Brandon Hyde's take on why the O's issue so few intentional walks

If it seems like the Orioles don’t issue many intentional walks, they don’t and the stats back that up.

Heading into the Tampa Bay series, the O’s pitchers have issued just seven intentional walks this season. Only three American League teams issued less, five by New York, four by Cleveland and two by Houston. Only six major league clubs have issued less than the O’s in 2024.

Oakland pitchers lead the AL with 26 intentional walks with Boston next at 22, Toronto 21 and Texas 20.

The O’s philosophy seems to be pitch the big boppers carefully and work the edges of and off the plate. And if you walk him you walk him.

During the Toronto series, I asked manager Brandon Hyde about a specific instance during Wednesday’s game with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. but also in general how the club handles such situations when a big hitter is up.

“You know putting more runners on base sometimes isn’t always the best,” said Hyde. “And one of the things we are not good at and something we can always improve on is being able to navigate around a hitter or being able to get a hitter in chase mode from the start. That takes a little bit of time and development honestly, so you are not just having to intentionally walk somebody."

The O's grudgingly walk batters on purpose and seem to prefer to get them to chase a pitch or hit the pitcher's pitch in tough spots. 

“You see us, we don’t get intentionally walked a lot. But there are instances where we get pitched, they're trying to strike us out from the first pitch and if they walk us, they walk us.," said Hyde. 

On Wednesday night against Toronto, with the Orioles leading 4-3 as Jackson Holliday had homered in the top of the seventh, right-hander Yennier Cano pitched the last of the seventh. With two outs and a man on second, Guerrero came up. A base was open but the O’s pitched to Vladdy. He lined one deep to right and the O’s kept the lead there only because right fielder Anthony Santander made a great catch leaping by the right-field wall.

“In that situation with Cano, you know you trust Cano at that point to make edge pitches and off,” said Hyde. “He kind of left one middle in that Vladdy hit. There was too much of the plate in that situation. Alejandro Kirk has been very dangerous that is hitting behind him also, so putting another runner on for Kirk, you have to kind of navigate all those things.

“But there are definitely certain situations in the game where we can’t have this guy beat us in this spot and it’s an area we can always improve.”

Guerrero hit Cano’s first pitch, which if the goal was to pitch on the edge of the plate or just off it, he didn’t get that done. The pitch found too much plate.

Some wonder why not just walk Vladdy and don't risk that pitch going over the plate to him as the pitcher might miss his spot. After he was not only one of the majors' hottest hitters the last few weeks, but this year against the Orioles he has hit .467/.564/.956/1.519 with five doubles, a triple, five homers and 14 RBIs.

My take - when a player has kicked your butt with those stats, probably better to just walk him and know he can't do too much damage, rather than try to pitch him carefully.

But yeah, in many of those spots, the O’s pitchers are directed to work the corners and edges as best they can.

Hyde acknowledged that plan doesn’t always work out.

“Yeah and then sometimes the ball is right in the middle of the plate. But we see that against us too,” he said.

The O’s don’t like to issue many intentional walks and with seven all year over 117 games that's an average of one every 17 games.

O’s batters by the way have only been walked intentionally 11 times this year. That is right in the middle of the pack in the AL, ranking seventh-most.

Cleveland batters lead the AL drawing 24 intentional walks with Boston at 22 and Texas 18. The Los Angeles Angels have gotten just three intentional walks this year, the fewest in the majors. The St. Louis Cardinals and Cincinnati Reds have the next fewest with five each.   

About last night: Right-hander Zach Eflin threw another good one for the Orioles last night, his best so far. He pitched seven scoreless on four hits as the Orioles beat Tampa Bay 4-1 in the opener of the weekend series.

With the Yankees getting rained out, the Orioles (69-48) took sole possession of first in the AL East by a 1/2 game over New York. They are now 25-12 in division games.

The Orioles are 5-0 this year at the Trop and have allowed just eight runs in those wins. They have given up three, zero, two, two and one run in five trips to the Trop in 2024. They've won seven in a row on the road versus the Rays. They are 7-1 this season against Tampa Bay and 15-5 in the last 20 games between these clubs.

Eflin is 3-0 with an ERA of 2.33 in three starts as an Oriole with two walks and 17 strikeouts over 19 1/3 innings.

Four times this year the O's have seen a starter go seven innings exactly and allow zero runs. Cole Irvin did it April 27 versus Oakland, John Means May 4 at Cincinnati, Kyle Bradish May 26 at the Chicago White Sox and Eflin on Friday against his former team.