Roberto Alomar

Alomar, Blyleven, Palmeiro Dan Connolly Baltimore Sun To me, there are three slam-dunk candidates on this year's Hall of Fame ballot: second baseman Roberto Alomar, pitcher Bert Blyleven and first baseman Rafael Palmeiro. Alomar, a 12-time All-Star who should have been elected in his first year of eligibility in 2010, and Blyleven, who is fifth all-time in strikeouts and ninth in shutouts but hasn't been able to break the 75 percent plateau in his first 13 tries, will get in this year.

Orioles owner Peter Angelos has been given a 1997 "Rodman Award" by Esquire magazine.The tongue-in-cheek award, named for outrageous Chicago Bulls forward Dennis Rodman, has been given out annually for four years for "dominance in the field of sports obnoxiousness and annoyance."Angelos was identified by the magazine as the "windbag owner of the Baltimore Orioles." It took him to task for publicly suggesting last year that umpire John Hirschbeck should apologize to Roberto Alomar, the second baseman who spat at Hirschbeck last season, for comments the umpire made before the spitting incident.

Poll results Last week we asked which former Oriole would be the next to go into the Hall of Fame, and it was quite the race between second baseman Roberto Alomar and pitcher Curt Schilling. You feel Alomar will beat Schilling there. The results: Roberto Alomar, 29.2 percent (1,374 votes) Curt Schilling, 27.5 percent (1,294 votes) Mike Mussina, 17.2 percent (807 votes) Lee Smith, 14.2 percent (667 votes) Sammy Sosa, 6.6 percent (312 votes) Rafael Palmeiro, 5.3 percent (249 votes)

OUR HOPE for world peace, or at least peace for Roberto Alomar Jr., is that the photo of him shaking hands with umpire John Hirschbeck was reprinted in every newspaper in the country following Tuesday's Baltimore-Chicago game, and that the videotape of it gets replayed on EPSN and "This Week in Baseball" until every man, woman and child in America sees it.Finally, finally, there may be healing for the wound Mr. Alomar inflicted on himself last fall when...

On April 7, Brady Anderson was batting .174 with no homers and no RBIs. Then, during the homestand, Anderson had four homers and nine RBIs in eight games, going 15-for-31 and improving his average to .352.Ups and downsJeffrey Hammonds -- UP -- Keeps hitting and hitting and hitting. Fielding better, too.Brady Anderson -- UP -- Past managers wanted him to be more patient at the plate. He's swinging aggressively under Davey Johnson and thriving.Bobby Bonilla -- EVEN -- Privately blames media for stirring DH/outfield controversy.

Enough alreadyI think people are overreacting to the Roberto Alomar incident and need to get their priorities straight. I have never heard such invective spewed out on the radio talk shows or printed in the newspapers. This is ridiculous.Alomar committed a rude act. He didn't bash the umpire over the head with his bat or shoot him or knife him -- he spit in his face. A childish thing to do. The umpire only made things worse by charging into the Orioles' clubhouse and threatening to kill Alomar.

UPS AND DOWNSCal Ripken -- UP -- Davey Johnson didn't really give him any choice -- and, after all, Johnson is the manager -- but Ripken made the right decision by taking the high road and going along with this move to third.Davey Johnson -- UP -- Give him points for guts. His case will be helped tremendously, though, if Manny Alexander is effective once the grand experiment begins.Manny Alexander -- EVEN -- The curtain is coming up, and Alexander's last dress rehearsal was back in March.

Highlights and lowlights from the Orioles' 18-2 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers in Vero Beach, Fla.:Ups and downsDown : Scott Erickson. Scheduled to go five innings, he couldn't clear a six-hit fourth. Everything was up. Eleven of last 16 batters against him reached.Up : Dodgertown. Worth the 2-hour drive even to take a pounding.Up : Roberto Alomar. His first right-handed at-bat is near.The batsThe Orioles fell mostly silent against Martinez, managing two hits in four innings. "First baseman" Ozzie Guillen slipped to 1-for-14 and failed to push the ball out of the infield.

Kent MerckerHis projected role in 1996: The No. 3 or No. 4 starter in the rotation, behind Mike Mussina and David Wells. The Orioles acquired Mercker, a left-hander, in a December trade with Atlanta, for pitching prospects Joe Borowski and Rachaad Stewart.Number crunching: His opportunities limited as the No. 5 starter for the Atlanta Braves, Mercker has never pitched more than 143 innings in any season. This is why the Orioles loaded his contract, agreed to on Saturday, with incentives based on innings pitched.

LAST FALL, an argument between Orioles second-baseman Roberto Alomar and umpire John Hirschbeck ended with the player spitting on the umpire -- an outrage that almost led the umpires to boycott baseball's play-offs.After a suspension for the first five days of the season, the Baltimore Orioles star resumed play yesterday just as it was announced that Lisa Pollak, a feature writer for The Sun, won a Pulitzer Prize for her story about the umpire's sons and their battles with a deadly disease.