Okay, Fine. Let’s Talk About the Orioles.
The 2019 Orioles finished 54-108, which was a seven-game improvement from the year prior. The only major league free agent they signed in the offseason was shortstop José Iglesias and his .687 career OPS. Even he was a replacement for Jonathan Villar, who they basically cut after hitting 24 home runs and stealing 40 bases rather than pay his $8.2 million arbitration salary. With the exception of Austin Hays and maybe Ryan Mountcastle, none of their best prospects were considered close to the majors. Worse yet, they still employed Chris Davis. By any measure, the 2020 Orioles were supposed to be a very, very bad baseball team- and a tough one to write about.
Naturally, because nothing makes sense in 2020, they’re currently 12-10 and sitting in a playoff position. They’re not just beating up on soft competition, either. They’ve faced (in alphabetical order) Jake Arrieta, Gerrit Cole, Patrick Corbin, Tyler Glasnow, Aníbal Sánchez, Max Scherzer, Blake Snell, Stephen Strasburg (twice), and Zack Wheeler.
Can this be for real? Last year’s Orioles didn’t win their 12th game until May 4 when they improved to 12-22. The 2018 squad needed a four-game winning streak to reach 12-27. Without any noticeable improvements, this team is above .500. What gives?
Position Players
Let’s start with second baseman Hanser Alberto because he is the most doesn’t-make-senseish of all. He’s the quintessential slap-hitting infielder. In 2019, he hit .305 by leaning on his 86.5% contact rate (tenth best in the majors among qualified hitters). However, he was still merely an average overall hitter because he walked only 16 times and managed an extra-base hit almost as rarely. (By the way, being merely average made him one of the best players on the team.) In 2020, his elite contact rate and pathetic walk rate are more or less the same, but he’s leading the league with 11 doubles after only 21 all of last year. His hard-hit rate has improved from 18.5% to 25.6%, so while he’s still no home run threat, boosting some singles into doubles has done wonders for his slugging percentage.
The catcher tandem of Pedro Severino and Chance Sisco has been incendiary. Severino is the primary starter. From 2015-2019, his career slash line was .221/.299/.360. This season he’s batting .328/.386/.609! Sisco, a career .203 hitter entering 2020, is crushing .310/.474/.586! On one hand, the former has only 71 plate appearances and the latter 38, so small sample size restrictions may apply. On the other hand, here’s Severino bombing a Max Scherzer fastball 410 feet:
There’s power throughout most of the batting order. Anthony Santander, Renato Núñez, and Rio Ruiz have combined for 18 home runs through 22 games. Even Chris Davis has been… Nah just kidding. He’s hitting .133 with no home runs. But the team as a whole is fourth in the AL with an average of 5.18 runs per game.
Pitchers
Actually this pitching staff kind of stinks. That’s why they’re only 12-10 despite a powerful offense.
Really?
Well, sort of. The starting pitching has been abysmal. Last year’s ace John Means has a 10.57 ERA through three starts. The only two starters who can generate swings-and-misses with regularity are Tommy Milone and Asher Wojciechowski, and one has surrendered 22 hits in 18 innings while the other has given up five home runs. Alex Cobb has been okay, but he’s really more of a #3 or 4 starter on a playoff team.
The bullpen deserves a lot of credit for their positive win-loss record though. They have seven relievers with at least eight innings pitched so far, and all have been good-to-excellent.
| Pitcher | Innings | ERA | FIP | K |
| Shawn Armstrong | 10.0 | 1.80 | 3.12 | 11 |
| Miguel Castro | 9.2 | 3.72 | 3.95 | 15 |
| Paul Fry | 8.0 | 2.25 | 2.99 | 10 |
| Mychal Givens | 8.0 | 0.00 | 1.87 | 11 |
| Travis Lakins | 10.0 | 2.70 | 1.82 | 11 |
| Tanner Scott | 8.0 | 1.13 | 2.24 | 11 |
| Cole Sulser | 10.1 | 4.35 | 3.89 | 10 |
If you know the names of more than three of these guys you’re either lying or you are, in fact, a player on the Orioles. Cole Sulser and Travis Lakins sound like aspiring play-by-play announcers. Nevertheless, this group has yielded just five home runs in 64 innings combined. Tanner Scott has an especially eye-popping 92.3% groundball rate. When paired with his 37.9% strikeout rate it’s enough to make Baltimore forget Zack Britton.
Are a stellar bullpen and a stacked top-half-of-the-lineup enough to earn a playoff spot? Can any of these players continue punching above their weight? In a normal year, the answer to both questions is probably no, but in 2020, well, it’s also probably no, but there’s at least a decent chance it could be yes. With five Wild Card teams in each league joining three division winners in October, the Orioles don’t have to be a complete team to reach the postseason. At the very least, they certainly appear to have more quality roster pieces than in either of the previous two years. That counts for something.
