(Photo by Ed Zurga/Getty Images)
Two months from now, when the baseball season is over and the game’s winter has just begun, few KC Royals fans will instantly recall Hanser Alberto’s Labor Day return to Oriole Park at Camden Yards, the place he became an everyday big league ball player. Baltimore gave him the chance to play regularly in 2019; he appeared in 109 games and hit .305 with 12 home runs, then became the Orioles’ second baseman last season and hit .283.
Then came arbitration season and the O’s, in a move clearly motivated by finances, non-tendered Alberto, making him a free agent available to any club.