Blame the front office for failing to sign an ace, but for the lack of hitting?
Despite being predicted to be in the running for the AL East title entering the season, the Orioles are sitting in the cellar, 15-27, 9.5 games out of first place. Not only that, but a sad milestone has also been reached: for the first time since GM Mike Elias and manager Brandon Hyde took over in winter 2018, the fanbase is brimming over with discontent.
There’s a plausible case to be made that both men are at fault for the Orioles’ terrible start. The players look dazed and demoralized on the field, and every cost-saving offseason move—Charlie Morton for Corbin Burnes; Gary Sanchez for James McCann; Tyler O’Neill for Anthony Santander; Andrew Kittredge for Danny Coulombe (?)—now seems like a clear downgrade from last year. Morale troubles? Talk to Hyde, I presume. Roster construction? That’s on Elias. Unfortunately, we’re seeing signs of both.
That being said, even if we can blame the O’s brain trust for trying to build a starting rotation out of string and a prayer, they were at least allowed to count on the team maintaining its level of offensive output, right? After all, other than losing Santander and a pair of hitting coaches (Ryan Fuller and Matt Borgschulte) the Orioles’ on-field cast looks mostly the same.
Well, 41 games into the season, that’s not how things are shaping up. While the 2024 Birds had the second-best offense in the American League behind only New York, this season, only three AL teams are hitting worse: the Royals, the Angels and the White Sox. (What a list.) In fact, we’re seeing an alarming “then and now” problem on multiple dimensions.
The Orioles are scoring 3.80 runs per game, one full run less than they did in ’24. Over the last forty years, the Orioles have failed to crack 4.00 runs a game three times, in 1988, 2010 and 2018, all pretty poor seasons.
They’re also not-getting on base at historic rates. Only Colorado and the Angels are striking out more often than the Orioles, who have an unsightly 24.1% strikeout rate. Moreover, this team is putting up 7.41 hits per game. To find an Orioles team that averaged less than 7.41 hits per game, you have to go all the way back to 1968. Batting average? Same deal: the O’s current .227 mark would be the third-lowest in modern Orioles history (ahead of only 1968 and 1910). To find a lower OPS, you have to go back to the “Why Not?” year of 1988.
Most of the new Orioles are not hitting. Ramón Laureano is a positive-WAR player because of his defense and his power, but a .197 average is not sustainable. That’s what Tyler O’Neill is hitting, too, and he’s already missed time with injuries, a reputation that proceeded him. Catcher Gary Sanchez has a .100 average and a hard-to-believe -9 OPS+ and is on the shelf right now with an inflamed wrist. Backup-backup catcher Maverick Handley is hitting .083, and from just watching him flail at the plate this season, you’d never know that prospect Coby Mayo is a top bat: he’s hitting .083, too.
The suckitude appears to have wafted further than the new recruits. Two returning players, Jorge Mateo and Heston Kjerstad, are troublingly duking it out right now for least valuable Oriole, with both carrying an inauspicious -0.6 bWAR. Mateo is not even playing good defense right now, according to BRef, which projects him to lose his team 38 runs this season at this rate.
Kjerstad’s slow start is especially worrying because the Orioles are (finally) giving him a lot of at-bats to prove his worth. He’s seventh in AB’s currently, but is hitting just .212/.262/.364/.625. The power is there—he’s fourth on the team in RBIs and fifth in home runs, with four—but the “plus bat control” that he showed in college isn’t flashing right now.
There are a few core pieces who are living up to their billing. Consider this in terms of OPS+, where 100 is an average MLB hitters, >100 is good, <100 is bad, a negative number is terrible. Returning stars with a plus-100 OPS+ to date include: Gunnar Henderson (132 OPS+), Cedric Mullins (125 OPS+), Ryan O’Hearn (156), Jackson Holliday (103) and Ramón Urías (114).
The Birds will still need a lot more from their core of homegrown talent. Colton Cowser and Jordan Westburg are missing time due to injury, and their bats will be ecstatically welcomed back to the lineup. Jackson Holliday is starting to figure it out: since mid-April he’s added forty percentage points to his average and his OPS. Ryan Mountcastle is in the black in most stats measuring value, but only barely so, and he’s barely middle of the pack in pure power.
One more player whose offensive struggles have garnered a lot of attention is Adley Rutschman. The switch-hitting catchers’ slashline of .197/.295/.328/.623 is not impressive per se and his WPA (Win Probably Added) is an ugly -0.5, above only Laureano and Kjerstad on this team.
But preaching patience with Adley is still very much the wise thing to do. The switch-hitting catcher’s bat speed has not slowed down this season, and his 41.3% squared-up rate is the highest of his career, clocking in in the 96th percentile in the league. It’s not hard to conclude that if Adley keeps up this quality of contact, good things will follow. (One more piece of good-news data on Rutschman: his pop time is in the top ten percent of all catchers, indicating good health.)
But let me emphasize it again: the 2025 Orioles are scoring the fewest runs per game in fifteen years, and racking up hits at a lower rate than any year since 1968. The only way such data would not be worthy of a four-alarm fire would be if the rest of MLB, too, was suffering at the plate. But this isn’t the case: there is no sustained league-wide offensive downturn.
The Orioles will get a boost when Cowser and Westburg come off the list, and when, hopefully, Adley Rutschman’s hard-hit balls start finding the grass or the seats. But those natural correctives seem like they wouldn’t be enough. The Orioles offense is historically bad right now, and some bigger fixes are needed.