The Orioles have been good. Really good. As of this morning, July 31, the Birds sport an AL best 64-41 record and a modest 1.5-game lead over the Rays for the AL East division lead. However, skeptics might point to the O’s modest +42Â run differential (good for fourth in the division, 6th in the AL) and Pythagorean expected W-L of 56-48 to suggest the Orioles look like more of a solid second wild card than the leaders of the most fearsome division in the sport.
Putting aside my fierce lifelong Orioles fan bias, I think this modest criticism is probably fair. The Orioles have indeed exceeded expectations, even those of the most voracious Baltimore lifers. That being said, there is a pretty clear explanation for the team’s effective gaming of their expected record: a top-3 bullpen highlighted by Felix Bautista. A word about King Felix: the further I dig into his numbers, the dizzier I get. By baseball reference wins above replacement, Felix has been the third most valuable pitcher (not just reliever) in the AL at 3 WAR, behind just Gerrit Cole and Nathan Eovaldi (who looks to have run into some elbow issues). Cole has accumulated that value (4.8 WAR) in more than triple the innings of Bautista. At this rate, the Orioles closer could be looking at a top 3 AL CY Young finish.
Back to the bullpen: the Orioles have amassed their current record largely as a result of winning tight games. Now, while this can be a mercurial skill, the best way to assure continued success in this category is to fortify a bullpen that leads all of baseball in WAR by a full win (5.5 to SF’s 4.4).
Here is a quick table assessing the current options:
Basically, how I’d summarize this table is that the Orioles have 2-3 spots that could use an upgrade. I’ll say this now: that won’t be achieved through three trades. More likely, the Orioles will upgrade through a combination of, one, maybe two trades, internal guys returning from injury or the minors, and possibly someone getting bumped from the rotation. So before getting into trade possibilities, I’ll quickly break down some in-house possibilities.
To summarize, I think that DL Hall, on his current progression, is likely to replace Cionel Perez by late August/early September. I have no idea why the team would build him back up as a starter at this point. I think the playoff strategy should be to try to get starters through five innings, then use a league-best pen to shorten the game and King Felix to slam the door.
As far as Tyler Wells, it’s no guarantee that he seamlessly slides back into the pen and is back up to 94-96 touching 97 like his Rule V debut season. That being said, if the team can give him some rest, then build him up to that guy in shorter stints, he’d be an ideal seventh inning option who can get K’s and pop-ups without allowing walks when there’s late inning traffic on the basepaths.
Now for the fun part. I’ve assembled a varied and (I think) interesting array of potential relief pitcher trade targets. Integrated into this chart are a number of current starters who I think could be lethal in shorter stints out of the pen. Now, transitioning a guy from SP to RP is easier said than done and there’s no guarantee a guy will take to it. However, it’s an interesting strategy for a team that needs to hone in on any possible advantage/efficiency to harden their playoff edge.
Of these options, all things considered I’d rank my top 5 guys as:
Add one or two of those guys (or an under-the-radar option I may have missed) to the current pen and you have something like:
- Felix Bautista
- Yennier Cano
- DL Hall
- ACQUISITION
- Shintaro Fujinami
- Danny Coulombe
- Wells/ACQUISITION
- Michael Baumann
Now that looks like a World Series bullpen to me. I’d love to hear your thoughts, tweet at me as rudely as you care to anytime. Let’s go O’s!
