Outfielder Tyler O’Neill is staying in Baltimore. He could have opted out of the final two years of his contract, walking away from $33MM, but Andy Kostka of The Baltimore Banner reports that he will forgo that chance and stay with the Orioles. In other Baltimore contract news, Francys Romero of BeisbolFR reports that the club will turn down their $5.5MM club option on infielder/outfielder Jorge Mateo, who will become a free agent.
Neither decision is a major surprise. O’Neill, 31 in June, signed a three-year, $49.5MM deal with the O’s last winter, with that deal giving him a chance to opt out after the first season. At the time, he was coming off a solid 31-homer season with the Red Sox. However, he had a lengthy injury history. The deal was hopefully going to give the O’s a potent bat while O’Neill could return to the open market if he had a healthy and productive season.
It did not work out as hoped. O’Neill had multiple IL stints due to neck, shoulder and wrist injuries. He only got into 54 games and put up a dismal .199/.292/.392 line in those. After that performance, he wasn’t going to top $33MM, so he’ll stay with the O’s for another two seasons.
Baltimore’s outfield picture should look different next year, as they traded Cedric Mullins and Ramón Laureano at the deadline. Going into next year, O’Neill is in the mix for playing time alongside Colton Cowser, Dylan Beavers, Jeremiah Jackson and others. It’s also possible the Orioles give O’Neill lots of time as the designated hitter to keep him off the IL, though they also might want to have catchers Adley Rutschman and Samuel Basallo sharing the DH spot. Basallo can play first but the O’s also have Coby Mayo and Ryan Mountcastle in the mix there, unless Mountcastle is traded or non-tendered.
Mateo, 31 in June, has been with the O’s since 2021. He’s never been much of a hitter but has been a useful bench/utility piece thanks to his ability to steal bases and play multiple positions. 2025 was his final year of arbitration. He and the O’s avoided arb by agreeing to a $3.55MM salary with a $5.5MM club option for 2026.
However, 2025 was mostly a lost season for Mateo. He underwent left elbow surgery in August of 2024. Inflammation in that elbow put him back on the shelf in June of this year. While on a rehab assignment in July, he suffered a hamstring strain that kept him out of action until September.
Around all those injuries, Mateo got into 43 games and hit .177/.217/.266, so the O’s have made the easy decision to move on. He’ll become a free agent for the first time in his career. The O’s could bring him back at a lower price point or even on a minor league deal. Other clubs might also be interested in him as a depth add on a minor league pact or a modest big league deal for a utility role.
Photo courtesy of James A. Pittman, Imagn Images
Crap
Someone is smart.
That someone was not the guy that signed O’Neill to that contact.
even worse- the same guy spent another 15 million moving the fences around to play to Oneil’s swing. The whole thing has been a mess.
O’Neill had nothing to do with moving the wall. He wasn’t even on the roster when they announced that they were adjusting the wall.
They announced that they were moving the wall in November of 2024.
They didn’t sign O’Neill until sometime in December I believe.
@ba$eba||
“Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?!?!?”
Sometimes passion can far outrun facts.
even worse- the same guy spent another 15 million moving the fences around to play to Oneil’s swing.
Huh? The wall had nothing to do with O’Neill’s swing whatsoever. O’Neill was signed after the wall was moved back in. If you can’t get your facts straight, why are you posting?
Maybe spend more time being optimistic about Grayson… /s
I know. I read that somewhere. Must be true.
You can’t be talking about their supa dupa general manager.
Health question marks absolutely would’ve limited him in free agency, not surprised to see him opt in. If he can stay healthy he still could be a good piece for the Orioles. I’d try to keep him out of the field, but unfortunately it doesn’t seem like there will be much room in Baltimore to stick him at DH regularly.
No surprise here.
Hopefully, he can turn it around this next season. BAL fans need something to be optimistic about.
not really- Gunnar, Holliday, Cowser, and Basello are plenty for Os fans to be optimistic about…. and on the pitching end- Grayson and Bradish being back for next year.
Eh, I’m not optimistic about Cowser. I think Holliday is a couple years away from being anything more than an average bat and subpar 2B defensively. Basallo will struggle next year before he adapts. Grayson… who is optimistic about him anymore?
Bradish, yes. Bradish is a reason for optimism. A healthy Westburg, also a reason. Full seasons of Beavers & Basallo to see how they handle themselves are reasons for tepid optimism, but O’s prospects seem to always take giant dumps in their second year, never to recover.
“ but O’s prospects seem to always take giant dumps in their second year, never to recover.”
This could only be possibly true with Colton Cowser. I’d probably take a look at Gunnar, GRod, Westy, and Adley’s second seasons. No basis for that comment.
Bmor 44 – fine, do third year. The list of regressions goes on and on.
James, fans are always willing to have more to be optimistic about.
Just pointing out the obvious.
O’Neill is probably the last thing O’s fans are optimistic about.
Yeah, this opt out was never going to be exercised.
Fell by 2 full WAR going from positive to negative value. He HAD to.
I’m shocked!
In related news, no flying pigs have been seen yet either.
flyingpigmarathon.com/
Actually, this is every year thing. 🙂
I laughed 😂
Yaaaaaay!
Glad to see the Jorge Mateo experiment come to an end.
I’m not sure anyone’s more glad about that than me.
2 years overdue.
Yeah. Mateo was a great spark in 2022 and his hot start to 2023 really put the club on the right foot. But, his time has come and gone, and I’m glad Elias finally caught up with that notion.
That’s right, he hit in April 2023. 6 HR, hit .347. Then stopped hitting and never started again. Since May 2023 he’s about .198.
He had his times where he was electric. Him batting 9 and Mullins 1 and having the 2 of them on base always brought some energy to the lineup. He was actually one of my favorites. Hope the best for him
Opt outs suck. If the player’s good, he opts out and leaves the team. If he stinks, he stays and the team is on the hook for a low performance or injury prone player.
I think it’s just a cost of doing business these days, teams need to put their feet down and start offering only 1 year deals to guys like this (not advocating collusion here).
if he really continues to stink it up, they can cut him and just take the dollar loss. at least we didn’t also trade any of our practice baseballs for him. we need more practice.
I still wonder why people thought this was a good signing at the time and they still defend it. I know I don’t know what I’m talking about but it was easy to see that this contract might not work out too well. Again, I know I don’t know what I’m talking about.
Santander didn’t turn out much better. O’Neil was a risk, but better defense in 2024 and past, better vs rh, and better avg and obp than Santander. If he got injured they had Heston Kjerstad to jump in and get ab… well none of that went as planned. Lauriano filled in and provided value, and later prospects as a result of that gap. Jackson likely wouldn’t have been called up for a preview if not for the injuries, so some good came out of it.
Laureano was the best get for Elias last winter and was an afterthought. He carried the offense for a bit.
“The man with the 46in python forearms” Tyler O’Neil
This message approved by Steve Garvey.
I’m not saying he’s Rogers but I do want to point out that pretty much everyone gave up on him before this year. Stowers/Norby for Trevor Rogers was pretty much compared to the Glenn Davis acquisition.
Here’s to hoping that O’Neil gets healthy and maybe taps a little of that power against lefties that he showed 2 yrs ago.
Stevie wonder saw that coming
That’s because Stevie Wonder isn’t blind.
The question is:
Will the Orioles sign a big 1B/DH type bat and hope that General Soreness can play more in RF and only cycle in at DH? Or do they sign a corner OF big bat (like he should have been), relegating General Soreness to primary DH duty?
Either of those two options would include the necessity of non-tendering/trading Mountcastle, which needs to be done.
They will sign/trade for a cf.
Really useful lefty killer bat when healthy so he really should be dh /1b only or minimal OF innings to keep him healthy enough to stay in the lineup. Thing is, Orioles are a team that needs 2 heavy inning OFers, not so much a DH/1b.
Mountcastle is now overpriced so, assuming he is nontendered or traded for scraps, leaves Basallo Mayo Rutschman for 3 spots. A capable outfielder who hits lhp is a fit not O’Neill. And for the other role, 13$mm is too much when a healthy lefty killer platoon bad OF/dh/ph gets paid more like $5mm ala Hays (now a neg OFer), Andujar, Grichuk. But plenty of other teams need rh power, have openings, and can make better use of him.
So question is will ME, w plenty of $ to play with, admit his mistake and pay down enough to trade TON or will he just wish for unlikely things and refuse, thereby misconstructing his roster.
And btw, Hays would be a nice OF4, has really killed lhp the last 2 years and can still play LF, tho not like he useta.
No, no. Hays as a retread is such a bad idea. I can’t even believe people are giving that air. First of all, Hays was on the IL what, four times last year? And second of all, he left Baltimore in a cloud. He was bad for the clubhouse. Plus he’s a bigot. So, Hays can go waste someone else’s roster spot. O’Neill is better than he is.
Hays is a fine player but he definitely can’t play any CF and comes with his own injury risk. I don’t think he fits as well with O’Neill on the club. Elias dealt him in a postseason race and didn’t draft him either so I’d be highly surprised to see him bring him back.
I agree that bringing Hays back is a bad idea. But what is the basis for your comments about “he left Baltimore in a cloud “, “He was bad for the clubhouse “, and “He’s a bigot “? I’ve never heard any of those things about him.
He was apparently unhappy about losing playing time to rookies and was vocal about it. Also he and his wife posted some flagrantly anti-LGBTQ stuff on Twitter.
Kinda getting too personal there, WB.
They will sign a platoon 4th OF that hits lefties. Thats him; the guy hit 950 ops vs lefties the last 2 years and is a serviceable 4th on d. I hear he’s bigoted against trolls who make things up, tho. He claims they have some sort of issue that they can relieve by throwing out ridiculous criticism about everyone. Lighten up
Saj – dumb comment. Literally devoid of value.
Yeah, there itis
Frequently hurt, can basically only hit one side of a platoon, prone to lengthy slumps. Don’t need Hays again.
Mateo was not really a utility or bench piece except over parts of 2024. This year he was hurt for the vast majority of the season. In 2022 and 2023 he was an every day player. At shortstop. A starting shortstop for more than half of his time with the O’s. Pretty notable thing to highlight, I’d say. He’s not that now, but he was that before Holliday came up. He had 149 starts at SS in 2022 and 110 there in 2023. Remember when he won a Fielding Bible Award? I do. That wasn’t done as a bench piece.
Why is it so hard for MLBTR writers to get even the basics of Orioles player use and history correct?
He was mostly a bench piece for the second half of 2023 as well.
He started 110 games at Shortstop in 2023. I said it in my post. What bench piece starts 110 games in the same position?
@wade
Jesus your BS continues. He started 95 games at SS. He played 110 because he’d often come in on defense. He only took 100 ABs after the all star break. So you are completely incorrect again.
Oh, my bad. Started 95 games at SS is still not a bench role, and still more than half the season. What bench piece starts 95 games in the same position on a first place club? Again with your BS.
Mateo has 102 PA in 40 games after the 2023 ASB, so he was mainly late innings, defense replacement. Gunnar was still getting his feet wet. They also put Mateo in a few starts and DH’d Gunnar that year IIRC.
Mateo’s hitting was still just 84 OPS+ in his best year, 2022, so never more than replacement value. His defense was excellent, as was Urias’ playing 3B next to him. But after breaking up that duo Mateo’s D steadily declined while Urias has put up decent to great numbers so I wonder if he carried Mateo that season.
Mateo was average in 2024 and atrocious in the field this year.
I think in late 2023 I looked closely and said he was even with or slight upgrade as UIF for 12-14 teams. Certainly now he carries much, much less value. Not worth the option, or the $3.4M in 2025.
Someone may sign him as a UIF, like the Rockies or Chi Sox who have no aspirations, and he won’t hit there either.
Yeah, I know he ceded playing time to Gunnar. But, he was also instrumental in that 2023 club and was not a UIF or bench player for the majority of that year.
He was “mostly a bench player in the second half” is the comment you said was not true. He was a bench player going into the postseason.
Using him as a DH will leave him with the extra energy he needs for his true passion…gains in the gym…rather than building a flexible/durable body for, you know, playing baseball.
Step away from the squat rack, Tyler 🙄😬🤷♂️
All that juice O’Neill is on is finally catching up