Orioles Rumors

Looking Ahead To Club Options: AL East

By Anthony Franco | May 6, 2025 at 7:29pm CDT

MLBTR wraps our division by division look at next year’s team/mutual option class with the AL East. Virtually all of the mutual options will be bought out by one side. Generally, if the team is willing to retain the player at the option price, the player will decline his end in search of a better free agent deal.

Previous installments: player options/opt-outs, NL West, AL West, NL Central, AL Central, NL East

Baltimore Orioles

Andrew Kittredge, RHP ($9MM club option, $1MM buyout)

Baltimore signed Kittredge to a one-year, $10MM free agent deal over the winter. He’s making $9MM this season and has a matching club option or a $1MM buyout for 2026. Kittredge was supposed to be a key setup man in front of Félix Bautista, but he suffered a left knee injury early in camp and required a debridement surgery. He began a rehab stint at High-A Aberdeen on Sunday. While there’s plenty of time for Kittredge to turn things around, it hasn’t been the start to his O’s tenure that he envisioned.

Ramón Laureano, OF ($6.5MM club option, no buyout)

Laureano, who was non-tendered by the Braves, signed a $4MM contract with Baltimore in February. That came with a $6.5MM team option without a buyout, giving the Orioles an extra season of club control. Injuries to Tyler O’Neill and Colton Cowser have pressed him into everyday work, mostly in left field. He hasn’t provided much through his first 24 games. Laureano is hitting .185 with a .237 on-base percentage through 59 plate appearances. He has hit a trio of home runs but struck out 18 times while drawing only four walks. Laureano has generally been a below-average hitter since being suspended following a positive PED test in 2021. He’ll need much better production over the next few months for the Orioles to exercise the option.

Boston Red Sox

Walker Buehler, RHP ($25MM mutual option, $3MM buyout)

Buehler signed a one-year, $21.05MM free agent deal to match the price of the qualifying offer — which the Dodgers had declined to issue when he hit the market. It’s a relatively expensive pillow contract. Buehler was coming off a dismal regular season, in which he’d posted a 5.38 ERA with a career-worst 18.6% strikeout rate over 16 starts. He finished his Dodger tenure on a high note, though, closing out the World Series while pitching to a 3.60 earned run average in 15 playoff innings.

An ace-caliber pitcher early in his career, Buehler hasn’t looked the same since undergoing the second Tommy John surgery of his career in August 2022. His stint in Boston has gotten out to a shaky start. While his 4.28 ERA through 33 2/3 innings is serviceable, he’s striking out just 20.7% of opponents while averaging a personal-low 93.5 MPH on his fastball. Shoulder inflammation sent him to the injured list last week. The mutual option was always an accounting measure designed to push the $3MM buyout to the end of the year rather than disbursing it throughout the season as salary. The team seems likelier to decline its end than the pitcher does.

Lucas Giolito, RHP ($14MM club option, $1.5MM buyout)

Giolito signed a two-year, $38.5MM deal during the 2023-24 offseason. He negotiated an opt-out clause after the first season and hoped to retest the market after one strong year. Instead, Giolito’s elbow gave out during Spring Training and he required UCL surgery that cost him the entire season. The veteran righty made the easy decision to stick around for year two.

By exercising his player option, Giolito unlocked a 2026 option for the team. It’s valued at $14MM and comes with a $1.5MM buyout. If Giolito pitches 140 innings this year, it’d convert to a $19MM mutual option (still with the $1.5MM buyout). That’d give him a chance to test free agency if he wants. Giolito has an uphill battle to 140 frames. A hamstring strain cost him the first month of the season. He finally made his team debut last week, working six innings of three-run ball with seven strikeouts in a no-decision against Toronto. The Rangers tagged him for six runs on 10 hits in just 3 2/3 frames tonight.

Liam Hendriks, RHP ($12MM mutual option, $2MM buyout)

The Red Sox added Hendriks on a two-year, $10MM deal over the 2023-24 offseason. They knew they wouldn’t get much in year one, as Hendriks had undergone Tommy John surgery the prior August. He attempted to make a late-season return last year but was shut down after a minor flare-up of elbow discomfort. Elbow inflammation shelved him for a couple weeks to begin this season, though he made his team debut in mid-April.

Hendriks allowed two runs on three hits in one inning during his first appearance. He has rattled off five straight scoreless outings since then, albeit with four walks in five frames. His 95 MPH average fastball is solid but below the 97-98 range at which he sat during his elite seasons with the White Sox.

Note: Jarren Duran’s arbitration deal contains a ’26 club option with an $8MM base salary. He’d remain eligible for arbitration if the Sox decline the option.

New York Yankees

Tim Hill, LHP ($3MM club option, $350K buyout)

Hill finished last season with the Yankees after being released by the White Sox in June. He’d allowed nearly six earned runs per nine with Chicago but managed a tidy 2.05 ERA over 44 frames for New York. He’s out to a similarly productive start to the ’25 season. Hill has surrendered five runs through 17 1/3 innings (2.60 ERA).

While the soft-tossing lefty has managed just 11 strikeouts, his game has always been built around ground-balls. He’s getting grounders at a massive 81.6% clip thus far. Only nine of the 40 batted balls he’s allowed have been hit into the air. It’s easily the highest grounder rate in the majors. The Yankees value this skillset as much as any team, and the $2.65MM option decision is a drop in the bucket for them.

Jonathan Loáisiga, RHP ($5MM club option, no buyout)

Loáisiga is still working back from last April’s elbow surgery. The righty has generally been a productive reliever when healthy, but he’s only once managed even 50 MLB innings in a season. He’s on a rehab stint with Low-A Tampa and will need another few weeks before he’s built into MLB game shape. Loáisiga is making $5MM this season. The option has a matching base value and could climb by another $500K if the Yankees exercise it. He’d earn $100K each at reaching 50, 55, 60, 65 and 70 innings in 2026.

Tampa Bay Rays

Pete Fairbanks, RHP ($7MM club option, $1MM buyout)

Fairbanks is in the final guaranteed season of the three-year, $12MM extension that he signed before the 2023 campaign. That includes a $1MM buyout on a club option that comes with a $7MM base value. That’s a bargain for a quality high-leverage reliever, but the deal includes various escalators that could push the option price above $12MM.

The option value would climb by $500K if he gets to 125 combined appearances between 2023-25 and another $1MM apiece at 135, 150 and 165 combined outings. Fairbanks made it into 95 games over the first two seasons. He’d trigger the first $500K escalator at just 30 appearances this year and would max it out if he makes it into 70 games. He can boost the option price by another $2MM based on this year’s games finished total: $500K apiece at 25, 30, 35 and 40.

Fairbanks has never reached 50 appearances in a season because of various injuries, but he’s already at 14 games through this season’s first six weeks. Fairbanks has finished 11 of those contests while working as Kevin Cash’s primary closer. He has recorded 13 strikeouts against six walks while allowing three runs over 13 1/3 innings. The option price should remain solid value, though the escalators might eventually push it to an area where Tampa Bay would rather explore deadline or offseason trades rather than having a reliever projecting as one of the highest-paid players on the roster.

Danny Jansen, C ($12MM mutual option, $500K buyout)

Jansen seemed to be pulling away from the rest of a weak free agent catching class early last season. His production tanked from June onwards, leaving him to sign an $8.5MM pillow contract with Tampa Bay. He’s making an $8MM salary and will collect a $500K buyout on a $12MM mutual option at year’s end. Last summer’s offensive drought has carried into 2025. Jansen has only one home run with a .147/.301/.221 batting line through 83 plate appearances. He remains a very patient hitter, but the Rays would have an easy decision to decline their end of the option if he doesn’t find the double-digit home run power he showed during his best seasons in Toronto.

Brandon Lowe, 2B ($11.5MM club option, $500K buyout)

Lowe has had a rare extended run with a Tampa Bay team that is almost always willing to trade any player. He’s in his eighth big league season and in year seven of the extension he signed in Spring Training 2019. Lowe collected $24MM for what would have been his standard six seasons of team control. The Rays exercised a $10.5MM option for this year and can retain him once more at an $11.5MM price. It’s an $11MM decision after accounting for the $500K buyout.

While injuries have been a recurring issue, Lowe has been one of the better offensive middle infielders in the sport when healthy. His 39-homer season in 2021 is an outlier, but he has tallied 21 longballs in each of the past two seasons. He’s out to a much slower start this year, batting .203/.258/.305 with four homers across 128 plate appearances. The batted ball metrics are still solid, but his career-worst 20.1% swinging strike rate is the fifth-highest among hitters with at least 50 PAs.

This one can still go a few different ways. If Lowe hits like this all season, he’d be bought out. If he finds something like his 2023-24 form (.238/.319/.458), then $11MM is reasonable. It’d keep him as one of Tampa Bay’s highest-paid players, though, so there’s a decent chance he’ll be traded at some point this year. The 16-18 Rays look like fringe Wild Card contenders for a second consecutive year. They could again try to walk the line between buying and selling come deadline season.

Jacob Waguespack, RHP ($1.5MM club option, no buyout)

The Rays signed Waguespack to a restructured deal early last offseason. He’s making $1.3MM this season and has a $1.5MM club option for next year. That’d escalate to $2MM if he reaches 20 “points” this season. Waguespack would receive one point for each MLB relief appearance and two points per big league start. He has spent the ’25 season to date on optional assignment to Triple-A Durham.

Working as a pure reliever for the Bulls, Waguespack has reeled off 14 innings of two-run ball. He has fanned 15 hitters against three walks while getting ground-balls at a lofty 60% clip. It hasn’t earned him a major league call yet, but he should be up before too much longer if he keeps performing at that level. Waguespack spent the 2022-23 seasons with the Orix Buffaloes in Japan. He made four MLB appearances with Tampa Bay last year but lost a good portion of the season to a rotator cuff injury.

Note: Taylor Walls’ arbitration deal contains a ’26 club option with a $2.45MM base salary. He’d remain eligible for arbitration if the Rays decline the option.

Toronto Blue Jays

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AL East Notes: Swanson, Buehler, Eflin, McDermott

By Mark Polishuk | May 4, 2025 at 10:31pm CDT

Erik Swanson has yet to pitch this season due to a median nerve entrapment in his right arm, but the reliever’s path back to the Blue Jays roster hit a snag in the form of some soreness in his right forearm. The issue prevented Swanson from a planned minor league rehab outing earlier this week, and the good news is that initial tests revealed no structural damage. However, Swanson told The Athletic’s Mitch Bannon and other reporters that more tests are set for Monday, as it hasn’t yet been determined what exactly is causing the forearm discomfort.

Swanson had some bouts with forearm soreness at a few different points in his career, such as in each of the last two Spring Trainings, and also a minor strain that sent him to the injured list for a little over three weeks during the 2020 season when he was pitching with the Mariners. Though the medicals have been clean so far on his current issue, obviously all parties will be cautious in dealing with any forearm-related injury. In the short term, the problem has delayed Swanson’s recovery, and adds more uncertainty over when exactly the reliever will make his 2025 debut.

Orioles Recall Coby Mayo

By Darragh McDonald | May 3, 2025 at 3:27pm CDT

3:27pm: The Orioles have officially announced Mayo’s promotion. As noted by Kubatko, Urias was in fact placed on the 10-day injured list with what the Orioles have termed a “mild” hamstring strain. Manager Brandon Hyde told reporters (including Kubatko) that the club expects Urias’s trip to the IL to be a short one, and then he’ll resume a running progression after resting for a couple of days.

1:00pm: The Orioles are bringing infield prospect Coby Mayo back up to the majors. Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com reported that Mayo was on his way to join the team. Matt Weyrich of The Baltimore Sun confirmed that Mayo would indeed be recalled to the active roster.

Mayo, 23, is one of the best prospects in baseball but he has struggled to find playing time in a crowded Baltimore infield. He made his major league debut last year but was optioned back to the minors multiple times and only got 46 plate appearances over 17 games.

He came into camp this year with a shot at earning an Opening Day job but was optioned to the minors in mid-March. Mayo is only really a viable option at the corners. Ryan Mountcastle and Ryan O’Hearn have been sharing first base and the designated hitter spot.

Shortstop Gunnar Henderson started the season on the IL but the club decided to go with a rotation of Jordan Westburg, Jackson Holliday, Jorge Mateo and Ramón Urías to cover the three infield spots to the left of first base. Henderson was off the IL after missing just seven games. That left Westburg and Urías sharing third while Holliday and Mateo shared second.

Though Mayo expressed some frustration with getting optioned, he has continued mashing in the minors. He already has six home runs and has been drawing walks at a 12.6% pace. He has a .252/.346/.523 line and 130 wRC+ for the year. Dating back to the start of 2023, he has 1,147 minor league plate appearances with a .287/.390/.570 line and 149 wRC+.

Though he has been doing everything in his power to push for a promotion, the O’s seemed content to wait. Yesterday, general manager Mike Elias spoke on the situation, per Jake Rill of MLB.com. “He’s going to be a big part of this team,” Elias said, though he added that Mayo needed the “right opportunity” or the “right pathway”.

It seems that injuries have finally created that pathway. Westburg landed on the 10-day injured list earlier this week due to a left hamstring strain. Urías was scratched from last night’s game due to right hamstring tightness, leaving Emmanuel Rivera to play third base. With Mayo’s reported recall, perhaps Urías will land on the injured list. Presumably, Mayo will take over at the regular third baseman, with Rivera serving a bench role.

Perhaps that means this will only be a brief promotion. Mayo only hit .098/.196/.098 in his debut last year. If he struggles again this time, he could end up optioned back to Norfolk when Westburg and Urías get healthy, though it’s also possible that he hits enough to stick around. Mountcastle is having an awful year, so perhaps there’s a scenario where his playing time goes to Mayo even with Westburg and Urías on the roster.

Time will tell how that plays out, which will impact Mayo’s future contractual status. He came into this year with 43 days of major league service time, putting him 129 shy of the one-year mark. There are still 148 days remaining in the regular season, meaning Mayo can get over the one-year line if he’s up the rest of the way. That would put him on track to qualify for arbitration after 2027 and free agency after 2030. However, getting optioned back down to the minors later in the year could prevent him from getting over the one-year line and could push those timelines.

Photo courtesy of Nathan Ray Seebeck, Imagn Images

Orioles Move Charlie Morton To Bullpen

By Steve Adams | April 30, 2025 at 3:43pm CDT

The Orioles used veteran starter Charlie Morton out of the bullpen last night when Kyle Gibson’s first start of the year was shorter than hoped, and it seems that’ll be the continued plan for Morton — at least in the short term. Manager Brandon Hyde announced today that Morton will pitch in relief for the time being (link via Andy Kostka of the Baltimore Banner). The O’s haven’t closed the door on the 41-year-old returning to a starting role, but they’re hoping a change in role can help get him back on track.

It’s a disappointing outcome for both the team and for Morton personally. The 18-year big league veteran signed with the O’s on a one-year, $15MM contract over the winter. Morton was one of several one-year acquisitions for the Orioles’ rotation, joining Tomoyuki Sugano and Gibson in that regard. Baltimore’s baseball operations staff hoped that the infusion of aging veterans, paired with steps forward from young pitchers like Grayson Rodriguez and Cade Povich, would help them overcome the loss of ace Corbin Burnes, who signed with the D-backs in free agency.

Virtually nothing has gone right for the Orioles’ staff in 2025, however. Morton is hardly alone in terms of struggles, but his have been the most glaring. He’s appeared in seven games — five starts, one bulk appearance following an opener, and last night’s mop-up work — and been tattooed for a 9.45 ERA in 26 2/3 frames. His 15.2% walk rate is a career-worst, while his 18.8% strikeout rate is his lowest since 2015. Morton’s typically strong ground-ball rate has evaporated; he’s sitting on a career-low 36.7% mark and has averaged a career-worst 2.03 homers per nine innings pitched. He’s also displayed career-worst marks in average exit velocity (91.6 mph), opponents’ barrel rate (11.1%) and hard-hit rate (48.9%).

The rest of Baltimore’s rotation hasn’t been quite as bad, but it’s still been a mess overall. Dean Kremer has been torched for a 7.04 ERA while working with career-worst strikeout and swinging-strike rates. Povich was terrific his last time out but still has an ERA of 5.04. Sugano boasts a sharp 3.00 ERA, but it’s hard to see that continuing when he has the fourth-lowest strikeout rate among all qualified big league pitchers.

Injuries have hit Baltimore’s staff hard. Zach Eflin has been out since mid-April due to a lat strain. Rodriguez initially hit the IL with elbow inflammation but has since been diagnosed with a lat strain of his own; he was recently moved over to the 60-day injured list. Trevor Rogers, Albert Suarez, Chayce McDermott, Kyle Bradish and Tyler Wells have all yet to pitch this season. Rogers dislocated his kneecap in January. McDermott suffered a lat strain in February. Suarez’s shoulder flared up in March. He’s now on the 60-day IL, too. Bradish and Wells had UCL surgeries performed just days apart last June.

There’s little recourse for the Orioles at the moment. Rookie Brandon Young made his MLB debut earlier this month but has struggled in both of his outings (6.23 ERA, eight walks in 8 2/3 innings). Gibson made his season debut last night and was promptly shelled for nine runs in 3 2/3 frames. Triple-A starters Kyle Brnovich, Cameron Weston and Thaddeus Ward have posted results that range from underwhelming to ugly.

Right now, the hope will be that Povich can build on his last solid outing in tonight’s series finale versus the Yankees. Baltimore has announced that Kremer, Sugano and Gibson will start this weekend, in that order, against a Royals club that has struggled to score runs in 2025. Baltimore is off again next Monday. That gives them the short-term luxury of skipping the fifth spot this next time through the rotation, but the O’s only have one off-day from May 6-28, so that’s a short-term reprieve.

Orioles Recall Kyle Gibson For Season Debut

By Anthony Franco | April 29, 2025 at 12:50pm CDT

April 29: It’s now official, with Strowd optioned for Gibson’s recall, per a club announcement.

April 28: The Orioles list Kyle Gibson as the probable starter for tomorrow evening’s game against the Yankees. He’ll match up against Carlos Rodón in what will be his season debut. Gibson is already on the 40-man roster but will need to be recalled from High-A Aberdeen after agreeing to be optioned to the minor leagues.

Baltimore signed the veteran righty to a one-year, $5.25MM free agent deal on March 21. Gibson had spent the entire offseason on the open market after the Cardinals declined their $12MM option on his services. He’d thrown side sessions independently but signed too late to get any kind of game action. As with most pitchers who sign in the latter half of March, Gibson consented to a minor league assignment that could serve as a kind of unofficial Spring Training.

The 37-year-old Gibson has made a trio of starts — two at Triple-A Norfolk and his most recent with Aberdeen. That start came on April 20. Gibson reached five innings and 78 pitches. He’ll also be on over a week of rest, so he should be able to take something close to a typical starting workload tomorrow.

It’ll kick off the second O’s stint for Gibson, who absorbed 192 innings with a 4.73 ERA for the club two seasons back. A reliable source of back-of-the-rotation innings, Gibson worked to a 4.24 mark across 169 2/3 frames for St. Louis last year. He’ll slot alongside Tomoyuki Sugano, Charlie Morton, Dean Kremer and Cade Povich in Brandon Hyde’s rotation. The O’s lost Zach Eflin to a mild lat strain a few weeks ago, while Grayson Rodriguez is at least a month away amidst elbow and lat injuries. Albert Suárez, who entered the regular season in long relief after battling for the fifth starter role in camp, suffered a subscapularis strain during his first appearance and promptly landed on the 60-day injured list himself.

Baltimore will need to option a pitcher tomorrow. Kade Strowd, who was called up this afternoon but did not get into their 4-3 win against New York, seems likely to head back to Norfolk.

Orioles Place Jordan Westburg On Injured List

By Anthony Franco | April 28, 2025 at 6:42pm CDT

The Orioles announced a number of roster moves just before today’s series opener against the Yankees. Third baseman Jordan Westburg and catcher Gary Sánchez have each landed on the 10-day injured list. Westburg’s placement, which is retroactive to April 27, is due to a left hamstring strain. Sánchez is battling right wrist inflammation. The O’s selected third baseman Emmanuel Rivera and catcher Maverick Handley onto the MLB roster in their places. Baltimore also confirmed the Walter Pennington waiver claim which MLBTR had reported this afternoon. They needed to create two openings on the 40-man roster, which they did by transferring Grayson Rodriguez and Colton Cowser to the 60-day injured list.

It continues a frustrating start to the season for Westburg. He made the All-Star game behind a .264/.312/.481 showing a season ago. He’s been out to a much slower pace this year, posting a .217/.265/.391 slash through 23 games. Westburg has hit four homers, but a drop in his hard contact rates have contributed to a mediocre .242 average on balls in play. He had a stretch of seven consecutive hitless games during the middle of the month. He’d begun to turn things around, with hits in six of his last seven, before hamstring discomfort kept him out of Sunday’s lineup.

Ramón Urías has drawn into the lineup at the hot corner over the past few days. He’ll take over as the starting third baseman while Westburg is on the shelf. Urías is a good depth infielder. He won a Gold Glove a few seasons ago and has shown himself to be a slightly above-average hitter over parts of six seasons. He has raced out to a .317/.386/.400 start this year, drawing eight walks against 11 punchouts over 70 trips to the plate.

Rivera comes up to join Jorge Mateo as multi-positional infielders on Brandon Hyde’s bench. It’s his first major league call of the season. Baltimore had outrighted the defensive specialist off their 40-man roster during the offseason. He accepted a minor league assignment and has appeared in 17 games with Triple-A Norfolk. Rivera is batting .308/.370/.338 with plus contact skills but minimal power (two doubles and no homers) across 73 plate appearances.

A veteran of parts of four MLB seasons, Rivera has suited up for four teams at the highest level. That includes a productive 27-game stint with the Orioles late last year. His overall offensive track record is fairly modest, as he owns a career .244/.306/.369 batting line. He has above-average marks for his third base defense. He’s out of options, so the Orioles would need to DFA him again if they want to take him off the big league roster at any point.

Baltimore also makes a change behind the plate. Sánchez has worked as Adley Rutschman’s backup after signing an $8.5MM free agent deal. He has started 10 games — nine at catcher and once as the designated hitter — without making an impact. Sánchez has three hits, all singles, with one walk and 12 strikeouts across 35 plate appearances. His injury opens the door for Handley’s major league debut.

A Stanford product, Handley was selected in the sixth round of the 2019 draft. The righty-hitting catcher owns a .224/.342/.344 line over parts of six minor league seasons. Handley’s offensive upside is limited by middling power, but he’s a very patient hitter who has worked a lot of walks. He went unselected in last winter’s Rule 5 draft but has been hitting well in Norfolk to begin the season. Handley owns a .346/.433/.558 slash through 15 games. His broader minor league numbers suggest he’s unlikely to carry anything like that over against MLB pitching, but he should provide a reasonably high-floor backup behind Rutschman as long as Sánchez is out of action.

The IL transfers for Rodriguez and Cowser are essentially procedural moves. They backdate to the time of their initial IL placements in late March. Rodriguez opened the season on the shelf with elbow inflammation and was shut back down after sustaining a mild lat strain. He’s still a few weeks from throwing and probably down into June or July. Cowser broke his left thumb diving into first base during the first week of the season. That came with an initial 6-8 week timetable. There haven’t been any recent updates on his status, but the O’s determined he wouldn’t be ready for MLB action before the final few days of May at the earliest.

Poll: Will Cedric Mullins Sustain His Hot Start?

By Nick Deeds | April 28, 2025 at 5:20pm CDT

There wasn’t much for Orioles fans to be excited about back in 2021, as they ultimately lost 110 games that season. Center fielder Cedric Mullins was the exception to that, however, as the then-26-year-old broke out in a big way that year with a .291/.360/518 slash line in 159 games while playing strong defense in center. Flash forward to 2025 and while the Orioles are certainly not going to lose 110 games, their fans are once again staring down disappointment as their 10-17 record puts them dead last in the AL East. Amid that disappointment, however, Mullins is once again emerging as a bright spot.

Now in his age-30 season, the club’s center fielder is putting on by far the best offensive performance of his career. He’s slashing .279/.421/.547 in his first 107 trips to the plate, production that’s good for an incredible 185 wRC+. His six home runs put him on pace for a career-best mark over a full season, and he’s pairing that surge in power with a massive 17.8% walk rate while maintaining a fairly low 19.6% strikeout rate. He remains an impressive baserunner as well, with five stolen bases in six attempts, and that entire offensive package has been paired with his typically-stellar defense.

In all, it’s the sort of scorching start that would be MVP-caliber if maintained over a full season; only Aaron Judge and Bobby Witt Jr. have posted more fWAR than Mullins in the AL this year. That sort of season would not only help the Orioles get back into the conversation for a playoff spot, but it would be game-changing for Mullins himself ahead of his first foray into free agency this winter. In a free agent class that has long looked relatively light on quality offensive options, a strong offensive season for Mullins could earn him quite the raise on the open market as was the case for fellow outfielders Anthony Santander and Jurickson Profar this past offseason following their own strong walk years.

Just how feasible is it for Mullins to maintain this production? Some of it certainly looks sustainable. He’s posting a career-high in hard-hit rate (40.0%) while posting his best barrel rate (7.7%) since his 30-homer campaign in 2021, so there’s some reason for optimism about his power increase. His .305 BABIP is within spitting distance of his .290 career mark, and a 20.3% line drive rate (his best since 2020) provides an easy explanation for the slight increase. In general, Mullins is elevating the ball more than he ever has before in his career with a ground ball rate of just 26.6% and a launch angle of 24.1 degrees, both career-best marks. With that said, his aforementioned barrel and hard-hit rates are both still below league average and seem unlikely to keep generating homers at quite this level and his .423 expected slugging percentage is more than 100 points below his actual figure.

While the sustainability of Mullins’ newfound power is questionable, his improved plate discipline is backed up by underlying numbers. Mullins is swinging just 42.1% of the time, the lowest figure he’s posted since his debut season in 2018, and most of that patience has come against pitches outside of the zone. He’s swinging at balls outside the strike zone just 20.7% of the time, and he’s combined that with a knack for making contact on pitches in the zone, connecting on 90.8% of his in-zone swings. It’s led to a swinging-strike rate of just 7.5% so far this year and, while his gargantuan 17.8% walk rate will almost certainly come down at some point, it’s easy to imagine this sort of approach resulting in a career-best walk rate for Mullins, who walked in just 8.1% of his career plate appearances entering this season.

While some regression appears all but guaranteed to come for Mullins eventually, there’s enough real improvements to his approach that it’s not hard to imagine him matching or perhaps even surpassing his career-best 2021 campaign. Mullins’ .366 xwOBA, while nearly 60 points below his current wOBA, is actually 22 points higher than his 2021 figure and by far the best of his career. That expected number puts Mullins in the same ballpark as players like Witt, Seiya Suzuki, and Francisco Lindor this year, and it’s in line with the production of Freddie Freeman, Kyle Schwarber, and Corey Seager at the plate last season.

How do MLBTR readers think Mullins’ platform season will play out? Will he enter free agency coming off of a career year, end up in line with his 2021 numbers, or regress back to his career norms? Have your say in the poll below:

Orioles Promote Kade Strowd For Major League Debut

By Darragh McDonald | April 28, 2025 at 1:50pm CDT

The Orioles announced that right-hander Kade Strowd has been recalled to the big league club. He will be making his major league debut as soon as he gets into a game. Left-hander Grant Wolfram was optioned to Triple-A Norfolk as the corresponding move.

Strowd, 27, was added to the club’s 40-man roster in November to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft. A 12th-round pick from 2019, he has been a reliever throughout his minor league career. He does have three starts but they were all at the lower levels and of the opener variety.

At the upper levels, he has generally been able to get decent amounts of strikeouts and ground balls, but with some control issues. From the beginning of 2023 to the present, he has 116 2/3 innings pitched between Double-A and Triple-A. He has a 5.55 earned run average and 11.9% walk rate in that time but a 29.1% strikeout rate and ground balls on about half the balls in play he’s allowed.

So far this year, he has ten innings pitched at Triple-A with an unsightly 8.10 ERA. However, his .481 batting average on balls in play and 36.1% strand rate are both far to the unlucky side in that small sample. He has struck out 36% of batters faced this year and kept his walk rate down to 8%.

For Baltimore, the pitching staff got a lot of usage recently. Their game on Friday was postponed by rain to Saturday, meaning they played three games in the past two days. Wolfram pitched on both days and might not have been available for tonight’s contest, so Strowd comes up to give them a fresh arm. It could be a brief stay for Strowd, since the O’s don’t have a starter listed for tomorrow and Kyle Gibson is on the taxi squad, per Jake Rill of MLB.com. If Gibson gets the ball, then someone will need to be bumped off the active roster.

Image courtesy of Nathan Ray Seebeck, Imagn Images

Orioles Claim Walter Pennington

By Darragh McDonald | April 28, 2025 at 12:55pm CDT

The Orioles have claimed left-hander Walter Pennington off unconditional release waivers, reports MLBTR’s Steve Adams. The Rangers had designated the lefty for assignment last week. His transaction tracker at MLB.com listed him as released by the Rangers over the weekend but the O’s put in a claim. The Orioles had an open 40-man spot and won’t need to make a corresponding move.

Pennington, 27, made his major league debut with the Royals last year but was flipped to the Rangers in July as part of the Michael Lorenzen trade. Between those two clubs, he tossed 18 innings in the big leagues last year. He allowed 3.00 earned runs per nine, with a 20.2% strikeout rate, 13.1% walk rate and 45.3% ground ball rate. He has posted some strong minor league numbers in recent years. Over the 2023 and 2024 seasons, he logged 134 innings on the farm with a 2.69 ERA, 28.6% strikeout rate, 10.2% walk rate and grounders on more than half of the balls in play he allowed.

This year, Pennington hasn’t pitched in any official action. The Rangers optioned him to Triple-A Round Rock on March 9th. Per his transactions tracker, he was transferred to the club’s Arizona Complex League affiliate on March 28th. MLBTR has learned that he is healthy and has been working on some mechanical stuff in extended spring lately.

The O’s had an open roster spot and are intrigued enough to bring him into their system, with the southpaw likely reported to Triple-A Norfolk soon. The Orioles aren’t hurting for lefty relievers, as they currently have Keegan Akin, Gregory Soto, Cionel Pérez and Grant Wolfram on the big league squad. Still, clubs always like to add more pitching depth when they can and both Pérez and Wolfram have poor numbers at the moment.

Photo courtesy of Joe Camporeale, Imagn Images

Orioles Place Tyler O’Neill On 10-Day Injured List

By Mark Polishuk | April 26, 2025 at 10:56am CDT

The Orioles announced that outfielder Tyler O’Neill has been placed on the 10-day injured list due to neck inflammation. The placement is retroactive to April 24. Outfielder Dylan Carlson was called up from Triple-A to take O’Neill’s place on the 26-man roster.

O’Neill didn’t play in Baltimore’s game on Thursday and presumably wouldn’t have played yesterday either, had the Orioles’ game with the Tigers not been rained out. Manager Brandon Hyde told reporters (including Jacob Calvin Meyer of the Baltimore Sun) that the IL placement was meant “to get [O’Neill] right” and completely over his neck soreness, though the outfielder isn’t expected to miss more than the minimum 10 days.

Signed to a three-year, $49.5MM guarantee in December, O’Neill was the biggest acquisition of the Orioles’ offseason, though the deal could end up being a one-year, $16.5MM pact if O’Neill triggers an opt-out clause at season’s end. After hitting his customary Opening Day home run, O’Neill has yet to really get rolling this season, as he has hit only two homers in total while batting .215/.284/.385 in 74 plate appearances. The outfielder’s walk and hard-contact rates are down, and he has continued his high-strikeout ways with a 28.4% strikeout rate.

O’Neill’s .337 xwOBA is much higher than his .293 wOBA, so there is at least some evidence that he has just been somewhat unlucky in the season’s first month. His IL stint might well act as an unofficial reset point for O’Neill’s 2025 season and Orioles tenure, once his neck heals up.

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