With few new names, bullpen hopes to continue 2022’s success
On the verge of the Orioles’ first post-rebuild season, The Baltimore Sun is breaking down the roster position by position, examining the biggest questions at each spot and who could help carry the team back to the postseason, in 2023 and beyond.
First up was a starting rotation with a long list of candidates. Next up: a bullpen with plenty of depth, only a few new names and expectations to replicate its success in 2022.
Opening day candidates
While most eyes will be on the deep competition for the starting rotation, the race for the few open spots in the bullpen will also be interesting. The Orioles will have 14 relievers in spring training with experience coming out of a major league bullpen. That number is 19 if you include the handful of starting pitchers who would realistically be relief candidates if they don’t make the rotation.
Four pitchers seem to be locks: closer Félix Bautista, setup man Dillon Tate, lefthander Cionel Pérez and free agent acquisition Mychal Givens. Right-hander Bryan Baker could also pitch himself into that group after his strong finish in 2022, which would create only three open spots.
Five of the other top candidates on the 40-man roster pitched out of the Orioles’ bullpen in 2022 to varying degrees: Keegan Akin, Joey Krehbiel, Nick Vespi, Logan Gillaspie and Yennier Canó. Akin and Krehbiel spent almost the entire season in the majors after excellent starts, but both struggled in the final two months. Akin and Vespi, the latter of whom is recovering from hernia surgery, are both lefties on a roster with few left-handed relief options.
One pitcher on the 40-man roster without big league experience who has a shot at breaking camp with the club is Rule 5 draft pick Andrew Politi. The Orioles will also have four other relievers with major league experience as nonroster invitees to spring training: Darwinzon Hernandez, Kyle Dowdy, Reed Garrett and Eduard Bazardo. These players all face an uphill battle to make the club, but they would provide depth if they remain in the organization during the season.
Biggest question How many starting pitchers will be moved over to the bullpen?
Executive vice president and general manager Mike Elias said last week that the Orioles have 12 pitchers competing for the five rotation spots. He added that the team’s offseason acquisitions — Kyle Gibson and Cole Irvin — are essentially locks to break camp in the rotation.
So, with 10 pitchers vying for three spots, that will leave several who could be pushed over to the bullpen in either middle or long relief.
Some in that competition — Kyle Bradish, Dean Kremer and Grayson Rodriguez — seem most likely to fill in behind Gibson and Irvin if everything goes as planned. If that’s the case, there would be about five leftover starters who also have at least several games of major league relief experience: Tyler Wells, Austin Voth, Spenser Watkins, DL Hall and Mike Baumann.
Wells, Voth and Watkins all started 17 or more games for the Orioles in 2022. Voth has the most experience as a reliever with 75 career relief appearances, mostly with the Nationals in 2021 and the first half of 2022. Wells was a reliever in 2021 before transitioning to a starter last year, while Watkins totaled nine long-relief or mop-up appearances the past two seasons. Baumann opened 2022 in the Orioles’ bullpen and then posted four serviceable starts in September/October, but he spent most of the time between in Triple-A.
Voth might be the most likely of this group to land in the bullpen since he is out of minor league options. But the most interesting name on the list is Hall, Baltimore’s secondbest pitching prospect who started one game and relieved in 10 others in the majors last year. If he doesn’t break camp in the rotation, the 24-year-old’s electric stuff as a lefty could be attractive enough for the Orioles to put him in the bullpen instead of sending him down to Triple-A.
X-factor
A key factor behind the Orioles’ turnaround in 2022 was their bullpen, which ranked ninth in the majors with a 3.49 ERA thanks to standout campaigns from Bautista, Tate, Pérez, Baker and others. The success followed dreadful 2021 and 2019 campaigns in which the team’s relievers ranked last with ERAs above 5.70.
But bullpen outcomes can fluctuate year to year, and the majority of relievers returning don’t have a track record of consistent production. That’s why the Orioles signed Givens, a familiar face, to a $5 million contract this offseason.
Givens, who pitched in Baltimore from 2015 to 2020, isn’t likely to be a difference-maker the way Bautista was last year. But Givens, who has a career 3.40 ERA in 457 ⅔ innings, has averaged about 67 innings over the past six full seasons and has posted an ERA above 4.00 just once. That consistent pedigree is something the Orioles needed to provide stability to an inexperienced bullpen.
“I love the makeup of our bullpen,” manager Brandon Hyde said last week. “I think adding [Givens] is a big add, also. A guy down there who has been down there for a while who likes to pitch here. I’m excited about our pen.”
The future
The best part about the Orioles relievers who surprised last season is that most of them have several years of team control. Bautista, Tate, Pérez and Baker are all 28 years old or younger with three to five years before they can hit free agency.
“I think for a lot of us, it’s just building on what we did the previous year, but at the same time looking forward and pushing forward and not being too far in the past,” Tate said.
If Bautista can repeat — or even improve — his outstanding rookie season, he would be one of the best bullpen values in the sport as a closer on a pre-arbitration salary. Bautista posted a 2.19 ERA with 15 saves and ranked 10th in the majors among qualified pitchers with a 34.8% strikeout rate.
Politi is another reliever who the Orioles could have for years to come — only if he remains on the big league roster for the entire 2023 season as a Rule 5 draft selection. Politi posted a 2.34 ERA in 69 ⅓ innings as a minor leaguer in the Boston Red Sox organization last year.