There doesn't seem to be a ton of Baltimore news these days

It looks like the Orioles' best players are Ty Wigginton, Corey Patterson and Felix Pie. This is bad for business.

It's no fun to be on the 'Bogey Train'

The announcer for the British Open just implored Mark Calcavecchia to get off the "Bogey Train."

I just wonder how one gets on this train. Because I'd like to get a ticket.

 And wouldn't a "Bogey Bus" be more appropriate. I guess maybe  it's the "Birdie Bus" so you wouldn't want to get the two confused. 

This is the type of parlance that needs to be standardized. Luckily I'm here to help.

How to kill the time between Strasburg starts

The best day of the week is every fifth day. That's when Steven Strasburg gets to pitch. It's Strasmas and it beats the hell out of Stammenmas.

The problem is that if Strasburg pitches on a Friday, he doesn't pitch again until Wednesday. That leaves Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. And those days can be really boring.

When Strasburg pitches, players like Edgar Renteria fling bats across the infield after getting fooled on a strike out pitch. Players like JD Martin are safely stashed in the dugout where they can do no harm.

When Strasburg does not pitch, JD is free to give up doubles to Edgar.

If you squint hard enough, and tune in on a lo-def, 13-inch monitor, Livan Hernandez can kind of look like Strasburg. But he's hardly an adequate substitute.

To help, I've come up with a few ways to kill the down time between Strasburg's starts.

I think we are going to see some alley-oops

I wish I a little taller, you know, so I could dunk. Like actually dunk. None of this barely grabbing the front of the rim and dropping the ball in nonsense.

It's a good thing for the Wizards and John Wall that there are people who can actually dunk a basketball. One of these people, and someone on who is extremely good at dunking, is JaVale McGee.

From watching the first two Summer League games, it's pretty obvious that the Wizards plan to run this season. This should be good news for people who like dunking.

Last season McGee was the "Wizard Most Likely to End Up on Sports Center for a Reason Related to a Basketball Game." And it was because he is good at dunking. McGee was able to do this even though he had guys like Earl Boykins and Randy Foye, who weren't so great at passing, setting him up for the dunks.

Well, Randy and Earl are gone, to be replaced by Wall. I know Summer League consists of a series of glorified pickup games, but Wall and McGee look like they have the "Run N Dunk" offense down.

And since I can't dunk, I will settle for tuning in for the rest of the Summer League games to live vicariously through the Wizards.

Snow golf

Somewhere down in Texas

With a gutsy performance in Arlington last night the Orioles stole a win from the Rangers and the spotlight from the King, Cleveland and Miami. The win provided us with the assurance that the team would only be swept 9 times and win 10 road games before the All-Star break. This year's version of the Birds also prevented themselves from living in infamy as the only team in Major League Baseball history to have no pitcher win 4 games by the mid summer classic.

Felix Pie continued to stay hot at the dish with a 7th inning bomb while Craig Tatum drew a crucial 8th inning walk and David Hernandez worked 1.1 innings to pick up his team leading 4th win of the season. Tonight Brian Matusz takes the bump and looks to join Hernandez, and the 2010-11 Cleveland Cavaliers, in the elusive 4 win club.