MIKE BURKE
Allegany Communications Sports
It’s no time to panic because there’s no point to it.
Hard as this would have been to believe a couple of months ago, the Baltimore Orioles and the New York Yankees are suddenly hearing footsteps, given how close they both have allowed the Minnesota Twins, the Kansas City Royals and the Boston Red Sox to get to one of them in the American League wild card chase.
Just two months ago, both the Orioles and the Yankees seemed to be shoo-ins for postseason play, and that prospect remains favorable, as the teams are tied for the AL East lead, which is definitely a good place to be. But in the words of Satchel Paige, “Don’t look back. Something might be gaining on you.”
Yes, it’s August 19th, and this is pennant-race baseball.
For the Orioles, the key is to stay afloat – to stay relevant in the race until what injured players are able to return do return – third baseman Jordan Westburg, No. 3 starter Grayson Rodriguez, left-handed bullpen ace Danny Coulombe and right-handed bullpen ace Jacob Webb, all of whom could possibly return by “late September.”
Still, the Orioles remain grinders, even though they are under .500 since before the All-Star break. They have split a pair of four-game series at Cleveland and at home against Boston, no small feat against two of the real good teams going right now; and oh, by the way, any team will gladly take a split of a four-game series against any team, because four-game series are unnatural, a freak of MLB’s greedy and bastardized schedule because of, yes, interleague play, which, like Commissioner Rob Manfred, is a menace.
The Orioles, even though they remain one of the highest-scoring teams, have been scoring fewer and fewer runs because they are hitting fewer home runs, and the Orioles have rarely scored any other way in the last month.
On Sunday the O’s beat the Red Sox for the split, 4-2, and they did so with three hits total – two of them home runs by Adley Rutschman and Gunnar Henderson.
On Friday, they lost to the Sawx, 12-10, in what was staff ace Corbin Burnes’ only bad outing of the year (8 earned runs in 4 innings). Yet the Orioles still had 16 hits as a team; but, once more, could not get runners in from scoring position with less than two out, leaving 12 on the evening.
Since Westburg was put on the injured list with a broken hand, the Orioles offense has fallen flat. There has been no “passing the baton” or “moving the lineup” because the entire lineup seems so homer-centric. Defensively, Westburg is an All-Star third baseman, plays second base and can play short. Thus, his absence, along with the absence of the injured Jorge Mateo, limits manager Brandon Hyde’s options and, in turn, has harmed the team’s depth.
Westburg might not be the best player on the Orioles team, but he might just be. He is, though, the glue of the Orioles team because he does everything – he hits, he hits behind runners, he hits with power, he runs the bases and he defends at least two positions at an All-Star level.
From the beginning, Westburg has shown himself to be a ballplayer in the Bobby Grich mode, which in itself is high praise; but in the long run, he can be to the Orioles what the great Joe Rudi was to the 1972-74 Oakland A’s.
The kid is just that good. He always does the right thing because he is so much wiser than his years, and the Orioles are just not the same team without him.
As for the Orioles bullpen, again, they just have to keep holding on, because without Webb and Coulombe, there isn’t a single reliever before now-closer Seranthony Dominguez who inspires confidence in being able to go one clean inning, much less two. In short, all of the relievers are gassed because starting pitchers don’t work more than six innings in general, as it normally takes close to 100 pitches to get to the sixth or the seventh,
Sadly, that’s baseball today. All of the top teams are in similar self-induced straits. Because of how starters are trained and used, there isn’t enough good relief pitching to last a full season without injuries being a factor. When starters need the number of pitches they use to get through at least five innings, the bullpens are a mess by late July.
Given the pitchers the Orioles have lost to Tommy John surgery and UCL revision since last September – closer Felix Bautista, No. 2 starter Kyle Bradish, No. 4 starter John Means, No. 5 starter Tyler Wells – it will be a gift if Rodriguez can return sometime in September, because in Burnes, Zach Eflin, who has been a tremendous acquisition by GM Mike Elias, and Rodriguez, the Orioles should have a shot should they make the postseason.
If any team has at least two hot starting pitchers in a short series, its bullpen automatically becomes better, particularly in the Orioles’ case if Webb and Coulombe return at full capacity.
Getting Craig Kimbrell straightened out would go a long way as well, but let’s not get into that today.
The O’s have a tough row to hoe coming up – the New York Mets, who have been a boil since 1969, which we won’t get into either; the Houston Astros (four games), who are a problem for every team; and then the Los Angeles Dodgers.
As Ringo Starr once said, “It don’t come easy.”
But as Jimmy Dugan said, it’s not supposed to be.
Mike Burke writes about sports and other stuff for Allegany Communications. He began covering sports for the Prince George’s Sentinel in 1981 and joined the Cumberland Times-News sports staff in 1984, serving as sports editor for over 30 years. Contact him at [email protected]. Follow him on X at @MikeBurkeMDT