The birthday boy could still take his offense to a higher gear

Ryan Mountcastle turned 25 on Friday. As he gets ready for his third big league season, let's take a look at a few ways he can take an impressive 117 career OPS+ and maybe even do a little better.

After 140 plate appearances in his 2020 debut season, Mountcastle finished eighth in the American League Rookie of the Year voting and was still rookie-eligible in 2021. And he finished sixth in the voting after last season.

Over 144 games and 586 plate appearances last season, he batted .255/.309/.487/.796 with 23 doubles, a triple, 33 homers and 89 RBIs. He produced an OPS+ of 112. Mountcastle was named the winner of the Major League Baseball Players Association Players Choice Award for Outstanding Rookie. But he was not among the three finalists when they were named for the AL rookie honor.

Mountcastle's 33 home runs led all major league rookies. He is the third rookie in the AL since 1990 to record a season of 33 or more home runs. The Yankees' Aaron Judge did that, with 52 in 2017, as did José Abreu of the Chicago White Sox, with 36 in 2014. Both won the Rookie of the Year award. Mountcastle's 33 home runs are tied for the ninth-most by a rookie in AL history and ranked tied for 14th overall in the AL this season.

On Sept. 16, he hit his 29th homer to break a tie with Cal Ripken Jr. from 1982 for most homers by an O's rookie. He topped Ripken and another Hall of Famer, Eddie Murray, on his way to the top of that list. Mountcastle's 89 RBIs are third-most by an Orioles rookie behind Jim Gentile (98 in 1960) and Ripken (93 in 1982). His 57 extra-base hits are third-most by an O's rookie behind Ripken (65 in 1982) and Murray (58 in 1977).

The kid was keeping pretty good company.

Now perhaps the O's new co-hitting coaches, Ryan Fuller and Matt Borgschulte, can devise ways to help take his offense to an even higher level.

For one, Mountcastle could push to make strides in strikeout and walk rates. His strikeout rate, in the larger sample of at-bats in 2021, went up a bit from the year before. It was 21.4 in 2020 and 27.5 last year. That is not bad for a power hitter, actually, and league average is 23.0. His walk rate dropped a bit, from 7.9 in 2020 to 7.0 last summer when AL average was 8.5.

He's an aggressive hitter but his swing percentage was down a bit last year, from 58.8 to 55.1, so he was a bit less aggressive in 2021. As he continues to learn and mature as a hitter, Mountcastle will get even better at knowing how pitchers are trying to get him out, and that could help in many stat categories, especially plate discipline numbers.

But the guy was pretty good at attacking hittable first-pitch offerings in '21. When putting that first pitch in play he batted .444/.438/.944/1.383 with 10 homers and 26 RBIs. That is strong stuff.

In fact, he ranked third in the American League and fourth in MLB in first-pitch OPS. And he was second in the majors in slugging, behind only Fernando Tatis Jr. of San Diego. His 10 first-pitch homers tied for fourth in MLB.

That is major first-pitch damage, and my take here is always that if a pitch is a meatball, go get it. Oftentimes the first pitch could be the most hittable in the sequence. Working the count is a nice goal, but attacking early in the count was usually a plus for Mountcastle last season.

Mountcastle's groundball rate was well below average last year, and his flyball rate well above, which is probably where he should be as a power hitter that can do damage by driving the ball in the air. His groundball rate was 35.5 (MLB average was 42.7) and his flyball rate was 33.9 (MLB average was 24.3).

Mountcastle's home and road splits in 2021 were heavily favored to his home park, and his road numbers are another area he could improve next season. He produced an OPS of .871 and hit 22 of his 33 homers at Camden Yards, batting .274/.316/.555. He had a .713 OPS in road games, batting .233/.302/.411. His OPS+ was 130 at home, 30 percent better than league average, and 99 on the road.

In the much smaller sample of his 2020 season, Mountcastle's OPS was .902 on the road and .848 at home. Perhaps his 2021 numbers will even out more in the coming season, when it will likely be more difficult for him to homer at home after the enlargement of left and left center field at Oriole Park.

It might surprise some to learn that while Mountcastle fared pretty well versus breaking balls in 2021, it was off-speed pitches, such as changeups, that gave him more trouble. He slugged .454 versus breaking balls but just .240 with a .160 batting average against off-speed pitches. He produced lower exit velocities against those pitches with a higher whiff rate on off-speed than on breaking pitches, 41.4 to 38.5.

But the bottom line on this Friday birthday boy is that he put together a strong season in 2021 after a very slow start in which he produced one homer with a .515 OPS in April. No doubt he can still make improvements and tweaks to his game in the batter's box.

If players hit some of their peak years around 27 or 28, the best is yet to come for Mountcastle.

They are No. 1: The Orioles achieved another top farm system ranking when they came out No. 1 in the latest list, released yesterday by ESPN. Click here for the latest ratings (subscription may be required).

The Orioles were recently No. 4 in the most recent organizational rankings by Baseball America, and No. 10 in ratings from The Athletic. They were No. 1 in the most updated we've seen from MLBPipeline.com, released in August.

On Tuesday the ESPN top 100 prospects list came out and featured six Orioles. Only Miami, with seven players in the top 100, had more. ESPN ranked Adley Rutschman No. 1, Grayson Rodriguez No. 8, Colton Cowser No. 74, DL Hall No. 94, Gunnar Henderson No. 96 and Coby Mayo No. 98.

There was another birthday boy from yesterday. Minor league infielder Jordan Westburg turned 23.

Happy birthday, @jordan_cw21! pic.twitter.com/MBIWZAQoT2

-- Orioles Player Development (@OsPlayerDev) February 19, 2022