When the Mike Elias regime began in late 2018, who were Orioles used to managing their baseball team? Easy, layup answer: Buck Showalter. So, forgetting for a moment how bad things were in Showalter’s last year and a half, when the Elias regime tore down and started the club’s first-ever full-blown rebuild, who did Orioles fans most blame when the losses started mounting? Another easy layup: Brandon Hyde.
I wasn’t one of those blaming Elias or Hyde when the losses started piling up in 2019, 2020 and 2021. The reality was winning games at the major league level was not a priority at any time other than during the games themselves.
How were the Orioles going to match up with the likes of Hanser Alberto, Chris Davis, Rio Ruiz, Pedro Severino, Chance Sisco and Dwight Smith Jr.? On the mound, Thomas Eshelman, Wade LeBlanc, Tommy Milone, Dan Straily and Asher Wojciechowski made an awful lot of non-competitive starts for those teams.
But I never questioned Hyde’s managerial skills when he had so few quality players on his lineup card.
I have been sold on Hyde’s abilities for a while now. Showalter built a culture out of nowhere when he took over the Orioles in late 2010. Well, even though he had no major league managerial bona fides, Hyde has built a remarkable culture. Frankly, it is the envy of most teams in baseball.
All that said, there is one area of a manager’s skill set that Hyde has yet to master — the handling of a bullpen.
Hyde wasn’t blessed with a lockdown closer when he took over, nor was one was deemed necessary in the early days of the Elias rebuild. That was until failed starter Jorge López turned in the best half of his major league career as the Orioles’ closer in 2022. Elias, knowing how volatile relievers are, sold high to the contending Twins. The GM emerged with throw-in reliever Yennier Cano and major starting pitching prospect Cade Povich.
Hyde’s reliance on López was kind of a no-brainer in 2022. After the Orioles traded Lopez, they quickly passed the torch of closer to The Mountain, Félix Bautista. And at the end of ’22 and then through the surprise division title run of ’23, Hyde leaned heavily on Bautista, an out-of-nowhere failed Marlins international signing. The manager also leaned heavily on Cano in 2023.
I am by no means blaming Hyde for the elbow injury that led to Bautista’s absence in 2024. However, Hyde had a couple warning signs in the second half of the 2023 season and tried to lessen the load on Bautista and Cano to give them some much-needed rest.
There is no exact science in how to pump the brakes on the over-usage of a lockdown closer. Unfortunately, Bautista broke down and needed Tommy John surgery, which is keeping him out for all of 2024.
Coming back cleanly from Tommy John surgery is never a sure thing. Our collective fingers are crossed.
That brings us to 2024 and the Craig Kimbrel era. Elias was wise given his payroll constraints to strike quickly in signing Kimbrel to a one-year, $13 million contract. Elias and Hyde knew the deal regarding Kimbrel’s advanced baseball age (36 this month). Ask Philadelphia fans what they thought of the veteran reliever’s work last October.
It was assumed by observers that Kimbrel would have to be used carefully for fear of again blowing a tire in the second half of 2024. As such, the Orioles would probably repurpose Tyler Wells into a back-end guy to help Cano and Kimbrel stay fresh.
I get it, that once the games begin, the manager does everything in his power to win that night’s game. Still, it was a bit unnerving to see that going into that game on April 26 — the night Kimbrel would blow the first of two leads against the A’s — that it was already his 12th appearance in just 25 games. That’s a pace of almost 80 appearances across a full 162 games.
Even after Kimbrel melted down that Friday night with three walks, Hyde still came back with him two days later for his 13th appearance in 27 games. This time, Kimbrel’s velocity was OK, but he couldn’t get anything but a fastball over the plate. He ultimately gave up the go-ahead two-run homer to the A’s backup catcher Kyle McCann after a meeting on the mound to see if he was OK.
Clearly, Kimbrel looked every bit of his advanced baseball age in both of those games. It was assumed at the time that a stint on the injured list was coming with upper back tightness. The club elected to go day-to-day to see if Kimbrel could avoid an IL stint.
On May 1, Kimbrel was deemed available to pitch and even warmed up, though he wasn’t needed because the Orioles never took the lead. When Hyde brought Kimbrel into the game in Cincinnati on May 3 to hold on to a 3-0 lead, it kind of shocked the senses. But he looked terrific, striking out the side to nail the victory down. It looked like the Orioles had truly dodged a bullet.
In those four days without a closer, a funny thing happened. Three pitchers clearly not in Hyde’s circle of trust — Mike Baumann, Yohan Ramírez and Jacob Webb — were all used in key moments of the Yankees series, with Webb nailing down a save on April 30, striking three of four batters out.
It was with that backdrop that Hyde frankly shocked us in Cincinnati on May 4, when he went with Kimbrel after using him the night before.
While there didn’t appear to be an injury, Kimbrel was nowhere near his best self. Two hits, a walk and a run forced Hyde to bring in Cano to protect a one-run lead with runners on the corners and just one out.
Cano walked catcher Tyler Stephenson to load the bases. It looked pretty dire and it felt as if the Orioles were about to lose for the third time in Kimbrel’s past four outings. Somehow, Cano played Houdini and got a strikeout and a harmless fly ball. The Orioles, for a night, held on.
Hyde does such a great job with his position players at getting them off their feet and keeping them fresh and sharp. He needs to do the same with his closer. Kimbrel can still be very effective, just not as often as a manager would like.
It’s a lesson Hyde needs to learn in how he handles Kimbrel from here on out. If he fails to see the blinking red light warning him of what Kimbrel is no longer capable of, he’ll risk having no clear-cut closer — or one who is just a shell of his former self.
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