B. J. Surhoff, 1997 Upper Deck #304

For their 1997 base set, Upper Deck took some of the guesswork out of puzzling out when the pictures on the cards had been taken. It was a neat idea that was gone completely by 1999. Their reporting checks out here; on April 29, 1996, the Orioles did indeed host the Rangers, and B. J. Surhoff "went yard", lining a ball over the right field fence off of Rick Helling in the bottom of the seventh inning. It was a game-winning shot, as it broke a 7-7 tie and neither team scored for the rest of the contest. This game was as wild as the score suggests, with the Rangers jumping out to a 5-0 lead by the third inning, sending O's starter Kent Mercker to an early shower. Baltimore charged back with a three-spot in the third, but reliever Jimmy Haynes gave a pair of runs back in the fifth to make it 7-3. A Mike Devereaux solo homer and a Surhoff two-run double narrowed the deficit to one in the home half of the fifth, and set the stage for the Orioles to rally for the decisive runs in the seventh. Roberto Alomar led off with a double, stole third base, and scored the tying run on a Rafael Palmeiro sacrifice fly. Then it was over to Surhoff for his big blast, and the Baltimore bullpen combo of Haynes, Jesse Orosco, and Randy Myers successfully walked a tightrope to get the last six outs. Texas stranded 13 men on base, including four in the last two innings. So I guess what I'm saying is that this was a good choice by the Upper Deck folks.

Scott Erickson, 1997 Upper Deck #307

As I often do when I'm too lazy to think of a topic of my own, I'm going to spin off from Night Owl's blog. In a recent post, he declared his affinity for cards that depict pitchers batting. I second that motion; with the Orioles operating under the auspices of the designated hitter rule save for the occasional road interleague series, these oddball pictures are a rare treat for me. My absolute favorite is this Dennis Martinez card from 1982 Fleer, which is the even-rarer posed pitcher-as-batter. But seeing the hulking 6'4" Scott Erickson looking so ill at ease trying to lay down a bunt in a spring training game is almost as entertaining. That's some flat-footed stance he's got. The caption, "Practices his batting eye for interleague play in 1997", is notable for its awkwardness. If he was standing in a regular stance with the bat on his shoulder, I'd go along with the premise. But it doesn't quite match up.

I'm sure you're dying to know how Scott Erickson handled the bat in his career. He came to the plate 44 times in his career, which includes 17 plate appearances with the Mets and Dodgers at the tail end. He collected 4 hits in 35 at-bats, walked 4 times, and laid down 5 successful sacrifice bunts. That's an average of .114 with a .205 on-base percentage. He peaked with the O's in 2000, batting .400 (2-for-5) and collecting his only extra-base hit and RBI with a double off of Dave Coggin of the Phillies. So he was no Don Newcombe, but he wasn't Daniel Cabrera either.

David Wells, 1997 Upper Deck #251

Over the course of his 21-year career, David Wells called a lot of different cities home. He switched teams 11 times and played for nine different teams: the Blue Jays (twice), Tigers, Reds, Orioles, Yankees (twice), White Sox, Padres (twice), Red Sox, and Dodgers. Whew! The above card highlights his series-tying win in Game Two of the 1996 ALCS, in which the O's beat the Yankees 5-3. The following season, "Boomer" jumped ship from Baltimore to New York as a free agent. You just couldn't tie this guy down.

Much like Wells, I've been on the move more than I cared to be over the past few years (of course, I stayed in Maryland through it all). Since June of 2008, I've packed up all of my belongings twice, going from Columbia to Silver Spring to Chase. Next month, I'll be doing it all again, but this will be the last move for a while...knock on wood.

Tonight I signed a contract to purchase my brother-in-law's rowhouse in Parkville, which means that I'm taking the leap into home ownership for the first time. It's an exciting and overwhelming thing, and there's still a lot to be done in the next few weeks: tons of loan paperwork, an appraisal and inspection, some cosmetic improvements to the walls and floors, some furniture shopping, and of course the actual act of moving in. But I'm thrilled to be near the Beltway (not too near), and consequently closer to work. Needless to say, I'm also relieved to be escaping from the "blogger living in his parents' basement" stereotype. I'm going home. My home.

Mike Bordick, 1997 Upper Deck #308

To continue my train of thought from last night, Mike Bordick was another sure-handed player, and had much more staying power than Craig Worthington. He parlayed a dependable, if unspectacular, glove and a mediocre bat into a fourteen-year, 1720-game career. He made it to the major leagues for good in the summer of 1991, the same period of time that Pearl Jam's wildly successful debut album Ten was released.

I've been a fan of Pearl Jam almost as long as I've been rooting for the Orioles - about fifteen years. In my childhood and early adolescence, my musical appreciation and knowledge was limited to The Beatles. The grunge-rock quintet from Seattle was the first band to puncture my cocoon, and I stuck with them long after most others abandoned the group. As their commercial success dwindled in the late '90s, I found myself still identifying with their music. During my senior year of high school, I even got one of their emblems tattooed on my back. I eventually tuned out to their increasingly sporadic new work (2000's Binaural was so discouraging to me that I didn't even bother with 2002's Riot Act), but I continued to give the rest of their library a regular listen and gave their last album (a self-titled effort in 2006) a chance; I was not disappointed.

Through all of my years of Pearl Jam fandom, I have never seen them in concert. I've heard several of their performances, and they struck me as an especially adept live band; they don't get cute and play around with the tempos and lyrics of their songs so as to render them indistinguishable, and their sound translates seamlessly from the studio to the stage. There are a few reasons I can think of for missing out on their act every time they've been in the Mid-Atlantic: poor timing, old-fashioned lack of initiative, and an inability to identify any friends who would be sufficiently interested in accompanying me. As I mentioned earlier, avid Pearl Jam fans aren't exactly legion, and the few that I've personally known were more acquaintances than friends. But when I actually bothered to open a mass mailing from Ticketmaster back in April and found out that tickets for Pearl Jam's June 22 concert at the Verizon Center were going on sale that very morning, I finally seized my opportunity. I wanted to get a decent seat, and the tickets were priced a little steep, so I pushed ahead without bothering to find a companion for the show.

This past Sunday I made my way into the concert venue and took my seat in the middle tier of the arena, situated near the back of the stage but with a decent side view of the band. As the opening act (Ted Leo and the Pharmacists) warmed up a half-full and more or less indifferent crowd, I sat somewhat awkwardly at my perch. I'm not much of a concert-goer, and I was unfamiliar with the artists on stage and acutely aware of my lone-wolf status. At 8:45, the palpable buzz in the arena built to a roar as the featured attraction took the stage. I rose to my feet with the rest of the masses as Eddie Vedder stepped to the microphone and the band kicked things off with "Hard to Imagine". For the first few songs, I was restrained by my own self-consciousness. Should I sing along? Move around in time with the music, if I were so inclined? And the age-old dilemma: what the hell do I do with my hands? I tried just standing upright with my hands hanging to my sides; it still wasn't working for me. I clapped at the beginning and end of each song, and (somewhat) in time with the rhythm of the music in between. I even buried them in my pockets now and then, convincing myself that no one would pay me enough mind to judge.

An amazing string of some of my favorite songs early in the set helped to loosen me up and pull me into the moment. The hard rocker "Hail Hail" got me moving (and even singing) with less regard for how goony I might look. I'd waited over half my life to be in that place at that time, and I wasn't going to let the imagined opinions of complete strangers - who were half in the dark anyway - hold me back. Several times I became cognizant of the fact that a giddy sort of grin was plastered on my face, and why not? I made sure to soak up as many little details of the tableau as I could. I noticed the knowing grins that Eddie Vedder and guitarist Stone Gossard shot at each other. Bassist Jeff Ament seemed to be in his own world half of the time, but Stone would cross the stage to draw him out and they would play one-on-one. Matt Cameron didn't even seem to break a sweat behind the drum kit. But lead guitarist Mike McCready seemed to be the most in his element. He has a reputation as one of the greatest technicians of his generation, and he has the showmanship to complement it. He paced the stage ferociously, jumping up and down while his fingers flew across the strings and his feet manipulated the distortion pedals. He played to the entire crowd, pointing to specific sections of the crowd at various times to engage those not directly seated in the front. And of course, he showed off by lifting his guitar behind his head and playing blind on one occasion.

One of the most amusing idiosyncrasies of the show occurred as Pearl Jam played one of their biggest and oldest hits, Even Flow. During McCready's lengthy solo, Eddie Vedder wandered away to give the guitarist the spotlight. I watched as the lead singer stood near the keyboards and lit up a cigarette. He would repeat this act in the middle of a few other instrumental-heavy tunes, effectively saying, 'hey, you've got this covered. I need to take a load off for a bit.' In one instance he wandered around the back of the stage, dancing lazily, as if he were sharing a private laugh with a portion of the crowd.

I'd been pretty pleased with the song selection during the first set, as they touched on a good variety of old and new, the hits and the less-heralded. There were a few songs that I still wanted to hear, including my two favorites ("Black" and "Rearviewmirror"). But I had heard that Pearl Jam played lengthy shows, often doing multiple encores. When the band came back out just a few minutes after making an exit, I was cautiously optimistic. My hopes faded as they played an ecclectic mix of mostly newer and lower-key numbers. If I was relieved when the second-to-last selection of the encore was "Black", then I was downright euphoric moments later when I heard the opening bars of "Rearviewmirror". I actually screamed out like I was celebrating a strikeout by George Sherrill. They were going out on a high note, drawing out the bridge of the song before bringing it to an up-tempo, crashing conclusion. The Verizon Center, packed to the rafters, throbbed with cheers, screams, and applause for several more minutes.

To the delight of the throng, Eddie Vedder returned alone. He seemed overwhelmed by the size and enthusiasm of the crowd and suggested that Michael Jordan never got that kind of reaction when he made his comeback in that very building. (He might have had a point.) He played "No More", an anti-war song that he'd written last year, giving the rest of the guys a few minutes more to rest. When Stone, Jeff, Mike, and Matt joined him once more, Eddie informed the crowd in front that they should sit tight, as the band was going to play a song for the folks in the back. They then came around to the back of the stage and played "Last Kiss" for us. As their extended set approached a total running time of two and a half hours, I watched with bated breath as each song ended. The band would put down their instruments and take a few steps toward the stairs, only to hand off their equipment and pick up different instruments for the next song. It was like an extensive dream that might not ever end.

"Alive" brought down the house, and I was sure that would be the swan song. But they broke into a cover of "All Along the Watchtower", and even brought a young boy named Jake (who I assume they'd met earlier in the day) onstage to play guitar for the song. After the song was over, Eddie did a roll call of the band, thanked everyone, and...insisted that before they called it a night, he had to turn things over to Mike. So the show closed with "Yellow Ledbetter", a song I surely would have sung along with if I had ever figured out exactly what in the Sam Hill the lyrics were. As the rest of Pearl Jam took their leave, Mike stood alone once more and blared out the Star Spangled Banner on his axe in an homage to fellow Seattlite Jimi Hendrix. All told, the show clocked in at two hours and forty-five minutes, and it would have been worth twice the price of the ticket. If you have any interest in Pearl Jam, I can't recommend them enough as a concert experience. For a couple hours, I didn't even worry too much about my hands.

Rocky Coppinger, 1997 Upper Deck #225

Sometimes it's refreshing and entertaining to get my mother's take on sports. For instance, she's often flabbergasted when an overweight pitcher takes the mound for the Orioles. I remember one occasion when malcontent reliever Steve Kline was laboring through a typically lousy outing. Her reaction was, "Well, maybe if he didn't have that big gut he'd pitch better!".

When you think about it, she might be on to something. There have been a few hefty hurlers who have had some measure of success in baseball, most notably Mickey Lolich and David Wells. But the handful of pitchers who have toed the rubber and tipped the scales in an O's uniform are a less than illustrious bunch: the aforementioned Kline, Terry Mathews, Sid Fernandez, the notorious Sidney Ponson, Wells himself (who had a career-high 14 losses in his lone season in Baltimore), and the gentleman above, one John Thomas Coppinger.

Rocky towered over most batters at 6'5" and a generously-listed 245 to 250 pounds. But the art of pitching is heavily dependent on mechanics and self-control, and once you get to the highest levels of baseball, a huge fastball just isn't enough to cut it. One of several "next big things" to fizzle out for the Birds in recent history, Rocky lasted just five years (82 games) in the bigs, giving up home runs (1.8 per nine innings) and walks (5.2 per nine innings) in healthy doses.

So if you're a budding pitching prospect, do yourself a favor and listen to Mom. Healthy portions, don't skimp on the training regimen, and maybe switch to light beer.