The 2005 Ally Award

Goodness, how time flies.

It seems like just yesterday that a Belfry reader made a comparison between an Orioles' hitter and the athletic ability of a certain wafer-thin television barrister.

By season's end, the Pinata had a companion award!

The Ally is still the junior award...this is only the fifth time the Golden Spittoon will be distributed.

The first winner was our most illustrious...Cal Ripken's arms were already overflowing with hardware and gifts, his ears ringing with huzzahs and farewells, but we still managed to find a place to squeeze in the first Ally Award amongst his trophies.

In 2002, catcher Geronimo Gil took home the award, while "Home Run or Bust" third sacker Tony Batista was our winner in 2003.

Last season, it was an unprecedented group award bestowed upon the Orioles' bench, for performance far below the call of duty.

There were a couple of standout performances in 2005.

Everyone who played in left field was certainly a contender, as the collective efforts of Larry Bigbie, Eric Byrnes, David Newhan, and B.J. Surhoff turned left into the most toxic real estate on the East Coast this side of Love Canal.

David Newhan certainly earned some bonus points by mouthing off when he was dropped from the roster after not hitting for nearly half a season, and then compounding his chutzpah by not hitting after the Orioles managed to resign him, either.

But, as we all know, there was one performance that towered high above all others, a veritable King Kong of hapless statistics crushing the competition under his infected, bloated feet.

Did anyone else even have a chance?

Not really.

The 2005 Ally Award goes to:

Sammy Sosa !!!

Yes, yes, as is too often the case, a player swoops in for one season of work with the Orioles and departs with the hardware. This, however, is the first time this has happened on the hitters' side of the equation. Sammy joins the ranks of one-year wonders like Shawn Boskie, Omar Daal (although he was at least supposed to be around more than one year), and Doug Drabek, swooping in on a wave of hope and euphoria in February, only to skulk out in September, his Ally tucked under his arm, dragging his bad foot behind him.

Everyone remembers the low expectations we all had for Sammy. We all thought that if he could only manage to replicate his last seasons with the Cubs, with just more games being played, that the Orioles would get reasonable mileage out of him. Maybe a new home was going to rejuvenate him...away from the harping Chicago press, perhaps he could become Smilin' Slammin' Sammy again.

Or, he could do THIS:

A .221 batting average, with a .295 OBP, worst among the regulars until Eric Byrne joined the team.

A 'slugging percentage' of .376, only two points higher than the team's lowest among regulars.

An OPS forty points below Luis Matos, a player the O's would like to replace in center with someone more productive.

FOURTEEN home runs to go with 84 K's in only 380 AB.

3.36 Runs Created/9 innings. (Eric Byrnes created 3.92; B.J. Surhoff created 3.35.)

Simply amazing. We've all seen players fall off the cliff before, but seldom in such spectacular fashion. Players usually wait until they are 38 or 39 to stumble so severely, but Sammy turned out to be on the leading edge of that wave.

So we wave a fond farewell to Sammy Sosa, wondering what his baseball future holds after picking up one of the Belfry's awards. When one looks at what happened to Cal, the Chief, Tony B, Drabek, Jimmy Haynes, Daal, and all the rest, it doesn't look promising.