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Kade Strowd

Orioles Place Tyler O’Neill On 10-Day IL, Designate Kyle Gibson

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The Orioles have placed outfielder Tyler O’Neill on the 10-day injured list due to a left shoulder impingement, and designated right-hander Kyle Gibson for assignment.  Outfielder Dylan Carlson and right-hander Kade Strowd were called up from Triple-A in the corresponding roster moves.

After signing a three-year, $49.5MM free agent deal this past winter, the early days of O’Neill’s tenure in Baltimore have been marked by injuries and a subpar performance at the plate.  This is already his second IL trip, as he previously missed a couple of weeks due to neck soreness in late April and early May.  It is fair to wonder if these health issues have led to O’Neill’s modest .188/.280/.325 slash line and two home runs over 93 plate appearances, as O’Neill just hasn’t looked like himself this year.

Being hampered by injuries has been a frequent subplot of O’Neill’s eight-year MLB career, as the outfielder has only twice topped the 100-game mark in a season.  One of those comparatively healthier seasons came with the Red Sox in 2024, as O’Neill made 473 PA over 113 games and hit .241/.336/.511 with 31 home runs.  O’Neill hit the IL on three separate occasions but with a minimal amount of missed time, which allowed O’Neill plenty of opportunity to mash at Fenway Park.

The O’s were impressed enough to bring O’Neill aboard in what was the most expensive signing of Baltimore’s offseason, yet like so many other moves in what is becoming a Murphy’s Law year for the Orioles, O’Neill has yet to deliver much at the plate.  Given how much criticism was directed at the front office and at ownership for not spending over the winter, the struggles of one of the players who did receive a healthy contract has only added to the discord of the Orioles’ 15-29 start.

Gibson was another offseason signing, though he joined the O’s just a week before Opening Day on a one-year, $5.25MM contract.  The Cardinals declined their $12MM club option on Gibson’s services for the 2025 season, sending the veteran starter into the open market for what ended up being an extended stay.  Since he didn’t have a proper Spring Training, Gibson agreed to begin the season in the minors so he could ramp up, but it seems like the right-hander is still showing plenty of rust.

Called up to the Orioles’ roster in late April, Gibson has been tagged for a 16.78 ERA over four starts and 12 1/3 innings.  The ugly numbers include six runs allowed in just two-thirds of an inning in yesterday’s start, which ended up as a 10-6 Orioles loss to the Nationals.

Gibson was blunt about his lack of performance when speaking with MASNsports.com’s Roch Kubatko and other media yesterday, saying “four times taking the mound feeling like you haven’t given the team a chance to win each time is a pretty big gut punch.  Feeling like you’re part of getting a manager fired is a gut punch.  Just not going out there and being able to compete and give the team a chance to win every five days is frustrating. So yeah, I don’t know if any of you guys have ever felt the feeling of essentially letting down your co-workers, but it’s a gut punch.”

The DFA doesn’t necessarily mean that Gibson’s time in Baltimore is over.  Since there is no chance another team will claim the right-hander (and assume the rest of his salary) off waivers, Gibson could accept an outright assignment to Triple-A to give himself more time to get on track.  Gibson also has more than enough MLB service time to decline an outright assignment, which would allow him to retain his salary and re-enter free agency again.

Strowd is now back with the Orioles for the second time within the last month, though the right-hander has yet to officially make his Major League debut with an in-game appearance.  A 12th-round pick for Baltimore in the 2019 draft, Strowd’s minor league numbers aren’t great, as he has only a 6.99 ERA over 56 2/3 career frames at the Triple-A level.  That performance does come with a 31.02% strikeout rate and grounder rates that frequently top the 50% mark, but also a 12.41% walk rate.

Despite the rough bottom-line results, the Orioles were intrigued enough by Strowd’s ability to miss bats to add him to the 40-man roster last November in advance of the Rule 5 Draft.  This latest call-up should at least allow the righty to get a big league appearance on his resume, and given Baltimore’s pitching needs, there’s plenty of opportunity for Strowd to stick if he pitches decently well during however long he remains on the roster.

Orioles Recall Kyle Gibson For Season Debut

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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 Promote Kade Strowd For Major League Debut

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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 Select Kade Strowd, Brandon Young

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The Orioles announced that they have selected right-handers Kade Strowd and Brandon Young to their 40-man roster, protecting them being available in next month’s Rule 5 draft. The 40-man roster now has 39 players on it.

Strowd, 27, was a 12th-round pick of the Orioles in 2019. He has posted some intriguing numbers in the minors in terms of strikeouts and grounders, but also with a notable amount of walks. Over the past two years, he has thrown 106 2/3 innings with a 5.32 earned run average. His 12.3% walk rate in that time is certainly high but he’s also struck out 28.4% of batters faced while getting grounders on more than half of the balls in play he’s allowed.

Young, 26, signed with the O’s as an undrafted free agent in 2020. He missed decent chunks of both 2022 and 2023 due to elbow surgery but seemed to get back on track this year. He tossed 111 innings over 27 appearances between Double-A and Triple-A with a combined 3.57 ERA. He struck out 28.5% of batters faced while giving out walks just 8% of the time.

Both players have reached Triple-A and will give the O’s some immediate depth in 2025, Strowd in the bullpen and Young in the rotation. The starting staff just lost Corbin Burnes to free agency while Kyle Bradish and Tyler Wells are going to start the season on the injured list after undergoing surgeries this year. The club will presumably be making some moves to alter their staff in the coming months, but they didn’t want these two to be plucked away by another club in the Rule 5, so they get roster spots today.

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