The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.
This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Steve Adams of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…
- The Orioles firing manager Brandon Hyde (2:30)
- The Dodgers promoting Dalton Rushing to be a backup catcher (14:00)
- José Alvarado of the Phillies getting an 80-game PED suspension (28:20)
Plus, we answer your questions, including…
- Who are some hitters who could be available at the deadline? (36:05)
- Who are some pitchers who could be available at the deadline? (46:40)
- When will the Pirates fire general manager Ben Cherington? (53:00)
Check out our past episodes!
- Devers Drama, Managerial Firings, And Jordan Lawlar – listen here
- Replacing Triston Casas, A Shakeup In Texas, And The Blue Jays’ Rotation – listen here
- Mailbag: Red Sox, Alonso, Tigers, Tanking, And More! – listen here
The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff. Check out their Facebook page here!
Photo courtesy of Mark J. Rebilas, Imagn Images
Orioles at 15-32 have to be the biggest disappointment in baseball. Even PECOTA had them at 89.5 wins, winning AL East. Most projections had them at least at a wildcard.
Hyde lost the locker room between late last year and early this year. He may in fact be a decent manager. Is he a miracle worker that is the primary reason a team wins 101 games or a brick wall that sinks a team to lose 110? No. But he’s managed teams that have done both. The team has been moping, playing uninspired. And this year, lacking fundamentals, hustle, making inattentive plays, they’ve looked bad. I don’t think replacing with his 3B coach in Mansolino and keeping the rest of the staff is bringing in the new message the team needs.
Hyde mismanaged the bullpen at times and seemed to either yank starters way early or leave a reliever in a couple batters too long and turn a winnable game into a 4 run deficit. He also had questionable lineup decisions. If O’Hearn or Holliday got a few hits and a lefty came in, they sat and Mateo (who is not a major league hitter) would start. Mountcastle continues to bat 4th or even 2nd. Leadoff hitters deployed can’t get on base.
There are glimmers recently:
– Henderson in the past 20 games: batting .288, OPS .882 with 5 HR. These stack up with 2024 #’s. Despite 2 inexcusable errors, he has just 4 on the year and his other defensive metrics aren’t bad.
– Holliday in 86 May AB: 3 doubles, 4 HR, hitting .303, OPS of .903
– Mullins and O’Hearn have been doing very well in intervals.
But, the offense seems to pull individually and not as a group. Especially when they hit .190 with RISP, hardly ever show patience at the plate, and there never seems to be a sustained rally.
– Mountcastle despite a recent hit streak still only has 2 HR in 45 games despite the wall moving in.
– Rutschman still around .200 and that’s puzzling given increase in line drives, hard hit %, EV, etc.
Notice these are all offense players. Nothing is going to overcome this pitching staff. Only Sugano, whose underlying metrics are still questionable, has fared well as a starter. Povich shows some glimmers, Kremer will always run hot and cold, Eflin hurt, Morton and Gibson provided 10 losses singlehandedly and the bullpen that was solid has shown overuse.
But again, not Hyde’s fault he was stuck with Morton or Gibson, or the total bust in O’Neill. That’s on the GM who’s stepped in it more often than not since obtaining Flaherty down the stretch in 2023. Like 3 bad moves for ever decent one at best.
I’m afraid that Elias will set the team further back at the deadline and this winter if he stays unless he’s been humbled and undertakes a major course correction. The Orioles could have gotten Fried with what they spent last year. No reason they couldn’t have traded for Luzardo or gotten Pivetta. They can’t be cute, as the podcast mentioned. They must be THE players for all the top and #2-#3 starters and getting 3 or 4 of them in the fold is the goal.
The O’s could have traded some their young infield prospects in the offseason for better pitching. It was reported that they weren’t interested in parting with any of those talented youngsters; instead they were only willing to offer Mountcastle. Perhaps they will try a different strategy this winter.
Wabbit — Are you saying the Orioles should have traded Henderson, Holliday, or Westberg for Starting Pitching? You think they should this off-season?
Okay….which SP should/could they have gotten for such talent?
Last winter, perhaps Sandy Alcantara or Dylan Cease. Reports were that at the time, they were both available. The Marlins or Padres likely would have had to add to their end do to the limited years of control, but they & others were mentioned as available in trade.
So you would have traded Henderson, Holiday, or Westberg for 1 year of Cease or recovering from TJ surgery Alcantara??
(4.50 and 7.99 ERA’s in 2025 so far).
Hindsight is 20/20 on Alcantara. No one saw the drop off coming. I already accounted for the lack of control with my previous post. There were likely other pitchers who could have been pried away with more control, but top of the rotation arms are expensive in prospect capital. Choosing to go into the season with the pitching they had is garnering predictable results.
“Predictable results”?? Uh, since every outlet in Baseball/Gambling predicted the Orioles were a top 5 team, I’d say being one of the 5 worst is the definition of unpredictable.
It was unpredicted by hundreds of Professional Sports minds that all have/make money from the game.
I just wanted to know who it is that you would have traded Henderson, Westerberg, or Holiday for, and you keep coming back with “somebody”.
If trading one of those 3 players for a SP would have made the outcome of the Orioles season different, I’d like to know who that guy is.
If the O’s stand pat, it would seem more of the same is to come.
Nobody thought they were a top 5 team after their offseason. They were projected to win 83 games this season.
silly – Ummm …… what would it have taken to get Crochet?
jd – Voice of reason, thank you.
Every ranking I saw, including Vegas, had the O’s no higher than 3rd place behind the Yanks and Sox.
Crochet likely could have been acquired in trade, just another top of the rotation arm Baltimore didn’t pursue. Maybe going forward they will simply out score their opponents with their very good infielders. An extension discussion could have been made with Crochet’s agent prior to the trade. Happens all the time.
You can’t trade all your prospects if you can’t pay megastar to come to your team like tanks or dodgers… need to have a pipeline of top talent in the system for small market teams…
I would be thrilled to see the Pirates hire Brandon Hyde.
Thornton — Agree on all the trees, disagree with forest.
Recentcy bias I think has distorted your perspective.
The season is on the players. Across the board, they are all injured or under-performing. Blaming Elias for a lack of clarvoyance while wearing 20-20 hindsight lenses is rash.
As you pointed out, the outcome of the Orioles season fooled everyone in/around the game. How could Elias see it any way but what everyone else saw?
Elias shouldn’t be expected to be perfect.
The core is still insanely young in their MLB carrers…the future is still very very bright for a long time to come still. I’m as hungry for this as any Orioles fan, but progress isn’t always linear.
A deferred/development/reload year. There’s a lot of good that come from this year. ((But man, it sure is Brutal to watch right now..ugh))
I found Mrs. Elias.
I found Mr. Elias jillited Ex.~
Elias. He gone.
I think she doth defendeth too much
O’s – Sorry I respectfully disagree.
O’Neill’s season is right in line with his 2023, 2022, 2020 and 2019 seasons ….. lot’s of injuries and poor performance.
And Morton’s season is right in line with any 41-year-old pitcher’s season.
Can’t same the front office is blameless when everyone “told them so” last offseason.
Every analyst and baseball insider roundly criticized their offseason, that’s a fact.
Fever – I agree with your take. While I thought the industry was being too harsh on the O’s overall, the holes were obvious to any objective observer.
O’Neil – A very inconsistent player who is oft-injured and can’t be relied upon as an offensive cornerstone. He’s more of a ‘pencil him in as your 6 or 7 hitter and be very happy if you get a season or two where he can find his way into the heart of your lineup’
Morton – It was a horrible move the second it was made. The entire industry hated it. The fans hated it. And it played out on the worst end of the spectrum. But that’s not an excuse as there was always a higher probability of that outcome than normal given the advanced age and limited skillset of the player.
Grayson – Relying on the development and ascendancy of any young player is a risk but this is a young player who consistently proves he doesn’t have the most important ability – availability. Penciling him in at the TOR was a risk and doing that in conjunction with relying on risky back end options was a recipe for disaster – as we’ve seen.
Povich – The only reason he wasn’t traded and remained on this team is because the whole league clearly saw what we’ve seen – he’s not a major league pitcher. His location, control and shape are all lacking. He has the upside of a 5. That’s not an upside that belongs on a playoff hopeful’s roster.
Rogers – The guy wasn’t good last year and Elias thought he was smarter than the league and overpaid for him. He was hurt and ineffective last season and he’s the same this season. A truly disastrous move when all he had to do was not get fleeced and bring in any piece that move the needle in the right direction.
The bottom line: Elias has made more mistakes over the past year than correct calls and that has come home to bite the Orioles. That coupled with our players being snake bit has us bleeding out slowly on the national stage. This is Elias’ fault. He didn’t construct a roster with a high probability of success, heavily relying on positive range outcomes with risky players to drive the team.
That said, Elias isn’t entirely to blame. Cowser breaking his finger damn near day 1 wasn’t his fault. Westburg being hurt again wasn’t his fault. His shiny new rp in Kittridge getting hurt in ST wasn’t his fault. And the awful performance of Gunnar, Adley, and Mountcastle aren’t his fault. The reality is that he set out to build a 95 win team, built an 85 win team, and was derailed by all of the above into a 65-75 win team. Does that get you fired? I don’t think so. But it should certainly motivate him and ownership to behave entirely differently this offseason. And hopefully he’ll accept this lost season for what it is and prepare for the future at the deadline by moving rentals and letting Holiday, Mayo, Kjerstad, etc. play every day so that they can develop in this unexpected non competitive window to help a future competitive club.
Fever — Nobody, myself included, said the Orioles were better than ’24. Yes, the rotation was less then before, no question.
I agree with you on O’Neil. (And said so at the time he was signed in December)
Yes, the industry did believe in the Orioles off-season (Baseball America had them winning the division, PECOTA had them 1/2 a game behind Yankees).
The Orioles were universally a Post Season pick.
Nobody, absolutely nobody, on these boards or anywhere else, had them as the 5 worst team.
Show me who had the Orioles last in the AL East? Please.
Everybody here is claiming this season “told them so” on THIS result. No, everyone agreed the pitching had issues…but not so much so they wouldn’t make the Post Season, that they wouldn’t win-it-all.
All these folks on here claiming “I told you so” wish they had been so bold as to predicted this outcome.
I know it’s not you brah, but folks around got serious amnesia. (You’d think the Internet would help people find those “Orioles Trainwreck 2025” articles written in Jan-March 2025…)
O’s – interesting way of putting it
I think its a mix TBH, but given the lack of major moves its pretty easy to see what worked and what didn’t for them:
Cole Irvin – many zeroed right in on what his splits looked like away from Oakland Coliseum (I was one). He never turned into anything. But he was sold as the big move of the 2022-23 offseason as the Orioles sat on the sidelines (this was dumb).
Reliance on injury prone Means and Rodriguez to be rotation mainstays – a “fool me twice, shame on me” situation, they never accounted for this.
Implosion of Flaherty down the stretch in 2023 after acquisition – no one could have foreseen this. You can’t pin this on Elias.
Burnes – a great pickup, and Burnes performed as expected. But just for one year. Whether the Orioles’ offer to retain him was actually competitive or done knowing he wouldn’t take it – who knows.
O’Neill and Sanchez – Many were excited, seeing O’Neill as the big righty, glossing over the injury history, and a cost savings. I saw it as a wash at the time. Well, Santander was cheaper than expected and O’Neill and Sanchez have both been complete busts. This looks bad.
Eflin – this one looks very good. Eflin has been above expectations for the most part even with the injury missed time considered, the only thing is the time limit to 1+ year.
Rodgers – an abject disaster immediately because he was awful. Looks worse now because Stowers hitting over .300 with 10 HR this year.
Kittredge – a backup plan because they ran away from Hoffman due to his physical. Hoffman has looked great. Kittredge immediately got hurt. Elias looks stupid. Kittridege has to be lights out the rest of the season to salvage.
Sugano – this looks very good so far but with questionable metrics and a hot summer ahead.
Morton – looks absolutely awful. Gibson – not quite as bad because a third of the price.
And what not done looks bad too. Santander said the Orioles offer to him wasn’t even competitive. Mullins said he’s never even gotten a call about an extension. Mountcastle should have been moved after the 2023 offseason when he had value.
As said previously, at the top of the draft with position players, a lot of hits from Elias the scout. But Elias the GM? Not so much.
I agree brutal to watch. One game like yesterday where they rallied to win in extras was like a playoff game given how bad they’ve been this year so far! They’ve got to turn it around.
Thornton – Great post! As for disappointment, of course that’s always based on expectations and most didn’t expect much from the Orioles because of their horrific offseason. You simply don’t lose the 2024 production of guys like Burnes & Santander and expect to be better or the same by replacing them with guys like Morton & O’Neill.
Also the changes to the outfield wall actually hurt the Orioles based on the types of pitchers and hitters they have. They don’t have the strikeout pitchers to keep the ball in the yard, and they don’t have the power hitters that those wall changes would have made a difference with.
The Rox should hire Al Avila.
1) Director.of Scouting
Promoted to:
2) Head of Player Development
Promoted.to:
3) Assistant GM
Or.the Pirates
Or.the Orioles
Or. the Marlins…..
Sincerely, Al’s mom
Well, I’ll need somebody who knows what they are doing……
Adding onto the problems umpire scoring has been biased against the os. Umpirescoring.com has them as the most bad or missed calls this year and the last 5. Yanks and Mets are on the other side of the list being most favororable… someone being paid off???
paos – I couldn’t find a website by that name, but this website has the O’s as 4th-most unfavorable calls and Yankees being the 6th-most favorable.
umpscorecards.com/data/teams
BTW – O’s/Sox game was finally called just now.
Uh. Wot?
Dump – It”s a Nor’easter …. that’s slang for heavy rain and wind, a total washout.
Two games tomorrow, 1:35 PM and 7:10 PM ….. and that’s EST, not MLBTR time ;O)
Familiar w N’easters, having once emerged from a subterranean computer lab to an unexpected foot of snow. Fun walk home up Mass Ave. Was reacting to the fan attributing the Os flatulence to…biased umps?
Dump – Yeah Manny Gonzalez missed 14 calls in Toronto’s extra-inning loss to the Red Sox on April 10th.
12 of the 14 missed calls favored the Red Sox.
It happens to every team eventually, ABS can’t come fast enough.
While I thought the industry was being too harsh on the O’s overall, the holes were obvious to any objective observer.
O’Neil – A very inconsistent player who is oft-injured and can’t be relied upon as an offensive cornerstone. He’s more of a ‘pencil him in as your 6 or 7 hitter and be very happy if you get a season or two where he can find his way into the heart of your lineup’
Morton – It was a horrible move the second it was made. The entire industry hated it. The fans hated it. And it played out on the worst end of the spectrum. But that’s not an excuse as there was always a higher probability of that outcome than normal given the advanced age and limited skillset of the player.
Grayson – Relying on the development and ascendancy of any young player is a risk but this is a young player who consistently proves he doesn’t have the most important ability – availability. Penciling him in at the TOR was a risk and doing that in conjunction with relying on risky back end options was a recipe for disaster – as we’ve seen.
Povich – The only reason he wasn’t traded and remained on this team is because the whole league clearly saw what we’ve seen – he’s not a major league pitcher. His location, control and shape are all lacking. He has the upside of a 5. That’s not an upside that belongs on a playoff hopeful’s roster.
Rogers – The guy wasn’t good last year and Elias thought he was smarter than the league and overpaid for him. He was hurt and ineffective last season and he’s the same this season. A truly disastrous move when all he had to do was not get fleeced and bring in any piece that move the needle in the right direction.
The bottom line: Elias has made more mistakes over the past year than correct calls and that has come home to bite the Orioles. That coupled with our players being snake bit has us bleeding out slowly on the national stage. This is Elias’ fault. He didn’t construct a roster with a high probability of success, heavily relying on positive range outcomes with risky players to drive the team.
That said, Elias isn’t entirely to blame. Cowser breaking his finger damn near day 1 wasn’t his fault. Westburg being hurt again wasn’t his fault. His shiny new rp in Kittridge getting hurt in ST wasn’t his fault. And the awful performance of Gunnar, Adley, and Mountcastle aren’t his fault. The reality is that he set out to build a 95 win team, built an 85 win team, and was derailed by all of the above into a 65-75 win team. Does that get you fired? I don’t think so. But it should certainly motivate him and ownership to behave entirely differently this offseason. And hopefully he’ll accept this lost season for what it is and prepare for the future at the deadline by moving rentals and letting Holiday, Mayo, Kjerstad, etc. play every day so that they can develop in this unexpected non competitive window to help a future competitive club.