennant push? Or is it an injured and undermanned upstart that simply hit its peak and now is beginning to slide back to reality after a disappointing homestand that culminated with a 6-2 loss to the previously scuffling Cleveland Indians? Maybe it's a little bit of both, but on the afternoon in which the Orioles learned they would send multiple players to the annual All-Star Gamefor the first time since 2005, the team again resembled the also-rans that have been so prominent at Camden Yards in the last decade-plus.