Is the O's staff making progress with putaway pitches?

When interviewing Orioles right-hander Kevin Gausman on Friday night at Single-A Frederick, he made an interesting comment about the 2015 O's pitching staff.

When asked about his outing that night, where he recorded eight strikeouts over 3 1/3 innings, as part of his answer, he talked about last year's pitching staff.

"I threw pitches out of the zone when I wanted to and I was happy about that," he said. "I think last season as a whole, we gave up way too many two-strike hits. That has been a focus of ours. When we get a guy two strikes, not to give him anything that he can do anything with. That is a good sign going forward."

In checking the stats, Gausman was right. Last year, O's pitchers gave up a batting average against of .208 on an 0-2 count. While that sounds like a low average, it ranked only 13th best in the American League. Boston and Kansas City led the AL pitching staffs last season with a .141 average against when pitching with an 0-2 count. O's pitchers gave up nine homers in 2015 on an 0-2 count. Only four teams in the league gave up more.

Looking for improvement in this specific area, the Orioles have gotten it through 11 games. They lead the AL so far with an .031 average against this year, allowing just one hit so far in 0-2 counts. Toronto is next at .063 through Sunday's games, followed by Seattle at .091 and Kansas City at .094. Oakland ranks last at .239.

As a pitching coach told me once, "When you get to 0-2, you've already done the heavy lifting. So finish the deal."

At one time in baseball, an 0-2 count was called a "waste pitch." Meaning you threw the ball a foot outside and hoped the hitter would chase. Now hitters recognize pitches so well that the trick is to throw a pitch that appears it could be a strike to get them to chase one that actually is not a strike. Hitters make plenty of outs every night on pitches outside the strike zone. So you don't want to waste that pitch at all and make it easy for them to just take it, but rather execute a pitch to get weak contact or a strikeout. You've already done the heavy lifting, as the coach said.

So far, the Orioles have done well in this area. The hard part is getting to the 0-2 count, but when there, you want to finish the job.

Slow start for this duo: The Orioles' top two 2015 draft picks are off to slow starts at the plate with Single-A Delmarva. The Orioles selected Florida State outfielder DJ Stewart 25th overall last June and high school shortstop Ryan Mountcastle 36th overall in that draft.

Stewart came up with his first multi-hit game in the South Atlantic League last night, going 2-for-4 with a pair of singles and two RBIs as Delmarva lost 5-4 in 10 innings to Greensboro. Going into last night's game, Stewart was batting just .121 with 11 strikeouts over 33 at-bats. He is 0-for-17 this year against left-handed pitching and 6-for-20 (.300) against right-handers.

The 19-year-old Mountcastle is batting .132 over 10 games. He homered on opening night - a big blast to center field - but is now 0-for-16 his last four games. During a radio interview on 105.7 The Fan on Sunday, I asked O's director of player development Brian Graham about Stewart and Mountcastle so far.

"You know what, they are both doing fine," Graham said. "Their batting averages are not what they would like them to be or we would like them to be. But their at-bats are good. I saw them for a couple of days in Hagerstown.

"They had some good at-bats. If you get 30 hits in your first 100 at-bats, you're hitting .300, so I'd like to look up at 100 at-bats instead of 30 at-bats. Both are swinging the bat fine, but the average doesn't reflect that. I'm not worried at this point. You have to learn mental toughness when you are hitting a buck-40. But these kids have great makeup and they're going to get it done."

Right-hander Lucas Long threw seven scoreless innings for Delmarva Monday night. The O's 24th-round pick in 2014 has pitched 18 innings over three starts, allowing just 10 hits and one run with one walk and 17 strikeouts.

A move for Mancini?: The Orioles' 2015 minor league Player of the Year, first baseman Trey Mancini, has gotten off to a strong start at Double-A Bowie.

In 11 games, he is batting .308 with five homers, 10 RBIs, a .438 on-base percentage, a .769 slugging percentage and an OPS of 1.207. On Friday and Saturday at Akron, Mancini went 5-for-10 with three doubles and a homer.

But Mancini has returned to Bowie this year after playing 84 games there last year. I asked Graham if a promotion to Triple-A could come shortly for Mancini?

"He's a guy that is going to be at the next level soon," Graham said. "Trey has gotten off to a great start and at some point, he is going to get to Triple-A. My guess is sooner versus later."

Is it too soon to do that now?

"We just don't know that answer yet. You know Dan (Duquette) is a big part of that equation and Buck (Showalter). When the answer comes, Trey will be ready.

"Probably the best thing that happened was Trey Mancini accepted the challenge. He said, 'Fine, I'm here and I'm going to play good and get myself to the next level.' You have to give him a lot of credit."

Bowie's Garabez Rosa went 3-for-4 for the Baysox in a 5-1 win last night at Erie. Since starting the year 1-for-12, Rosa has a six-game hitting streak. During that stretch of six games, he is 13-for-25 with three doubles, two homers and 11 RBIs. He is batting .378 in nine games. Bowie has scored 28 runs during a three-game winning streak.

Meanwhile, the Orioles begin today leading the AL East at 8-3 by 2 1/2 games over Toronto (7-7) and Boston (6-6). Tonight at Camden Yards, the O's begin a three-game series against the defending division champion Blue Jays.

The AL East versus the AL East so far:
* Orioles - 4-1
* Blue Jays - 7-7
* Red Sox - 5-5
* Rays - 2-4
* Yankees - 1-2