Quick Hits As The Off-Season Begins

The MLB Post-season is underway, and after finishing this ’25 season at 75-87, the Baltimore Orioles are watching from home.

Before Pitchers & Catchers arrive in Sarasota next February, Orioles President Mike Elias will be tasked with improving the roster and building a team better positioned to contend in ’26.

Before you can move forward, you have to evaluate what exists.

The Orioles finished ’25:
– 24th in runs scored
– 24th in on-base %
– 19th in slugging %
– 26th in era

As of now, you can safely say that Kyle Bradish, Trevor Rogers, Dean Kremer, and Tyler Wells comprise 4/5s of the rotation.

Bullpen options on the current 40 man are Keegan Akin, Yennier Cano, Dietrich Enns, Cade Povich, Chayce McDermott, Albert Suarez (his ’25 ended with another injury, not sure if he will be available come Spring Training), Rico Garcia, Colin Selby, Kade Strowd, Jose Castillo, Yaramil Hiradlo, Carson Ragsdale, Josh Walker, and Grant Wolfram.

The current starters and bench would look like:

C: Rutschman
1st: Mayo
2nd: Holliday
SS: Henderson
3rd: Westburg
LF: Beavers
CF: Cowser
RF: O’Neill
DH: Basallo

Bench: J. Jackson, Mountcastle, Mateo, A. Jackson

The Orioles ’25 estimated team salary was $159M.
Here is the Financial Outlook For ’26.

Here is a listing of Free Agents (and potential FA’s) once the World Series concludes. 

Priorities, Questions: 

1) Clearly the lead priority is adding rotation help. Most would want at-least one front end starter, and a mid-rotation type.  They don’t necessarily have to find an Ace, but a second starter that slots in with Bradish, and Rogers? That should be the goal. Bradish looked fantastic in September. Might be a question of how many innings he can provide in ’26, but fully believe if he can stay healthy he’ll look the part. Rogers being named the Most Valuable Oriole in ’25 would have received 100 Billion to 1 odds in March. It’s a pretty remarkable story.  Over his 18 starts, he pitched at a Cy Young level here in ’25. His era was 1.81. His xERA was 3.35. If he’s again a 3rd or better starter, that’s huge.  I think we know who Kremer is at this point – a legitimate ML starter, who regularly takes the ball. That has value.  Was also good seeing Wells finish ’25 looking like his prior self. He was limited to 3 starts in ’24, and 4 to end the year in ’25.  In ’22 and ’23 he made a combined 43 starts, and was basically very competitive until he tired out. Can you get 15 starts from him in the first half before he probably has to be moved to the pen?  If you add two starters, you can bump Wells to the pen and have him around as viable rotation depth.

2) You have to obtain multiple high-leverage relievers.  A couple of guys you’d go into the year, realistically expecting them to perform. If you’ve obtained a couple of recognized weapons, and you are able to team them with some combination of Wells, Suarez, Akin, Cano (he had a disappointing ’25, but it’s plausible he could rebound), Povich, McDermott, Enns; you might have a group that can work. As always, I think the pen’s potential is tied to the rotation in-front of them.

3) Are the Orioles anticipating that Cowser rebounds? Are they comfortable with him in CF?

4) It’s not going to be popular locally, but O’Neill seems likely to be penciled into starting in RF to begin ’26. Maybe you get 110 productive games.  What’s the plan for when he’s out? I guess someone might argue for trading Mayo, and using TON more at 1st / DH. If you were trading Mayo, the primary reason would be using his value (as a piece) to bring back pitching; but the ancillary benefit would be freeing up room to get TON out of the OF if so desired (and you wanted to add an OF bat). TON has previously been regarded as a plus fielder.  I think he can be at-least adequate in RF at OPACY. The bigger thing with him, is that he has to give you the 110 games you’d hope to get from him, and he has to produce offensively. A ’24 TON season vs. what he did this year would be significant.

5) If you want to add a bat somewhere, what’s the plan? You’d have to free up space somewhere.  Cowser had a miserable year. I do expect he rebounds, but even if you believe he won’t – you’d be giving him away if you traded him now.  Mayo came on some in September, and his years of control are enticing, even if you have questions there. Seems to me that what the offense really needs is Rutschman and Cowser rebounding. Health from Westburg. The MVP level production Henderson provided in ’24 vs. his ’25 season (he was still a 4.8 fWAR player in ’25 for the record). Holliday will need to take another step. You’ll be hoping that Basallo breaks out, and that TON gives an approximation of his ’24 season. Meaning overall, the production increase needed is going to have to largely come from the guys here. If you don’t think it’s reasonable to expect collective improvement from this group, and you want to add a bat you believe you can rely on – again, the questions are where and who?

6) Who is the next Manager? What does the Coaching staff look like?  Here are the top Managers on the market. I’m not overly invested in the Managerial search. I’d argue for someone with a track record of success vs. a first time manager. You still have a young team, so an experienced voice vs. someone learning on the job makes sense for me. Overall you want a guy that communicates effectively with the players, Front Office, and Press.  You want a guy that demands accountability, and attention to detail. You want a guy that doesn’t throw people under the bus. A calming influence when there is adversity. I don’t think you need a high-strung living on every pitch type. I don’t know that works over 162 games in the mid-2020’s. You need players to buy in. That’s easier to achieve if you are hiring someone that has won elsewhere. I wasn’t a Brandon Hyde fan, but I don’t believe the O’s ’25 failures were on him. If the O’s rebound in ’26, the new hire will get more credit than I think he deserves. The nature of the job demands you’ll receive excess credit or blame. If you hire a first time Manager like Ryan Flaherty, it could work out fine. Not having done the job previously, doesn’t mean you can’t do the job. It just means everything is new. Elias needs to hire whoever he thinks is the best candidate, but at-least part of the criteria has to be, “Are you a leader of men?” 

7) It would be fantastic if Grayson Rodriguez was actually healthy and available next Spring. If he was, I think it would be an interesting conversation for the organization to decide if he should be kept as a starter or move to the pen? As a starter, there is a regular sequence which can be easier to monitor after an injury(ies). On the other-hand, how many innings could you expect from him? Would you be better served getting 1 inning outings from him out of the pen? Could he handle the workload of being used multiple times a week? Would you be in a position where he wasn’t capable of going back-to-back nights? If that was the case, what strain would that put on the other relievers?

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