The Baltimore Orioles have been playing pretty good baseball all season long up to this point but that doesn’t mean there aren’t areas of concern with this team. It’s nice to have an offense that is performing as a top 10 offense overall, it’s nice that our lockdown closer from last season is still lockdown this year, and it’s also nice that our bullpen is shaping up to be a top 10 bullpen with the struggles of Pedro Strop.
However, not all is rainbows and sunshine with this team despite the top tier performance of the various areas of the club. The starting rotation is a bit concerning for multiple reasons:
- Of the 32 games started just 19 of those starts saw our starting pitcher last six or more innings.
- Only two starters have eclipsed the seven innings pitched mark, Chris Tillman and Wei-Yin Chen each pitched eight innings in one start.
- The rotation has, collectively, walked 3.75 batters per game which is seventh highest in all of baseball.
- Every starter currently in the rotation is outperforming his FIP and xFIP which means regression is bound to hit, and some will be hit hard by it.
It’s very important for the Orioles starters to pitch deeper into games and five and two-thirds innings does not qualify. Every starter should be capable of pitching at least six innings before needing to be pulled due to pitch count or overall ineffectiveness. Right now the only starter that is consistently getting into the sixth inning is Jason Hammel, but he’s still trying to find some consistency on the mound because he’s followed up every decent to good start with a mediocre one.
Wei-Yin Chen has been our most consistent starter, performance wise, but he did get rocked by the Seattle Mariners in his last outing — in part due to an extended inning or two due to dropped balls in the outfield.
Then we have Chris Tillman and Miguel Gonzalez; two pitchers who have been a bit up and down in the early going of the season but if I had to pick just one to outperform the other the rest of the way it looks like it would be Tillman at this point.
Tillman has been improving with each successive start and that was on display in his last start against the Los Angeles Angels, where he pitched eight innings of shutout ball. Over his last three starts he has pitched 20.2 innings and given up just three earned runs, good for a 1.31 ERA, and he also has a 1.02 WHIP.
Gonzalez has been trending in the opposite direction though, as he’s been largely average-ish in each of his starts this season. He has yet to put together any truly impressive starts and he’s also followed up some of his decent efforts with poor ones. Over his last three starts he’s pitched just 17.1 innings while giving up 10 earned runs, a 5.19 ERA, and also has a 1.33 WHIP.
We weren’t really sure how our rotation would stack up this season as many of them largely out-performed anything they’ve ever done previously in 2012 (Tillman, Gonzalez, Hammel) and we’re still trying to figure out who can stick around long enough to be our fifth starter for the season.
Jake Arrieta was wildly ineffective in his four starts to begin the season, Josh Stinson and Zach Britton were both one and done, and wily veteran Freddy Garcia took a no-hitter into the seventh inning in his Orioles debut. Whether Garcia is able to keep pitching that effectively all season long for the team or not is a mystery to all of us.
If Garcia falters at some point, or if Gonzalez continues to struggle, or even if an injury occurs we do still have some reinforcements down on the farm or returning from injury in Steve Johnson, Tsuyoshi Wada, and Jair Jurrjens who have yet to get their shot at the rotation just yet. It’s possible we could also see Britton and Arrieta again at some point and then there’s still Kevin Gausman who is healthy and ready to pitch in the majors right now.
While having question marks in the rotation isn’t anything new for the Orioles or any team in baseball really the fact that their starters have the seventh highest walk rate in baseball should be priority number one to correct.
Granted, Arrieta really skews the number a little bit with his 7.58 BB/9 mark but just look at where each of our four starters were at last season and where they are currently at and you will see that it’s become an issue. It should also be noted that all four starters are in the top 20 in BB/9 in the American League with Tillman being sixth highest.
We knew that there would be some regression but we also knew that a stronger defense from the start of the season would benefit the rotation, and it has to a large degree this early on, but you can’t rely solely on your defense to bail you out. You have to be able to limit the damage you do with the walks and being able to last more than five or six innings every time out.
As far as which pitcher we should be most concerned about — that pitcher is Gonzalez at the moment because his walks are up, strikeouts are down, his home run rate is way up, and taking just one look at this FIP and xFIP you get an idea of the writing on the wall.
What do you think though?
Should the Orioles, and fans, be concerned about Gonzalez? Is there another starter the team should be more concerned about?
