In this space yesterday I noted that Ryan Mountcastle would be expected to hit more home runs in 2025 as the Orioles are moving the left field fence closer to home plate at Camden Yards. This is after three years after they had moved the wall back nearly 30 feet from its original position.

Mountcastle hit 22 home runs in Baltimore during the 2021 season, the last one with the previous dimensions. He averaged a homer at Camden Yards every 12.77 at-bats that year. But then he hit just 28 total home homers from 2022 through 2024, hitting one every 24.86 at-bats.

I wondered how the entire team was impacted by the year-to-year home homer numbers.

Here are the stats on that from 2021 on:

Actually, the O’s got closer to their 2021 home stats each year, almost equaling them last season when the team hit 235 homers for the season, second-most in the major leagues to the Yankees' 237.

The Orioles went a little too far in pushing back their left field wall, prompting some changes in the other direction for the 2025 season.

Executive vice president/general manager Mike Elias announced today in a video call that the baseball operations department after careful deliberation has “decided to pursue modifications to the dimensions in left.”

Some areas will be pulled in as much as 20 feet, and others 11 or at a maximum of nine. A rendering shows the wall lowered from 13 to eight feet.

The initial renovations moved back the wall 30 feet and raised it about eight.

“We made the change between the 2021 and 2022 seasons as we were trying to pursue a more neutral but also more pitcher-friendly array at Camden Yards,” Elias said, “and we were doing so under the time constraints of a single offseason and seeking a way to make at that time our extremely homer-prone park more neutral and perhaps erring to the side of pitcher-friendliness. And given the uncertainties of the game, offensive environments, et cetera, it became clear to us and me and our staff, our coaches and players, the feedback that we received over three years of lived experience, that it was a directionally correct move, but we overcorrected.

Coming off a season that produced the Orioles' biggest attendance increase in nine years, the club is holding an event soon to invite more fans to purchase tickets for games at Oriole Park at Camden Yards.

The O’s will host a Birdland Member Select-A-Seat event on Saturday, Nov. 16 from 10 a.m. to noon at the ballpark in downtown Baltimore.

The event is open to the public for fans interested in purchasing a 2025 Birdland Membership or Suite Package. Fans can choose their Oriole Park seat location and learn about the benefits of becoming a Birdland member.

Those interested can RSVP at Orioles.com/SelectASeat. The deadline to RSVP for this event is Nov. 14 at 6 p.m.

Once someone RSVPs, an O’s ticket rep will reach out to confirm their participation and provide more details regarding the event.

Jackson Holliday has been at Camden Yards before, but not as a player in the starting lineup. Tonight the 20-year-old No. 1 ranked prospect in baseball will play his third MLB game and first in front of the hometown Baltimore fans.

“It’s a pretty awesome place to be able to play,” he said this afternoon to a crowd of reporters, adding that he remembered being here before.

“I think it was when my dad (Matt) was with the Cardinals. Me and my brother came out here and shagged (BP fly balls). I remember thinking this is a really great place to hit.

"I remember being able to almost rob a home run because the wall was shorter before they moved it back and raised it about 100 feet. I do remember it and it’s very special be here,” the kid said showing he retains a sense of humor amid a flurry of interviews he has been doing.

“To be able to come to the ballpark and have a locker here, it’s definitely a little bit different. When I was with Aberdeen and Bowie, I came down to eat every now and then. But it’s definitely a different experience knowing this is home for now.”

While the Orioles spend the 2024 season trying to repeat as division champions, fans will be reintroduced to one of Baltimore’s iconic brews - which also repeats if you chug it too fast.

Natty Boh is coming back to Camden Yards.

The Orioles sent out a press release earlier today that featured new and returning menu items at the ballpark, but the big news is that National Bohemian will be available for the first time since 2016.

Fans will be able to purchase it in a specialty-themed orange can sold exclusively at the park, though the diehards would happily sip it out of their cupped hands. They just want their Natty Boh that disappeared suddenly in 2016 due to a dispute with parent company Pabst.

The blue ribbon goes to whoever mended those fences.

The playoffs are clinched. The division is clinched. And now, the Orioles can intensify their focus on getting the rotation and roster prepped for the American League Division Series, and reveling in the rest that’s coming to them with the bye.

Cedric Mullins is batting leadoff tonight with Gunnar Henderson out of the lineup. Heston Kjerstad is in right field, Adam Frazier is the second baseman and Ramón Urías is at third.

Ryan Mountcastle gets the start at first base, with Ryan O’Hearn serving as designated hitter.

John Means is making his fourth start since coming off the 60-day injured list. He didn’t allow a hit for 6 2/3 innings in Cleveland. He’s allowed two runs in 12 innings in his last two starts to seemingly thrust himself into the postseason rotation.

Means owns a 3.70 ERA and 0.992 WHIP in eight career games (seven starts) against the Red Sox. Rafael Devers is 3-for-20.

The Orioles got a lot of mileage out of moving back the left field wall about 30 feet.

Every fly ball that approached the warning track would elicit references to previous seasons and how another batter was robbed of a home run by the new dimensions rather than an outfielder.

It got a little tired for me, to be honest, but I understood the obsession. And the importance of balancing the playing field.

The cheap home runs became a joke, except no one with the Orioles was laughing.

An article from CBS Sports in late August noted how the ballpark was averaging 1.87 home runs per game this season compared to 3.36 from 2019-21. Only 8.8 percent of fly balls and line drives found the left field seats compared to 13.5 from 2019-21.