Baltimore Orioles: The trickle-down impact of losing John Means

The loss of Baltimore Orioles pitcher John Means to the 60-day injured list due to an elbow sprain is certainly a huge loss for the team.

Through the first 11 games of the season, the Baltimore Orioles had one of the best pitcher combined earned run averages in baseball, ranking 5th in the MLB with a 2.81 ERA (as of April 19).

While it is extremely early on to look at overall pitcher ERA, it is an important statistic to keep in mind while we talk about John Means. The soon-to-be-29-year-old has a 3.38 ERA this season, and last year was clearly Baltimore’s best pitcher overall, pitching to a 3.62 ERA in 146.2 innings.

How do the other Baltimore starters look so far this season? Behind Means this year is Jordan Lyles, who has a 5.23 ERA in 10.1 innings, again a small sample size. The third pitcher the Orioles have used has been Tyler Wells, who didn’t have a good first outing but had four shutout innings against the New York Yankees in his second outing. Bruce Zimmerman is the Orioles’ fourth starter, who has a 0.00 ERA through two starts with 9.0 innings pitched. Finally, the fifth starter has been Spenser Watkins, who has a 2.25 ERA through two starts.

John Means is huge for the Baltimore Orioles, and his loss is going to make the lives of the Baltimore pitching staff even harder this year.

While it may seem like an extremely negative thing for most teams, losing your ace for at least 60 days, but there are many positives that can be drawn from this.

First, it opens up spots in the rotations for prospects in Triple-A. Kevin Smith, the 18th-ranked prospect, currently has a 1.69 ERA in Triple-A through 10.2 innings, and could be a name we see shortly in the Orioles bullpen, if not rotation.

There are the obvious players like Grayson Rodriguez and D.L. Hall, ranked second and fifth in the Orioles Top 30 prospect list, respectively, who could be called up soon to fill in holes in the rotation. However, that could still be some time away, with Hall yet to have made his first Double-A start, and Grayson Rodriguez just making his third Triple-A start.

Kyle Bradish, who is the 10th-ranked Orioles prospect, is another name that has been brought up time and time again, and could possibly be the first Orioles pitching prospect to be called up. He’s pitched well in Triple-A Norfolk, with a 1.00 ERA through 9.0 innings.

Of course, there are also negatives from the loss of John Means because of the opening he leaves. The bullpen will now have to work harder, after having one of the worst ERAs in all of baseball last season, only time will tell how much the unit will have to work and how much improvement (if any) it shows.

Hopefully John Means will be back at some point this season. However, until his return, Baltimore’s pitching staff will certainly have a different look.