Given some of the inconsistencies of their decision-making, it has been fair to consider the 2024 Baltimore Orioles’ “all-in-ness.” (And given some of their inconsistent offensive performances, you’d like for them to consider their “all-inning-ness.”)
Giving up multiple prospects for Corbin Burnes suggested a full “all-in” nature, but it wasn’t followed up by another pitching acquisition despite the uncertainty surrounding Kyle Bradish and John Means (where developments have been positive, to be fair) or a bullpen acquisition despite parting ways with DL Hall and having to move Tyler Wells back into the rotation.
But the move they made last week certainly signified heightened all-in-eous-ness. No, not that one.
The move that stood out to me was the one where they quietly (or not really at all) announced that Colton Cowser would be an everyday player while Austin Hays would be a platoon player.
To be fair, the move was even more of a no-brainer than the one you were thinking about. Cowser has a 1.445 OPS as I type this, a number so insane I thought it was reserved for players who weren’t on the Orioles’ roster yet. Still, as Cowser got hot against the Red Sox, it wasn’t a sure thing that the Orioles would keep going to him given the significant number of legitimate major league bats they’re attempting to juggle at the moment.
At yet, even against a left-hander (old friend DL Hall), Cowser was in the lineup and continuing to produce against the Brewers this weekend. Because every game matters — particularly considering the red-hot start for the Yankees — the Orioles needed to make sure that their most productive bat at the moment stayed in the lineup. Perhaps that’s on the shallow end of the “all-in-acy” pool, but it matters.
The Orioles would still like to see Hays work his way out of his early-season funk, whether they believe he’ll go back to being a full-time player this season and/or moving forward to future years or even if it’s just to improve his trade value. And while Hays starting against the lefty Hall was a foregone conclusion, he made just one start against a right-hander last week.
Hays will probably work through this and demand playing time again at some point. Probably. But that’s of course not at all a certainty and makes you wonder if the team will stretch it’s “all-in-ocity” to other areas in the coming weeks. The Holliday move seemingly had to happen given really good guy Tony Kemp’s relatively low value to the team. And after picking up his first hit in the series finale against the Brewers, you’d like to believe that the phenom will start to make it relevant that the Orioles snuck him in before the PPI deadline. Or that Cowser will end up landing them that top-35 pick instead.
But what if he doesn’t? We continue to use the term “adjustment period” and reflect on how it took Gunnar Henderson two months to get going last season so we probably should be at least that patient with Holliday. Fair! But the 2023 Orioles, as fun as they seemed, still didn’t harbor true World Series aspirations even on Memorial Day. They could more fairly wait on Henderson without looking through the prism of an expiring contract for an ace.
That’s not to suggest that the Orioles need to put Holliday on “one week’s notice” to get going or anything like that, either. I think they brought Holliday up knowing they’d need to see through the growing pains. But the spotlight is brighter given the expectations of the team.
The same can be said for other players. Anthony Santander is off to a brutal start. He’s also one of the players with a consistent track record on the team, and recent history suggests he’s quite capable of bouncing back from early-season struggles. But with Heston Kjerstad hitting at nearly Colton Cowser levels and nothing more to prove at Triple-A, does there come a time where he has to be forced on to the roster (not for Santander’s roster spot necessarily) and demand cutting into the veteran slugger’s playing time?
It’s easy to say that day isn’t today. But it’s harder to argue for why it shouldn’t be.
And these “all-inny” questions don’t exist in the lineup alone. Cole Irvin’s 2024 performance as a starter looks similar to his 2023 performance as a starter. It’s easy to presume that the team would like to avoid having to make a decision until they’re closer to Means or Bradish being an option. But they waited only three starts before optioning Irvin last year.
If things don’t go well for Irvin in the series opener against the Twins, it will be fair to wonder how much longer the Orioles can go with a rotation they can trust 50 percent of the time (Burnes, Grayson Rodriguez and half of Dean Kremer’s starts). Cade Povich is off to a great start in Norfolk, but the sample size is quite small. Still, these games matter. This team wants to and has a core that is seemingly capable of finding a way to win a World Series.
They’ll prove their ultimate “all-in-ability” more in the lead-up to the July 31 trade deadline. But Cowser alone shows they’re recognizing the significance of each game. It will be fascinating to see how further decisions are made.
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