Baltimore Orioles: The Disaster In 24 and 29 At-Bats

Baltimore Orioles: Disaster in 24 At-Bats

Trey Mancini

Mancini’s slump comes on the heels of narrowly missing his first All-Star nomination. That might not seem like a big deal, but it’s a resume bullet would have earned him extra dollars in arbitration.

If nothing else, an All-Star selection is the positive equivalent to a scarlet letter. It’s a moniker that never gets taken away.

It may seem arbitrary – especially when a player like John Means will walk away from the 2019 season with the honor – but that doesn’t make it meaningless. And it doesn’t make it easy to snag either.

Consider Baltimore’s Tuesday night opponent for some examples. Following perhaps the best teenage season in the history of baseball, Juan Soto is hitting .301/.404/.538 as a 20-year-old. He’s never been an All-Star.

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Anthony Rendon made his first All-Star team this season despite already accruing 23.9 rWAR in his career. For contrast, Mancini has been worth 3.3 rWAR in his career. John Means has accrued 3.0 rWAR. Means, like Rendon, is an All-Star.

The point here isn’t to disparage Means – he deserves our aspersions no more than he does the All-Star label – but the significance of these past three weeks on Mancini (and the Orioles) would be easy to overlook. Because as we near the July 31 trade deadline, the Baltimore Orioles are staring down a difficult realization: Mancini may not be a true “All-Star”-caliber player.

Unlike Means, however, his first half was no doubt an All-Star quality couple of months. Through June 30, Mancini was slashing .301/.357/.544 with 17 home runs. Dude raked like he may never rake again.

Fast forward to today: Mancini broke out of his worst slump of the season (insert your sarcastic hip hip hoorays here), but he’s not back to the player he was in the first half. He is, however, looking more and more like the player he’d been before this year’s [pending review] breakout.

His current slash line (.281/.340/.500) looks scarily similar to the guy he was two seasons ago in his rookie campaign (.293/.338/.488). So long as he doesn’t regress all the way back to his 2018 numbers (.242/.299/.416) – this isn’t a disaster.

It is, however, a significant step backward for a team that needed some positivity. Before the break, the Orioles could sell the trade market on Mancini’s growth. He was blossoming into a genuine All-Star slugger. But unless he comes roaring out of this recent slump, teams need only look at his baseball-reference page to gain some ground in their negotiations. Because they’ll find  Mancini is essentially the same guy he’s always been.

That guy isn’t someone worthy of a top-prospect haul. If Mancini doesn’t fetch that kind of return, there’s not a player on the Baltimore Orioles who will. Not even All-Star starter John Means.