A look at Mike Wright through three starts: Is he showing signs of progress?

When the Orioles drafted Mike Wright in the third round out of East Carolina in 2011, they looked at a few numbers they liked about the right-hander. He was 6-foot-6 and he could throw 96 mph.

You can't teach that. The Orioles could envision Wright advancing to the majors and become a big, strong and durable innings eater who had mid-90s heat.

In 2013, Wright was the Orioles' minor league Pitcher of the Year. In 2015, he made the majors for the first time, throwing a stunning 14 scoreless innings over his first two starts. His first major league strikeout came against Mike Trout. Was this guy for real?

After pitching to an ERA of 1.75 over his last 22 Triple-A starts, there is really nothing left for Wright to do at that level. The Orioles need to find out if he can help them or not moving forward.

After some shaky starts last year after those early outings, Wright has shown some signs of making progress over his past two starts in the last week against Toronto and Kansas City.

In his start last Tuesday night in Baltimore, Wright held Toronto scoreless his last three innings. In his first six innings on Sunday, he gave up two runs to the defending World Series champion Kansas City Royals.

Wright took the mound Tuesday against Toronto with the memory of posting a 9.45 against that team last year. And he allowed three runs in the first three innings. At that point, it looked like Wright could have one of those outings where he allows five or six runs against a good hitting team.

But then Wright settled in and kept Toronto off the board in the fourth, fifth and sixth innings. He got those nine outs on just 43 pitches, allowing just one hit. Holding Toronto at bay after the early struggles allowed the Orioles to comeback. They did but fell a run short that night at 4-3.

Then Sunday at Kansas City, it looked like Wright could be in trouble early on again against the Royals. He bent, but didn't break. Kansas City had two on with one out in the second and got a leadoff double in the third. But the Royals did not score in those early innings.

When it comes to these recent outings, some see a pitcher with just 62 big league innings under his belt that is finally starting to turn a corner. Others see a bottom line record of 1-2 and ERA of 6.23 over his three starts this year and see a pitcher that still needs to do better.

Both are probably true when you get right down to it.

No doubt Wright can do better, but clearly there has been some progress his last two starts. He has shown some, at times, very solid secondary pitches to join his lively fastball. He has pitched out of jams against two good teams. He kept his team in the game in both starts until it unraveled on him and the team a bit in the seventh inning at Kauffman Stadium on Sunday.

When the Orioles had a roster move to make to activate Kevin Gausman yesterday, Wright dodged a bullet and avoided once again riding the Triple-A shuttle. It seems like the Orioles' message is they have liked some of what they've seen in recent outings from Wright and they want to see more. They have been waiting to see him take a step or two forward and maybe he finally has done that.

For an organization criticized for its ability or lack thereof to develop pitchers, right now the Orioles have three home-grown starters in Wright, Tyler Wilson and Kevin Gausman. They would like to finally be able to say they've developed a solid starting pitcher from their farm system that will have long-term success. Can Wright be that guy?

Has he finally shown enough promise and potential to stay in the major league rotation?