A closer look at the Orioles at the 54-game mark

Things have not gone perfectly for the Baltimore Orioles in the 2024 season. I just got an in person look in St. Louis at the Orioles being swept three straight amid all the rain delays and they looked bad in doing so. 

But in looking at this team this year, that series was an outlier.

Mostly they play well and win a lot. As of Thursday morning, they are 35-19 (.648) and on a pace to win 105 games at a point 33.3 percent into the season. That would be four more wins than last year.

As of Thursday morning, they have the second-best record in their division, the third-best in their league and the fourth-best of 30 teams in the majors.

Let’s look at the offense: The Orioles are scoring 5.04 runs per game to rank second in the AL and third-best in MLB. So one-third into the long season they rank third. This is pretty good no matter how you slice it. Sure, there will be poor nights and even poor series, like scoring eight runs in three games versus the Cardinals. But it won’t last too long.

This is a good hitting team.

They are tied for first in the majors in slugging, are second in home runs and fifth in team OPS.

Guess what and stop me if you have heard this before: They don’t score great in on-base percentage, ranking tied for 10^th in the AL.

But there are somewhat hidden areas they do well in that may help that. They rank fifth in the AL in team OPS when batting with runners in scoring position at .791. In batting from the seventh inning on, Baltimore batters rank first in the majors in OPS (.768) and first in homers (27). They can be great late.

In something from Statcast called “runner runs” a metric that seems to target running the bases well and taking extra bases, they are tied for second in the majors. The eye test tells us that the Orioles run hard on the bases and often push the envelope and do indeed take extra bases.

Pitching: Even with a bullpen that has had its share of ups and downs, the club ERA of 3.33 ranks third in the AL and fifth in the majors. That is a winning number.

Orioles starting pitchers, even during a year when several have made their way to the injured list, rank second in the AL and third in the majors with an ERA of 3.03.

In the last five games, the Baltimore rotation ERA is 1.24. Since May 13 over 15 games, the rotation ERA is 2.14 with seven quality starts.

The O’s bullpen ERA of 3.81 ranks eighth in the league and 15^th in the majors. There are reasons to have some concerns here for the long haul of the season and how this unit shapes up could be critical when October arrives. Will mid-year deals target the ‘pen?

A take from some in Birdland that manager Brandon Hyde overuses his ‘pen is not backed by facts and evidence. There are nine AL teams with more bullpen innings than Baltimore and there are 20 in the majors with more.

The defense and fielding: This part of the game can be challenging to quantify with a plethora of defensive metrics that can be hard to understand and to decide which one or ones are truly meaningful.

In the stat DRS (Defensive Runs Saved) the Orioles rank seventh-best in the AL and eighth in the majors. So they are in the top 26 percent in the sport, but the eye test could lead one to see it as even better than that. In FanGraphs’ team defensive rating, they rate fifth-best in MLB.

A 105-win pace: So yes, Cedric Mullins and Austin Hays have mostly struggled. Yes, starting pitchers got hurt. Yes, the bullpen had some rough nights. Yes, the offense doesn’t walk much and had some rough nights too.

But the Orioles are the only AL East team that is over .500 in division-only games at 9-3. The Yankees are 8-8 for instance.

The Orioles crank out series wins and are 12-4-2 this season in series play.

They have a clubhouse featuring wonderful team chemistry and a respected coaching staff and skipper. They have quality help waiting in the wings at Triple-A and more coming through the pipeline at lower levels. They have a new owner creating excitement along with a passionate fanbase. They have room to grow their payroll.

We can find things to question and be concerned about and that is fair to do. But so can every other team.

At this point of the year and it’s no longer a small sample, one thing we can’t question is this team’s ability to win.