SARASOTA, Fla. _ No one likes showing up for work at 6 a.m. to have their time wasted. So when the Orioles' seven spring training catchers got stretched out, strapped up and ready for early work in the cage before Wednesday's sunrise, it was all business.
Then Tim Cossins, the major league field coordinator/catching instructor running the show, reached into a bucket of balls he was feeding into a pitching machine for a blocking drill and found a rubber snake.
So began a day that was typical of a catcher in spring training, but only in how different it was from what everyone else was doing.
The work is hard, but worth it. And at baseball's most demanding position, catchers with decades of professional experience and major league pedigree worked alongside the Orioles' 22-year-old top prospect Adley Rutschman, continuing his indoctrination into a demanding lifestyle none of them would trade for anything.
"There's a natural camaraderie built because it's such a physically demanding position," Cossins said. "It's mentally demanding as well, and a lot of the team success hangs in the balance of whether the catchers are in tune.
"It's a massively important position. Just being in that environment, where you're pulling together, that helps solidify the whole thing."
