{"id":378214,"date":"2026-07-18T22:03:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T22:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/378214\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T22:03:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T22:03:15","slug":"orioles-sign-booth-lineups-and-notes-before-todays-game-in-houston","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/378214\/","title":{"rendered":"Orioles sign Booth, lineups and notes before today&#8217;s game in Houston"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Orioles first-round draft pick Eric Booth, an outfielder from Oak Grove High School in Mississippi, has signed for $7,324,700. The slot value for the seventh-overall selection was $7,327,200.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Booth receives the third-largest bonus in franchise history after infielder Jackson Holliday ($8.19 million) and catcher Adley Rutschman ($8.1 million.)<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Baseball America ranked Booth, 18, as the top outfielder in the draft. He has 80-grade speed and ran the fastest 60-yard dash at 6.33 seconds at last year\u2019s East Coast Pro showcase.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Booth is a plus defender in center field and he batted .481 (37-for-77) with a .669 on-base percentage and .922 slugging percentage as a senior. He had a commitment to Vanderbilt University.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">MLB Pipeline\u2019s Jim Callis was first with terms of Booth\u2019s agreement. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The deadline for teams to sign their draft selections is July 27 at 5 p.m.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Last night\u2019s 3-2, come-from-behind victory over the Astros extended the Orioles\u2019 winning streak to five games. They haven\u2019t won six in a row since May 30-June 5, 2025.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Taylor Ward\u2019s two-run homer in the eighth inning kept the Orioles on a roll entering the second half. The bullpen tossed five scoreless innings after Dean Kremer allowed two runs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The day begins with the Orioles in fourth place and two games out of the Wild Card. They\u2019re two behind the third-place Red Sox, who have won 11 straight.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Oriole passed the Astros in the Wild Card standings, with three teams now ahead of them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cEvery win matters, especially as we come closer to the deadline,\u201d Kremer told the media. \u201cI feel like this is just the beginning where we kind of find our stride, and hopefully things continue to look that way.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe baseball season\u2019s a long season, and it constantly tries to trick everyone, and us, into overreacting,\u201d manager Craig Albernaz said in his media scrum. \u201cThat\u2019s something that we have to be diligent to showing up every day and take each day and be prepared to win.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Christian Encarnacion-Strand is making his Orioles debut today at third base. Adley Rutschman is leading off and serving as designated hitter. Dylan Beavers is in right field and Colton Cowser is in center. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Left-hander Trevor Rogers allowed seven runs in 30 2\/3 innings in June for a 2.05 ERA and has surrendered one run in 11 innings this month. Left-handers are hitting .172\/.240\/.287 against him this year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Rogers has allowed three runs in 12 1\/3 innings in two career starts against the Astros. Jeremy Pe\u00f1a is 3-for-7 against him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Samuel Basallo is paired again with Rogers. The lefty has a 2.98 ERA in 11 starts with Basallo behind the plate. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ward is hitting .400 when ahead in the count and chases just 9.6 percent of the time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Houston\u2019s Spencer Arrighetti has posted a 4.50 ERA in 15 starts. He\u2019s walked 44 batters in 81 innings.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Arrighetti had a 1.34 ERA through May but it\u2019s made a steady climb. He allowed six runs in six innings against the Guardians, eight runs in three innings in Detroit, and most recently, eight runs in four innings in D.C.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Arrighetti allowed 0.38 home runs per nine innings in April and May, but the number increased to 2.57 since June.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The right-hander has allowed two runs in 11 2\/3 innings in two career starts against the Orioles. Gunnar Henderson is 3-for-6 with a double and homer against him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Arrighetti has a 3.22 ERA in six home starts this season and a 5.52 ERA in nine road games.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For the Orioles<br \/>Adley Rutschman DH<br \/>Gunnar Hederson SS<br \/>Taylor Ward LF<br \/>Pete Alonso 1B<br \/>Samuel Basallo C<br \/>Dylan Beavers RF<br \/>Colton Cowser CF<br \/>Christian Encarnacion-Strand 3B<br \/>Jackson Holliday 2B<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Trevor Rogers LHP<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For the Astros<br \/>Jeremy Pe\u00f1a SS<br \/>Yordan Alvarez DH<br \/>Isaac Paredes 3B<br \/>Jose Altuve 2B<br \/>Christian Walker 1B<br \/>Yainer Diaz C<br \/>Cam Smith RF<br \/>Zach Dezenzo LF<br \/>Lucas Spence CF<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Spencer Arrighetti RHP<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">More on late trade<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Orioles announced shortly before midnight that they acquired outfielder Rudy Martin from the Royals for cash considerations, selected his contract from Triple-A Norfolk and optioned him. Chris Bassitt was transferred to the 60-day injured list to make room on the 40-man.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Martin, 30, is a left-handed hitter who plays all three outfield positions. The Royals drafted him in the 25th round in 2014 out of Lewisburg High School in Mississippi. He\u2019s never played in the majors.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Martin is a career .252\/.358\/.387 hitter in nine seasons, and he\u2019s stolen 227 bases in 277 attempts. He swiped 78 bases in 81 attempts with the independent York Revolution in 2024, after spending 2022 in the Nationals organization and 2023 in the independent American Association.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Martin appeared in a combined 64 games this year with Double-A Northwest Arkansas and Triple-A Omaha and batted .284\/.414\/.441.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Orioles first-round draft pick Eric Booth, an outfielder from Oak Grove High School in Mississippi, has signed for&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":378215,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[133733,1492,56,58,57,115735,133598,116162,88780],"class_list":["post-378214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-eric-booth-jr","tag-featured","tag-houston","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-news","tag-orioles","tag-roch-kubatko","tag-samuel-basallo","tag-trevor-rogers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=378214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/378215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=378214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=378214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=378214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}