When the Orioles beat Toronto 10-4 on Wednesday and Jackson Holliday hit a grand slam, the high of that win got deflated postgame by the news that Jordan Westburg had fractured his right hand and would miss significant time.
When they got hammered 10-3 by Cleveland last night as lefty Trevor Rogers gave up five runs in his O’s debut, the gloom and doom of that loss was lifted by the news that Coby Mayo is joining the Orioles today in Cleveland.
The news was first reported here on MASNSports.com last night.
Mayo is ranked as baseball’s No. 12 prospect in the top 100 by Baseball America and No. 15 via MLBPipeline.com.
It seemed that when Westburg got hurt, that Mayo might replace him at third base. But Livan Soto was called up yesterday. However now, just like that, the team is turning to Mayo.
He’s had a fantastic year, batting .308/.384/.619/1.003. That includes four games on injury rehab with High-A Aberdeen. In his 77 games with Triple-A Norfolk, he’s hit .301 with 20 homers, 61 RBIs and a .961 OPS.
On Wednesday, Holliday was asked about playing alongside Mayo this year with the Tides.
“It’s unbelievable,” Holliday said of Mayo’s season. “Everyone is so astonished by his power but he’s a good hitter (for average too). Just a good hitter. Hitting like .300 in Triple-A. It’s a big-time bat. He’s got a helluva arm and I know how hard he works. If they need to call on him to play third, he’ll be able to do it.”
Most organizations could only dream of producing a homegrown first-to-third infield of players like Ryan Mountcastle, Holliday, Gunnar Henderson and Mayo. And that is with Westburg out injured. So yeah, pretty good.
