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Birds’ Offense, Not Pitching, Keeping Them in Neutral in 2014

hardy batting for baltimore orioles
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The Orioles offense has become a mystery as of late, and it has happened at a time where they are finally getting the starting pitching needed to compete on a consistent basis. Not many people predicted the Orioles offense to be ranked 10th in runs in the American League in the middle of June. With the injuries to Manny Machado, Chris Davis, and Matt Wieters, the projected starting lineup in March never came to be.

It is ironic that their struggles are coming in a month where they are finally starting to hit home runs. The O’s lead all of baseball this month with 21, but only rank 11th in runs with 62 runs scored. This goes back to the organizational struggles of getting on base. Their .324 on base percentage in June is good for 13th, and overall they rank 16th with a .316 on base percentage.

Unfortunately, this will never change and because of that, the offense will continue to be very inconsistent. The O’s have to hope to they hit home runs with runners on base and get the big hit with runners in scoring position. Surprisingly, the offense ranks second in baseball with runners in scoring position behind the Colorado Rockies with a .281 batting average this season. However, during their last 11 games, the O’s are 15-for-69 with RISP, which is an average of .217 over that span. Not good.

It appears the team is getting opportunities, but they just aren’t capitalizing. The question now becomes, how do you fix it?

Until Machado and Davis regain their 2013 form, and J.J. Hardy remembers he is a 20+ home run hitter, the offense will remain the way it has through the first 2 ½ months of the season. I can’t get too upset with Hardy though. With an offense that currently has a lot of holes, it is hard to criticize a guy who has hovered around the .300 mark all season long.

The second base position is what it is at this point, and with Wieters missing the rest of the season, the catcher position will not provide much help in the offensive category. I love the poll question posed at ESR earlier today. My vote would be for Steve Clevenger to receive the majority of the work behind the plate to replace Wieters. Caleb Joseph is very good at controlling the run game, but with this offense struggling so badly, Buck Showalter can’t afford to have so many dead spots in the lineup. I didn’t feel at any point that Clevenger was a liability behind the dish and I still have no idea what Dan Duquette saw in Nick Hundley.

Showalter has a lot of decisions to make, but at this point in the season, he probably thought his problems would surround the starting pitching, not the offense.

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