Jon Knott DFA; O's acquire two

The Orioles picked up Victor Santos from the Reds to help in their desperate search of pitching. Santos is really not a good pitcher at all. He's 30 and has a 5.14 ERA in 588 career innings including a 5.14 ERA in 32 relief appearances (49 innings) this season. Santos will start on Tuesday Night.

To make room for him on the 40 man roster, the club officially ended the Jon Knott Era in Baltimore. Knott hit .250/.356/.451 with 13 HR in 288 AB in class AAA Norfolk. The handwriting had been on the wall for a while in regard to Knott, no more clear than when he didn't even get called up after rosters expanded last week. It's extremely disappointing that Knott wasn't even given a shot with Payton/Gibbons manning LF for most of the season, but such is the way of the Orioles.

The Orioles also shut down Erik Bedard for the season, putting him on the 60 Day Disabled List. To add depth, the Orioles picked up Victor Zambrano, whose biggest career achievement was being traded for Scott Kazmir. Zambrano had brief stints with the Mets and Blue Jays over the past two seasons and was horrible. He also pitched to an ERA over 5.50 in class AAA with Syracuse and Indianapolis, naturally making him a desirable acquisition for the Orioles.

Hayden Penn has pitched well in Norfolk so far (20/5 K/BB in 21 IP) and would seemingly need to get some more work after missing a large part of the season with an injury, but the Orioles have decided against bringing him up even with the need for pitching. It would be nice to allow the 22 year old to ease his way back into the majors with some low-pressure innings out of the bullpen this month, but that appears not to be in the plans.