Orioles Lead AL East at Quarter-Pole Thanks to Post-Hype Breakouts

While the Dodgers and Indians are certainly surprising division leaders through a quarter of the season, by far the biggest shocker is that the Baltimore Orioles sit atop the toughest division in baseball. The Orioles have finished last in the division in each of the past four seasons, and haven’t tasted postseason baseball since their 98-win 1997.

Without any particularly high-profile signings or trades, the Orioles’ turnaround has relied mostly on getting more from pre-existing players. Nowhere is this more true than with the team’s two offensive leaders, both of whom seemed destined for greatness a short time ago and both of whom may be starting to realize their superstar potential. In Adam Jones and Matt Wieters, the O’s have a pair of up-the-middle defenders who have stepped up as impact bats this season and provided the engine for an offense that projected to be fairly impotent.

The 26-year-old Wieters reached the Majors in 2009 to much fanfare, but did not provide the immediate impact many expected of him. Wieters was the Orioles’ first pick (fifth overall) in 2007 out of Georgia Tech, and immediately became the team’s top prospect according to Baseball America’s ranking from that year after they signed him for a hefty $6M bonus. In fact, BA named Wieters the #12 prospect in baseball despite his not registering a professional at-bat until the beginning of the 2008 season. Wieters began his professional career at High-A Frederick and earned a midseason promotion to Double-A Bowie, absolutely outclassing both levels and leading BA to rank him the top prospect in baseball. Wieters began 2009 with 39 games at Triple-A Norfolk before earning the call. Wieters impressed as a rookie, partially thanks to some very fortunate peripherals, providing above-average production for his position both on offense and defense. In 2010, Wieters took a step back, hitting only 11 home runs and putting up a career-worst offensive year at 17% below league average. However, he was able to improve in a number of respects, including increasing his walk rate and dropping his strikeout rate, and also had a very impressive defensive year, although defensive metrics (as usual) disagree on the extent of his skills behind the dish. Wieters was also struck by significantly worse luck than his rookie year, furthering the narrative that he’d taken a step in the wrong direction. Wieters’ power started to appear last season, when he hit 22 homers and raised his ISO by 60 points to .188. He also rated excellently defensively, leading to a team-best 5 WAR overall. Wieters’ power has continued to develop in early 2012, as he’s hit 8 bombs already and his .226 ISO would be by far a career best.

Adam Jones, 26, has experienced an even more obvious breakout. If not for Josh Hamilton’s otherworldy start, Jones would be tied with Adam Dunn for the lead in all of baseball with 14 jacks. Like Wieters, Jones was once a heralded prospect, after being drafted by the Mariners out of high school in the first compensation round in the 2003 draft. Jones came up through the Mariners’ system, ranking ninth among Seattle’s prospects after 2003, moving up a slot in 2004, and then getting bumped to second and first prospect in the system for BA’s 2005 and 2006 organizational rankings. Jones also made BA’s overall top 100 in both his age 19 and 20 seasons, rating as the 64th and then 28th best prospect in baseball. Jones got a cup of coffee in 2006, then spent most of 2007 thrashing at Triple-A before the team simply couldn’t keep him out of the bigs. The Mariners were really pretty persistent in keeping him out of Seattle, as after the season Jones was shipped off to headline a package of prospects that brought back Erik Bedard. Since coming to Baltimore in 2008, Jones has been a solid but unspectacular regular, producing 1.8 WAR in each of his first two seasons and 2.6 and 2.9 in each of the last two years. Jones’ career-high WAR last season coincided with a career-high 25 homers and 10% above-average offense. While his defense in center isn’t stellar, he does acquit himself with the glove and provides well above-average offense for the position. Jones’ 2012 ISO of .289 would represent a career high by more than 100 points, so it’s not unreasonable to think he’ll slow down a bit.

Nonetheless, the Orioles now have three players at premium defensive positions for whom 30 homers is well within reach, including their two breakout stars and J.J. Hardy, who accomplished the feat last year and is well on his way with 9 homers in 2012. As the season goes on, I’d expect the Orioles to drop back in their divisional race. The team’s pitching staff doesn’t have a clear ace, and while a patchwork rotation can be somewhat successful when paired with an explosive offense, that doesn’t exactly describe the Orioles’ bats at this time. That said, if the Orioles are going to experience success in the near future, it seems likely that it will come on the backs of Jones and Wieters, who will hope to continue their development toward superstardom.

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