Ten years later it's the O's and Royals again in the postseason

It hasn’t been so long that Orioles fans won’t remember. The 2014 Kansas City Royals swept the Orioles four games to none in the AL Championship Series.

It sounds crazy to say, but it was a close series.

The Orioles lost by two, two, one and one run. Each game went down to the last pitch. The Royals didn’t lose a game, but barely won each of them.

This is no rematch now, but it is the Orioles and Royals in the American League Wild Card series beginning Tuesday.

This time it’s a best-of-three series, with all games in Baltimore and the winner advancing to face the AL top seed New York Yankees.

Maybe, in the end, it set up well for the Orioles.

They avoid the hot Tigers and now face a team they won two series against in April. Should they advance they went 8-5 versus the Yankees and 4-2 at Yankee Stadium.

The O’s went 4-2 versus K.C. in April, winning two of three in Baltimore in the second series of the season. They won two games via walk-off wins on Jordan Westburg’s two-run homer on an 0-2 pitch in the series opener and on James McCann’s two-out, two-run single for a 4-3 win to take that series finale. They lost the series opener April 19 at Kauffman Stadium but won the next two by 9-7 and 5-0 scores.

In the six games, they outscored the Royals 29-27 pitching to an ERA of 4.58. They hit five homers in the six games, batting .252 with a .721 OPS.

In facing Kansas City, they avoid a Detroit team that went 31-13 the last 44 games but lost its last two games versus the 121-loss Chicago White Sox. No, you can’t explain ball.

The Royals won on the regular season’s final day, but they lost nine of their past 13 games and were 11-18 in the last 29 games.

Kansas City’s offense fell off late in the year. They scored just 20 runs their last 11 games, batting .173 with a .477 OPS. They scored just 3.0 runs per game in those last 29.

The Orioles offense perked up late when they got some injured players back. Baltimore scored 56 runs the last 10 games (5.6 per game), scoring five or more seven times. The club scored 22 runs in sweeping the Twins. Over those last 10 the Orioles batted .284/.335/.462/.797.

They have some momentum heading into the playoffs. The offense was scuffling heading into the 2023 postseason.

Gunnar’s success: With a final homer tally of 37 this year, Gunnar Henderson set a record for hitting the most ever by an O’s shortstop. He fell three homers short of becoming the fourth shortstop in MLB history to get to 40. Alex Rodriguez did that six times, Ernie Banks four times and Rico Petrocelli one time.

The O’s record was 34 set by Cal Ripken Jr. (1991) and Miguel Tejada (2004).

Henderson began Sunday ranked tied for third in the AL and for fourth in MLB with 8.1 fWAR. That is the best mark by an Oriole since Ripken, Jr. set the club record with 10.6 in 1991; four O's (six occurrences) have finished a season with an 8.0 fWAR, along with Ripken, Jr. (3x; 10.6, 1991; 9.8, 1984, & 8.5, 1983), Brooks Robinson (8.1, 1964), F. Robinson (8.2, 1966), and Jim Gentile (8.0, 1961).

One reason Gunnar hit so many homers in 2024 is his ability to drive various pitches. Per Stats Perform, entering Sunday, his slugging percentage was .466 off fastballs and he hit 11 homers off that pitch. But he slugged .659 off breaking pitches with 17 homers and .514 against offspeed pitches with nine home runs.

He's not going to win the AL MVP, but Gunnar is going to be in the top five or 10 in the voting very likely. 

Worth noting: The Orioles have won 192 games the last two years. Only the Los Angeles Dodgers have won more. A nice achievement for an organization that has won 90 or more in back-to-back years for the first time since 1982-1983. Now they are headed to the postseason in back-to-back years for the first time since 1996-1997.

MLB’s winningest clubs since 2023:

198 – Los Angeles Dodgers

192 – Baltimore, Atlanta

185 – Philadelphia, Milwaukee.

Not pictured: The Yankees, Red Sox, Rays and Jays.

Orioles' Game 1 starter Corbin Burnes faced Kansas City twice this season, going 1-0 with a 3.97 ERA. In five career games, he is 3-0 with a 2.15 ERA and .517 OPS against.

In eight career postseason games with two starts, Burnes has a 2.84 playoff ERA and a 3.60 ERA in his two postseason starts.