It’s March 28, 1996, and the Orioles lost to Atlanta, 12-5, in one of the final exhibition games. Starter Jimmy Haynes struggled, giving up — gulp — all 12 runs. “Needless to say, Jimmy was awful,” said O’s manager Davey Johnson. “I left him out there to try and get something going and the last couple innings he got a little better.” Well, I guess that’s one way to do it. Haynes still will be the team’s fifth starter, but with comments like that from the boss, it’s hard to think the leash will be all that long.

Here at Ghosts we’ve covered just about everyone who will be on the Opening Day roster. But after discussing a particularly volatile performance on the mound in today’s spring game, this seems an appropriate time to talk about a young fire-balling reliever who may become a critical part of the bullpen, or he may implode and be just another guy. Welcome to the Armando Benitez experience.

Armando Benitez was born in November of 1972 in Ramon Santana, Dominican Republic. His parents worked in a sugar refinery and the family lived in the “batey,” a makeshift village next to it. Armando and the other kids immediately loved baseball, but they lacked even the most basic equipment to play it.

“They would always look for oranges to play baseball,” his mother Constancia remembered. “When it would split, they started using socks and pieces of cloth, forming them into a round shape and sewing them. … The gloves a lot of times were made of cardboard. They’d play on the street or sometimes in the country next to the refinery.” (South Florida Sun Sentinel, p. 11A, April 4, 2004)

Benitez mainly played the field, until a game when he was forced onto the mound by default changed his life forever.

“I remember it like it was today,” he told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel in 2004. “One day on the team I was playing, we took a beating and nobody wanted to pitch. I told them give me the ball and I’ll do it. … I’d never pitched a baseball, and I threw seven innings.”

In 1990, when he was 17, Benitez signed with the Orioles. He ascended through the minors on the back of a blazing high-90s fastball. He skipped Triple-A altogether and made his major league debut in 1994 before the strike. It was impressive. He pitched just three games, throwing 10 innings, striking out 14 and only giving up 1 run. The O’s looked to have a serious high leverage bullpen piece at just 21 years old.

But then, 1995 happened and Benitez was quite bad. He pitched in 44 games, but gave up 30 runs in 47⅔ innings. He had trouble finding the plate (37 walks) and though he didn’t get hit a ton (37 hits), he got hit hard (8 homers). On one particularly rough night in June, he gave up a grand slam to Seattle’s Edgar Martinez as part of a 9-run meltdown in the eighth. Then with his next pitch, he drilled Tino Martinez, forcing his teammates to rush in to stop him from starting a fight. And then, following the game, he stormed out of a meeting with manager Phil Regan and packed all his stuff from his locker.

“He’s a very sensitive person,” Regan said after the game. “I’m sure he was hurt and embarrassed by what he did. He’s only a young kid. He wants to perform, he wants to do well. It was just an embarrassing moment for him.” (Baltimore Sun, p. 6D, June 8, 1995)

Coming into 1996, Benitez is still just 23 years old, and it seems like he will be a part of the bullpen, which is now stocked with veterans after the O’s brought in Roger McDowell and Randy Myers. He has looked dominant this spring, and it seems as though he has a good rapport with his new manager, Johnson, and new pitching coach Pat Dobson. 

“It’s easier,” Benitez told Ken Rosenthal of The Baltimore Sun this spring. “Last year was my first time in the majors. Right now is my second time. I know what happened. I know what to do. I have the experience.” (Baltimore Sun, p. 6D, March 5, 1996)

With 1995 in the rearview, the O’s still seem to have big plans for Benitez. With his overpowering stuff, it is easy to dream on him becoming a force in the back of the bullpen for years to come.

Fun in the Sun

Welcome to a recurring segment where I find fun things in today’s (in 1996) Baltimore Sun!

In this tidbit buried in the “Sports Digest” part of the sports section, we find out that the University of Florida has hired Marshall’s Billy Donovan to be its next coach. Donovan, a coveted up-and-coming coach, would go on to spend the next 19 years at Florida, highlighted by back-to-back championships in 2006 and 2007. For now, he coaches the Chicago Bulls.