More than anything else that has happened with the Orioles this decade, the six-year contract extension that kept center fielder Adam Jones away from the free-agent market in May 2012 heralded a new era for an ascending, playoff-bound team.
That contract, an $85.5 million deal signed six years ago Sunday, comes to an end this season. So, too, in many ways does the generation of Orioles baseball during which it was consummated.
It isn't lost on Jones, 32, that such a dusk has set in, chiefly because so few of the players who made that success happen have had the opportunity to extend their time in an Orioles uniform before club control expired.