O's: Soft news is good news

This is the lull before the storm. This is the time when major league front office people tie up loose ends, take a few days off and catch their breath before offseason begins in earnest following the World Series. That's why the biggest baseball headline in The Sun today is about negotiations with reliever/swingman Mark Hendrickson, who almost certainly will re-sign with the Orioles -- which is fine because he's a versatile role player on the pitching staff, but it's not really news when you consider he's from nearby York and not many other teams will be beating down his door this winter. The Orioles had an extended conversation with Cuban defector Aroldis Chapman yesterday. That's an interesting development, but we all know that he's going to end up in Boston or New York. The thing that's most significant about the meeting is that it signals that owner Peter Angelos no longer has strong reservations about negotiating with Cuban players, though I g...