Baltimore Orioles: These are not your same old O’s
While many in sports media don’t seem to have noticed, the way the Baltimore Orioles conduct business, and especially the way they develop players, has changed significantly in the last couple of years
The refrain is a consistent one. This was during the College World Series in Omaha. Blaine Knight was pitching for Arkansas, and the ESPN announcers were discussing Knight’s abilities on the mound. “It’s just a shame he’s headed to the Baltimore Orioles!” Eduardo Perez blurted out.
The anthem is frequent. A couple of weeks prior, the annual June draft had taken place, and when the Baltimore Orioles made Texas high school righty Grayson Rodriguez the 11th overall selection in the first round, even the draft analysts mentioned how a high school pitcher would likely desire to go to any other organization than the Orioles. The theme is prevalent, and it’s clear – the Baltimore Orioles not only do not develop players well, but they especially do damage to pitchers.
Not to insert my “30 for 30” voice here, but what if everything we’ve been assuming about the Baltimore Orioles is badly outdated? What if the Baltimore Orioles have not just changed how they do things in development, especially pitchers, but also specifically in the development of pitchers?
Well, we’re in that moment right now. Just look at the recent responses to trades that the Baltimore Orioles have made in their attempt to rebuild and use the MLB trade deadline to do so:
Dillon Tate is the biggest loser in this trade because his career development as a pitcher is now in the hands of the Baltimore Orioles organization. https://t.co/DdNMPkj8Lp
— Spreadapedia (@Spreadapedia) July 25, 2018
congratulations to zach britton for getting off the orioles. condolences to dillon tate, josh rogers, and cody carroll for going to the orioles. there are truly worse things than death.
— Jason Cohen (@Jason00Cohen) July 25, 2018
And the hits could keep on coming without a lot of extra searching. Those sending those tweets aren’t just random social media users either, though that’s what we showed above. It’s the talking heads like Eduardo Perez in the College World Series, mentioning issues with the Baltimore Orioles development and offering condolences for players who are in the midst of that system.
Perhaps a new look is in need for many in media and around baseball, starting with the biggest misconception – pitching development…
Baltimore Orioles pitching development
The history is there. The Baltimore Orioles drafted 15 high school pitchers and 22 college pitchers from 2000-2013 in the first 5 rounds of the MLB draft. Of those 37 pitchers, 17 made it to the majors for even one appearance.
The best of that group is not a guy who did his best work with the Orioles, as Jake Arrieta has the highest bWAR of any first 5 rounds pick in that era with 23.2 bWAR. However, he contributed only 0.1 bWAR as an Oriole. In total over 37 pitchers drafted, even with guys like Arrieta added in, the Baltimore Orioles have drafted that produced 63.1 bWAR, or roughly an average 1.71 bWAR per draft pick in the first 5 rounds, which is where you hope to draft your “superstar” players.
This has been an issue in the past, and the Baltimore Orioles knew it. They needed to change, and they did. It started in January 2017 with bringing in John Wasdin as the director of pitching development in the Baltimore Orioles minor league system. Immediately, the type of pitcher the Orioles were targeting changed.
The 2017 draft was a great example. In 2016, the Orioles selected three college arms with their first three selections. While those picks had some level of upside, they passed over plenty of upside along the way to go with the “safe” arm. They did not do that at all in 2017!
The first pick at #21 was DL Hall, a Georgia lefty with a beautiful curve, but with a small-ish frame that scared off some teams in spite of grades that would have him as a top-10 level guy. In the second and third rounds, Zac Lowther and Michael Baumann were picked, and both were college arms that had upside. They also drafted a personal favorite in the 2017 draft, Jack Conlon, a high school righty from Texas, but Conlon chose not sign.
The 2018 draft kept up that work, grabbing Rodriguez, one of the highest ceiling high school arms with the 11th pick, grabbing Knight in the 3rd round out of Arkansas with plenty of physical development left, and then also grabbing some very projectable young arms in high school lefty Drew Rom out of Kentucky and high school righty Yeancarlos Lleras out of Puerto Rico (technically Lleras was in the 6th round, but still).
The work Wasdin is doing is coming through as well. Six full-season starters have pitched all season and have under a 3.00 ERA. There are also three starters with 100+ strikeouts, and the Orioles have three starters with a WHIP under 1.10.
The full-season pitching staffs have been influenced as well. While the overall numbers have their moments, but it’s not surprising that each league leaderboard has a member of the Orioles affiliate in their pitching top 5 or so.
So, pitching has a different mindset in the organization, but the team is still going after their traditional three true outcome players, correct?
Changing where players come from
The Baltimore Orioles have very notably been absent from the international market in the last number of years. The team has traded away international slot money for players frequently over the last few years, preferring to avoid the “risk” of the Latin market and stick to primarily the draft for player acquisition.
This has led to a significant lack of athleticism in the Orioles farm system when comparing to other farm systems, because there simply aren’t the guys with big upside in the Orioles system. There have been high-floor prospects, but not the high-ceiling guys.
Instead, the team in 2017 also worked in more high-upside position prospects in the draft, and one of the most notable moves of the last weekend was that the Baltimore Orioles acquired international spending money from the Atlanta Braves in a deal.
More from Call to the Pen
- Philadelphia Phillies, ready for a stretch run, bomb St. Louis Cardinals
- Philadelphia Phillies: The 4 players on the franchise’s Mount Rushmore
- Boston Red Sox fans should be upset over Mookie Betts’ comment
- Analyzing the Boston Red Sox trade for Dave Henderson and Spike Owen
- 2023 MLB postseason likely to have a strange look without Yankees, Red Sox, Cardinals
With some rumors that the Baltimore Orioles will be highly involved in pursuing Victor Victor Mesa, the Orioles are suddenly working hard in the Latin market. However, for at least a year or two that will be tough to note because many of the top guys who are signed each July have deals in place 1-2 years in advance of their signing date.
The Orioles are coming into a unique spot to take advantage of an entry into the Latin market, however. The MLB punishment of removing multiple players from the Atlanta Braves in the 2017-2018 offseason allowed teams to designate funds from the 2018 signing period toward acquiring those players removed from the Braves.
A number of players each spring show up in showcases that were not well-known previously and come into the July 2nd period without a deal in place. The Orioles could end up being in a unique position of other teams having spent some of their “extra” money already with the Braves guys, and they could grab some extra guys this year that normally would be unavailable to just one team.
Next. Trade Deadline Guide. dark
So, the Baltimore Orioles have had a past history of doing some less positive things with their pitching development and Latin American scouting, but the changes are there, and really those changes should be noted more in the baseball media.