Baseball business will slow down over the holiday but isn\u2019t necessarily poised for a total shutdown.<\/p>\n
The Orioles found their closer (Ryan Helsley) and two big bats (Pete Alonso and Taylor Ward) by the second week in December, and they also brought back a trusted set-up man (Andrew Kittredge) and might have snagged a fifth outfielder (Leody Taveras) to back up in center. That\u2019s an impressive number of boxes checked, but there\u2019s more to do before players start reporting to spring training.<\/p>\n
The rotation is light on proven starters. Zach Eflin and Tomoyuki Sugano remain on the free agent market. The Orioles are down to Kyle Bradish, Trevor Rogers, Dean Kremer and Tyler Wells, along with a batch of No. 5 candidates that includes Cade Povich, Brandon Young and Trey Gibson \u2013 the latter waiting to make his major league debut.<\/p>\n
Sixteen pitchers made starts for the Orioles last season, including Keegan Akin (three), Scott Blewett, Dietrich Enns and Rico Garcia as openers. Sugano led the crew with 30, followed by Kremer with 29, Povich with 20 and Rogers with 18.<\/p>\n
Charlie Morton was next with 17 before the Orioles traded him to the Tigers at the deadline. He retired with the Braves. Kyle Gibson made four starts before his release on May 20, and he retired two months later.<\/p>\n
President of baseball operations\/general manager Mike Elias is making the rotation a priority, especially with Alonso signed to a five-year, $155 million contract. Dylan Cease, the top starter on the market, came off the board when the Blue Jays offered a seven-year, $210 million deal, but Framber Valdez (No. 6 in MLBTradeRumors.com rankings), Tatsuya Imai (No. 7), Ranger Su\u00e1rez (No. 10), Michael King (No. 14) and Zac Gallen (No. 15) are available.<\/p>\n
Elias has talked to the Marlins about Edward Cabrera, per reports from the Winter Meetings. The Nationals\u2019 MacKenzie Gore, Brewers\u2019 Freddy Peralta, Pirates\u2019 Mitch Keller and Royals\u2019 Kris Bubic also among other starters who could be on the move.<\/p>\n
Tarik Skubal could or won\u2019t be traded depending on who\u2019s asked. The industry isn\u2019t in agreement, except that the asking price will be outrageous, even for a one-year rental.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Elias said at the Winter Meetings that the Orioles could acquire multiple starters on major league contracts. Cease was a big domino to fall but other moves are slow to follow.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s just gonna kind of depend on the personnel,\u201d Elias said.<\/p>\n
Manager Craig Albernaz wasn\u2019t concerned about possible additions at the Winter Meetings, saying a day before the Alonso news broke, \u201cI love our players we have now.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat’s my only focus now are the guys in the Orioles uniform right now,\u201d he said, \u201cand I love our group.\u201d<\/p>\n
What else has got to be done?<\/p>\n
The bullpen might have gained some length with Albert Su\u00e1rez returning on a minor league deal. The signing doesn\u2019t carry the same weight as the big four of Alonso, Ward, Helsley and Kittredge, but Su\u00e1rez could become one of the most underrated additions of the offseason. His loss was felt for most of 2025.<\/p>\n
Akin, Enns, Grant Wolfram and Josh Walker are left-handed relievers on the 40-man roster. The Orioles may want to deepen that group, though they also could choose to shift Povich to the bullpen. That\u2019s a subject for spring training.<\/p>\n
Adding another set-up man is a possibility with Yennier Cano tendered a contract but posting a 5.12 ERA and 1.48 WHIP in a team-leading 65 appearances. He has minor league options and the Orioles can\u2019t assume that he\u2019s going to revert back to All-Star form.<\/p>\n
That was in 2023. He\u2019s trending the wrong way.<\/p>\n
Wells is a starter until he isn\u2019t. This is how he\u2019s going to prep in spring training and the team will decide later if he\u2019s in the rotation or bullpen.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou just named some really, really good arms and really, really good starters for us. I don\u2019t know if any of them compare to Tyler Wells in terms of his ability to command the baseball,\u201d pitching coach Drew French said last night on the \u201cOrioles Hot Stove Show\u201d on WBAL Radio.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere he might lack in terms of like the raw power and the raw stuff, his ability to execute, command, sequence, navigate a lineup three times through, know how to utilize his pitches for certain situations, whether it\u2019s first and third and one out and he needs a ground ball double play, or its bases loaded and no outs and he knows he really needs a strikeout, this guy knows how to do those things. He\u2019s got a lot of versatility in his game. We\u2019re really excited about the work he\u2019s put in this offseason with just body composition and turning the engine on a little bit more. We\u2019re looking forward to seeing it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were really, really proud of the rehab process and the things that Tyler and Kyle both did to get themselves back to being really productive big leaguers in September.\u201d<\/p>\n
Elias talked about role players being on his shopping list and that could lead him to an extra outfielder to play center and a utility infielder.<\/p>\n
Luis V\u00e1zquez was outrighted to Triple-A Norfolk, so he remains in the organization. Jeremiah Jackson is on the 40-man roster and gained supporters with his hitting, but he\u2019s only played right field and third base in the majors. The Orioles will need to move him around in camp.<\/p>\n
Infielder Payton Eeles was acquired from the Twins for catcher Alex Jackson and he\u2019s hit .285\/.410\/.417 with 28 doubles, 10 triples, 16 home runs, 94 RBIs and 68 bases stolen bases in 86 attempts in 210 minor league games. He\u2019s played second base, shortstop, third base and all three outfield positions.<\/p>\n
The third catcher debate rages on, with Adley Rutschman and Samuel Basallo alone on the 40-man and Norfolk\u2019s roster down to Maverick Handley and Silas Ardoin. The Orioles need to address the position, whether or not they carry a third on Opening Day. Drew Romo was a waiver claim by the Mets, which further dented the depth.<\/p>\n
The Orioles haven\u2019t announced their coaching staff, which still leaves us wondering if there\u2019s going to be another hire, whether a second assistant hitting coach or someone else. Albernaz said at the Winter Meetings that they\u2019re \u201cpretty much done,\u201d but also, \u201cwe could have a fit for one more.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for the confirmed hires, Albernaz said, \u201cI think it’s going to be a great fit for everyone. All of our guys, our goal for our coaching staff is to have great coaches, great teachers, great communicators, but more importantly, great people. I think all the coaches that were brought in and the coaches that have been here, our pitching group and also Buck (Britton), they’re great people. And so for us, we just needed great people around our players to support them.\u201d<\/p>\n
* Former Orioles left-hander John Means posted on social media last night that he ruptured his Achilles tendon on Tuesday, the same day that he was going to sign a contract \u201cand be available on Opening Day for the first time in a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Means wrote that he underwent successful surgery Wednesday with Dr. Bryan Vopat.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was finally enjoying my first healthy offseason in four years and felt better than ever,\u201d he wrote. \u201cI don\u2019t know why this happened or how this chapter will ultimately be used, but I know it\u2019s now part of my story and God has a plan.\u201d<\/p>\n
Means didn\u2019t pitch in the majors last season after recovering from his second Tommy John surgery. The Guardians declined his $6 million option.<\/p>\n
Bad things happen to good people and Means is an unfortunate example.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Baseball business will slow down over the holiday but isn\u2019t necessarily poised for a total shutdown. The Orioles…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":325849,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[363,48262,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-357926","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-mlb","9":"tag-orioles","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357926"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357926\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/325849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}