It's the 20th anniversary of the opening of Oriole Park at Camden Yards, and the Minnesota Twins are out to spoil it when they kick off their Opening Day against the Baltimore Orioles on Friday. It will be the first game in what is sure to be an intriguing season for the Twins, who finished with the most losses in the American League last season but attributed most of that to the injury bug and bad luck.
The starting batting order has already been released for the Twins as shown below, with Joe Mauer batting third being the man to watch as he always seems to be. There's still some injuries floating around the Twins right now which means there's a couple of new faces on the roster.
1. Denard Span, CF
2. Jamey Carroll, SS
3. Joe Mauer, C
4. Justin Morneau, DH
5. Josh Willingham, LF
6. Ryan Doumit, RF
7. Danny Valencia, 3B
8. Chris Parmelee, 1B
9. Alexi Casilla, 2B
Carl Pavano will take the mound for the Twins, he of a 9-13 record and a 4.30 ERA last season during the lost year for Minnesota in 2011. The Orioles will have 26 year old Jake Arrieta starting the opening day affair. Now in his third year of service for the team, Arrieta won 10 games in his sophomore campaign. Big things will be expected of the young man this year, but he is a guy who has never pitched more than 120 innings in his two seasons. Arrieta also had a worrying 5.05 ERA and 21 home runs allowed in 2011, almost a rate of one HR per game.
The game will be at Oriole Park at Camden Yards at 3:05 p.m. ET.
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