The Orioles outfielder hasn’t done much to excite fans since Opening Day.
Hey, remember Tyler O’Neill? Guy who’s really fond of hitting home runs on Opening Day? The only player Mike Elias has ever given a free agent contract that guarantees multiple years to the player? That Tyler O’Neill? Yeah, it’s understandable if you forgot about him, since he last played a game for the Orioles on May 15, but here on the 4th of July, he is back. The Orioles activated O’Neill from the injured list ahead of the day’s game against the Braves.
The Orioles got the corresponding move out of the way yesterday, optioning outfielder Dylan Carlson back to Triple-A Norfolk.
Up to this point, O’Neill has only gotten into 24 games for the Orioles. They have been poor ones overall, with a batting line of .188/.280/.325. He’s had two separate injured list stints, one for a neck impingement and another for shoulder inflammation. The second one has had him on the shelf for more than a month and a half. It is not looking much like O’Neill will choose to avail himself of the ability to opt out of his three-year contract after this season.
If the Orioles are lucky, the 30-year-old O’Neill might be able to follow the path that Gary Sánchez has been following this season. Sánchez also hit quite poorly before going on the injured list, and since returning has been batting much better, raising his season OPS to .763. That’s a situation where a story that Sánchez wasn’t fully healthy and returned from the IL at full strength and better able to demonstrate his quality is believable.
Can O’Neill do the same? The Orioles are still in desperate need of some better hitting against left-handed pitchers, which was supposed to be part of O’Neill’s appeal. He hasn’t been hitting lefties or anybody else up to this point. It may be frustrating if O’Neill’s return starts to bite into the playing time of Ramón Laureano, who has been performing at a level that Elias was probably hoping O’Neill would be doing when he gave the guy a nearly $50 million contract over the next three seasons.
Carlson, 26, heads back to Norfolk to cool his heels until somebody gets hurt again. He’s batted .234/.271/.378 over 41 games so far this season. That’s better than O’Neill had been doing but not as good as O’Neill should be doing.