Duquette: O's seeking 'top-of-the-rotation starter'

Orioles executive vice president of baseball operations Dan Duquette said Sunday on MLB Network Radio's "The Front Office" that the team would be active in the free-agent market for starting pitchers and outfielders.

"We would like to sign a top-of-the-rotation starter," said Duquette.

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"And by that, I mean a No. 1, 2 or 3 starter," Duquette told Jim Duquette and Jim Bowden. "So there's some in that group [of free agents]. I don't think there's that many No. 1 starters, but there's some twos and threes in there that we could be very competitive on."

Duquette added that he's happy with the returning Orioles core, including catcher Matt Wieters -- who accepted a qualifying offer on Friday -- shortstop J.J. Hardy, second baseman Jonathan Schoop and center fielder Adam Jones, as well as third baseman Manny Machado.

"We have a good core coming back, and we do have some flexibility in our payroll this year and we have an opportunity to add some good players to our team," Duquette said. "We're going to be looking at outfielders and pitchers and probably a couple of both."