Countdown: 20 Days

The 2010 baseball season will being in 20 days. 20 days, the weather is great here in the Land of Pleasant Living. 66+ degrees and a few wispy clouds in the sky. It smells like spring, I can taste baseball.

Still, the Orioles have some issues to deal with. Second baseman Brian Roberts has yet to play in an exhibition game and has returned from his brief jaunt to Baltimore with yet another prognosis of wait and see. Roberts received an epidural to try and calm the small hernia in his lower back. Roberts is still planning on being in the lineup in 20 days, but the longer this goes on the more worried I get. To me, the silver lining in this situation is that if this was any kind surgery-worthy injury we would have known that by now and Roberts would have been presenting more troubling symptoms. All accounts are that he looks fine and is doing pretty much everything in camp - except playing in games.

Even more troubling however is Nolan Reimold. Nolan is recovering from achilles surgery over the winter and it seems he is still running with soreness and limping.The young outfielder has been assuring everyone that he will be fine, but I am very concerned. Unlike Roberts, Reimold still has a lot to prove and I could see him trying to fight through an injury and making it worse. Combine this Felix's sore shoulder the outfield "log jam" is suddenly looking a lot less jammed.

Another source of concern is recent SI cover-boy Matt Wieters. Wieters has only one hit so far this Spring. Now, granted he hasn't played on consecutive days much, and it is less than 20 ABs, and some might say that he is a slow starter, and he isn't playing in complete games, and he is supposed to be working on his defense moreso that his offense - but one hit. One. I am a full believer in Wieters, but here is the deal Baltimore. We have put the weight of the world on this young man's massive shoulders. Wieters was feeling the pressure last year and he scuffled, hopefully those butterflies will be gone but I am sure being reminded that his Georgia Tech teammates nicknamed him "God" doesn't help things.

Once again, Spring Training is practice it doesn't count and there is no need to worry. CC Sabathia looks terrible as does Joba Chaimberlain the struggles of Wieters et al are more common than not and there is no reason to worry. But the Baltimore inside me is getting nervous.

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