As the Orioles approach .500 and a Labor Day home stand in a pennant race, Luke Jones and Nestor discuss the sweep in Sacramento and the momentum for the Rockies in Denver as the Birds surge toward a Wild Card berth.
The discussion focused on the Orioles reviving their wild-card chances after sweeping the Athletics and what they must do next to stay in the race.
Playoff Outlook
- Luke said the sweep put Baltimore one game under .500 and back near the final wild-card spot.
- Both emphasized the Rockies series as a must-win chance against another poor team, with taking at least two of three framed as the minimum acceptable result.
- They noted the schedule gets much harder afterward against Boston, Cleveland, Toronto, the Mets, Milwaukee, and the Yankees, so this stretch was viewed as the best chance to bank wins.
Team Factors
- Luke credited the pitching staff, especially the bullpen, for keeping the team in contention despite uneven offense and defense.
- They highlighted Gunnar Henderson‘s big Sunday performance and Kobe Mayo‘s strong production against left-handed pitching as potential difference-makers in September.
- Open questions: Can Gunnar Henderson sustain better production? Can the rotation, especially workload-heavy arms like Kyle Bradish and Brandon Young, hold up through the final month?
- Provide full on-air details about the Maryland Crab Cake Tour at Costas and Dundalk scheduled for early September. (@Nestor Aparicio)
- Bring and distribute Ravens scratch-off tickets to listeners during next week’s Maryland Crab Cake Tour segment. (@Nestor Aparicio)
Road Trip Results
- The Orioles swept the Athletics in Sacramento and moved to one game under .500.
- The comeback win on Sunday was viewed as especially important because the team had often missed chances to complete sweeps.
Wild Card Race
- Luke described the final wild-card chase as tightly packed, with Cleveland currently ahead and Baltimore, Toronto, and others still in range.
- Both agreed the Orioles need to capitalize on the Rockies series before a much tougher September schedule.
Offensive Contributors
- Gunnar Henderson‘s strong all-around game was seen as a major positive after a long inconsistent stretch.
- Kobe Mayo was praised for being highly effective against left-handed pitching and improving incrementally against right-handers.
Pitching Outlook
- The bullpen was discussed as a surprising strength that has outperformed expectations.
- The rotation has largely kept the club afloat, but Luke said workloads for starters such as Kyle Bradish and Brandon Young need monitoring as September continues.
Nestor Aparicio 0:01
Welcome home. We are WNST AM 1570 Towson, Baltimore. We call it Baltimore Positive. We’re on to a fresh week around here. If you happen to hear some rock and roll around here and some music, some conversations, we’re going to be doing some baseball this week. It is our 28th anniversary. We’re going to feature 28 great stories, great tales over the next 14 weeks. But this week, because it’s a little quiet, because you weren’t expecting the Orioles to really be in a pennant race in Colorado, we’ll have a little bit of that. But we have some baseball right here, right now. It’s all brought to you by friends at the Maryland Lottery. We’re going to be doing the Maryland Crab Cake Tour at Costas and Dundalk in early September to kick off the season. I’ll have all the details on that. Also, our friends at GBMC and Farnham and Dermer. I am with the comfort guys here. We’ll get back out and have some crab cakes this week. And I owe this guy crab cake and probably some pizza, Pizza John’s. He ordered a sweep of the Oakland, Las Vegas, Sacramento, and I know they’re in Sacramento because it said so on the jersey Saturday night. Oakland A’s, former Oakland A’s, Kansas City. I forgot them too. Nice sweep this weekend. Big bats on Sunday afternoon. Luke’s here to discuss it. I don’t know, man. You ordered it and they just came through. Here we are, wild card madness alive at 840 in the evening when they take on the Colorado Rockies.
Luke Jones 1:19
As I coined it a couple weeks ago, the race of the undead. Well, the Orioles are undead again, right? And I said it to you after the Yankee sweep, which so many people were just ready to say it’s over at this point. I did say at that point in time they’re going to get back in this kind of position again. You just watch because that’s how this race is gone. Now we’re going to see what happens, right? They need to finish off this series on a high note against another team that has been absolutely dreadful. The Rockies have lost 11 of 13, as I said to you going into this A series. The A’s have won 13 games since the start of July. I mean, this six-game stretch right here, and I wrote about it at BaltimorePositive.com. If you see what Cleveland had done the previous week, and the Guardians had moved in and still in real time hold that third and final wild card spot, they had a six-game road trip against it was Colorado and it was the Angels. Well, we’re talking about the three worst teams in baseball. There, the Guardians went six and zero on their road trip. I said, “Hey, if the Orioles want to stay on their heels, do the same exact thing: sweep the A’s and sweep the Rockies. Now they don’t need a sweep in Denver here, but boy, if you’re not coming home at least at the 500 mark after taking two of three at a minimum, that’s going to be a big disappointment. So great to see. We’ve talked about it. I’ve joked about it. Two game, you know, getting to one game under 500 had become their white whale. I think they were unsuccessful six straight times doing that. They fall behind 5-1 on Sunday afternoon. Bassett’s looking really bad early on, and you’re just thinking, oh my goodness, they’re gonna, yeah, they’re gonna win a series. It’ll be fine. But they’re going to be back to three games under, and it’s the same song and dance. But Gun Henderson, Kobe Mayo against the lefty, which kind of feels like Barry Bonds at this point in time. I mean, he’s just unbelievable against Southpaw’s pitching. And you know, Bassett, to his credit, was able to hang a few zeros on the board before he they turn it over to the bullpen and they get the job done. I mean, it’s a good series win. I don’t want to make too much of it because, like I said, this is an A’s team that is down what four or five of their top hitters. I mean, they have been dreadful since the start of July. But to the Orioles’ credit, they didn’t play down to their competition. They didn’t take their foot off the gas with the chance to sweep on Sunday, which that’s what we’ve complained about them doing all year long. So they get a sweep for the first time since mid July, coming out of the break down in Houston, and they’re one game under 500 for the first time since they went to the Bronx to begin that four game set back back at the beginning of May. This is the first time they’ve been at one game under. So finish up the road trip on a high note. Bare minimum needs to be two out of three. You’d love to sweep and actually be over 500 coming home because we know that that schedule is going to pick up again here coming this weekend with with Boston coming to town and then the Cleveland Guardians to follow after that, so yeah, you’re feeling good about them, but it’s also a reminder. And how many times have we said this?
Luke Jones 4:26
Whether we’re talking about Cleveland or Minnesota or Texas or any of these teams that at some point in time have looked like they were going to be the the team to grab that final wild card spot, we’ve all seen them fall back to the pack immediately after their hot stretch, so there is no time to puff out your chest because it could be just as fleeting. Where a week from now we’re talking about them being in a not so great position. So, but certainly a really really good start to this road trip, and they needed it if they were going to put themselves in a good position to. To have not just the not just a decent chance, but have a good chance to do this in the month of September.
Nestor Aparicio 5:05
Well, you know, there’s the the part where you’re like, well, 500, right? They got to get the 502 and one here. They come home at 500. Then there’s the part where like they’re taking on real pennant race teams once they get here. This has the feeling for Labor Day weekend that I don’t know that I’m going to say this that they could sell some tickets that people would be moved to come down and watch pennant race baseball this weekend after hate watching them according to you wanting to turn them off frustration I told the story to Shining and Resig last week at Koco’s how I screamed at Brandon Young when he made the error after a couple weeks ago because they get sick of errors. They had made an error a week and a half all of a sudden, right? Like, like part of this is them Henderson, the kind of day he had on Sunday. Not that, but if he had one of those once a week, we wouldn’t notice the 212 batting average or whatever it’s up to at this point, right? Like there is a point, and I’ve said this. There’s a month left in the season. If this is the month that they play really good baseball, you know, 620 baseball, not 900, they don’t have to go 13 and
Speaker 1 6:12
one.
Nestor Aparicio 6:12
They don’t have to sweep. But if they could just play 625 baseball for four weeks, they’ll be the playoff team, especially if they do that against Cleveland, right? Against the team they’re chasing, because you mentioned Detroit, Minnesota, these other pretenders have sort of faded away a little bit while they’ve been in Sacramento, of all places, winning baseball games in a minor league park. By the way, I’m a little disappointed we didn’t go out there this weekend. It looked kind of like looked a little cozy, looked a little fun out there. Those gold jerseys gave me some Reggie Jackson and Ken Holtsman Sal Bando throwbacks, but for me with them this week, they’re almost certainly going to come home at 500, if not above. They’re not going to lose two out of three to the Rockies, I don’t think. Even if they do, they’re still in it.
Luke Jones 6:56
I mean, sure, they better not, though, right? I mean, you don’t want to, you don’t want to extinguish all the momentum that you’re well. The notion that they’re
Nestor Aparicio 7:04
going to come home on Labor Day weekend at 500 in a real pennant race with by Monday being a playoff team if they win if they win some games this week at home, you would think that whoever is left in the bleeding heart group, people like me and Raskin and and Dennis, I had out last week. All of us have ignored them. We haven’t gone this year. I’ve gone when Wendy from Curio gives me a couple tickets. I’ve gone. You see me out there. A lot of people haven’t gone. You’re out there every night. Nobody’s going in Sacramento either, by the way. From what I saw over the weekend, minor league ballpark. It looked like it might have had 3,500 people there. I mean, like there there was nobody there. So this thing here in the pennant race, kids back at school this week. I think if you were still teaching fifth grade, you wouldn’t be here right now. I would think that this is the crescendo of a season that had hope that I thought they were going to win 92 games, and you look up and they’re playing playoff games at home on Labor Day, and that’s going to happen, I mean that’s my my take out of it today, with or without Colorado, and they’re not going to get swept in Colorado three in a row. I don’t think to fall four under. They were four under a minute. They were four under last time you and I got together a minute and a half ago. They were four under. So and they were still in it. I don’t think they’re going to be able to survive that at this point. They can’t go backwards. They can’t lose six to seven this week. If that happens, they will be done because we are getting to the end of the rope. But my God, how can you not be excited about San Henderson at the ball over the weekend? You know, Bassett wasn’t much, but I mean, he’s the guy I I kept counting on. I look up and he’s giving up runs every inning, and I’m thinking, man, this isn’t good. Somebody better step up here. But the pitching’s been decent. Bullpen was good. Nunez stepped up. I mean, I don’t. I’m not down on them. I’m not up on them. But I am fascinated that they’re playing meaningful baseball games. They’re going to play what a dozen meaningful baseball games before the Ravens even play. Still yet? Yeah. I mean, sure, absolutely.
Luke Jones 9:00
And I’m with you. Like you still look at it and say they still haven’t been above 500 since mid-April, right? I mean, it’s it’s a product of the environment. It’s not as though they’re a particularly good baseball team, but the playoff format is what it is. The standings are what they are, right? We’ve talked about this. I mean, really, for me, I kind of look at this thing now. It’s it feels like it’s starting to shape up into a four team race, right? You’ve got Cleveland leading the class right now. The Orioles right on their heels. Toronto, like, let’s not forget about Toronto. The Orioles and Toronto are going to play six times. Toronto’s a half game behind the Orioles, and they’re playing. That’s what I mean. They’re going to play
Nestor Aparicio 9:38
big games. This is going to be fun. This this sets up to be a fun pre tournament tournament for a team that has not been fun this year.
Luke Jones 9:46
No, it hasn’t been. I again, and I’m I’m not going to like I’m not changing my tune on on the macro level, right? Big picture, they still have all kinds of question marks. Yeah, this is the thing that’s going to
Nestor Aparicio 9:56
save Mike Elias. I got him into a pennant race.
Luke Jones 9:59
I mean. I’m sure. I’m sure. If there’s any question with ownership, he’s going to be reminding them of that. Sure, no question. Well, mr. Rubenshawn’s
Nestor Aparicio 10:06
not embarrassed anymore. Are you? He might come see the team play this week. He may show up. But at the
Luke Jones 10:10
same time, on the micro level, there’s nothing wrong with enjoying it, right? There’s nothing wrong with saying, okay, this is weird. I get it. It’s we’re talking about a sub 500 team, a team that’s hoping to get above 500 for the first time since April, sure, right? And look, you just laid it out, and and we just mentioned the teams that they’re going to play. They’re certainly going to have an opportunity to earn it here, and they’re certainly going to have an opportunity that they can get really hot, and it looks a little more representative, right? It doesn’t necessarily need to be 80 and 82, right? And I don’t think it’s going to be. I think one of these teams is going to, I don’t know, get to 83 wins, 84 wins. That’s what I said. Somebody’s going to play
Nestor Aparicio 10:50
six under ball this month. That is going to be 16 and 11 or something this month. So you look
Luke Jones 10:55
at it and you just say, well, if Gunner Henderson can get hot, I mean, really scary moment with Pete Alonso on Sunday. Oh my God, I
Nestor Aparicio 11:02
mentioned that. Yes, I
Luke Jones 11:03
mean you know, not that you’re thinking only about baseball in that moment when he gets hit in the head, but you’re just thinking, oh my goodness, like is he okay? Is he going to go on the IL? Like all that. And fortunately, you looked at the replay; it was a little more. I hate to say a glancing blow when you’re talking about the velocity that pitchers throw with in Major League Baseball, but it was kind of more the bill of the helmet and took the impact, kind of falling off his head as he was hit. So that was good to see. So I think it’s important for them to monitor him, you know, between you know from Sunday night and into the next couple days, just to be sure, but seems like he was fine. But but yeah, you’re in a position now where you look at this thing, and they’re going to have to earn it because they’re playing. Not that they’re not that they’re going to catch the Boston Red Sox for the second wild card spot, or no one’s going to. But you’ve got a chance to play them. You’ve got Cleveland. You go to Toronto. You’re going to Queens and playing a Mets team that has been more competitive, right? And then you come home and you’re going to have Milwaukee. You know, Milwaukee the weekend that the Ravens have their home opener. You know that that Sunday doubleheader down at the stadium complex, which will be really interesting logistically. But they’ll have that, and I
Nestor Aparicio 12:21
totally forgot about that.
Luke Jones 12:23
Yeah, I mean, two months ago, you kind of thought, well, no one’s going to be at the at the Sunday night game against Milwaukee, and I still have my doubts how many people will actually go to that. But it’s it’s exciting. It’s it’s it’s a big deal nonetheless. And then you’re going to finish up the last week. You’ll have Toronto again, and you go to the Bronx, right? I mean, like it’s go time. This is why I wrote that you better do something, you know, whether it’s sweeping the A’s in the Rockies, take you know going five and one, something like that, because you don’t look at the rest of the schedule and say, oh, there are a whole bunch of bankable wins there on paper. Not saying they’ll, not saying they’re going to lose all those games. These are games against
Nestor Aparicio 13:04
good teams. That right now is the bad teams. Sacramento and Colorado, make your hay. I mean, really
Luke Jones 13:10
bad, right? I mean, like I said, the A’s have won 13 games, and it’s funny. I mean, these were close games. I mean, these games could have gone either way. Well, the A’s are going to win
Nestor Aparicio 13:20
on Sunday. I thought the the A’s felt that up. Yeah,
Luke Jones 13:23
it felt that way. I mean, right. I mean, it’s five one, and and how many times have we seen the Orioles even against bad teams this year when they win the first two? They’ve got a chance to sweep, and you know they just kind of have a malaise to them. I mean, they even had some shit. You mentioned it, and I agree. The defense has the defense has picked it up. I mean, it has overall. But even on Sunday, you know the Gunner and Leodi Taveras, two plays in the second inning. They weren’t errors. They weren’t. They weren’t easy plays. But they’re plays that you need to make, right? When you’re trying to win ball games and you’re trying to to stack wins. So like it, Sunday’s game early on felt like, oh, you know, they’re they’re going to end up giving away a game here, and it’s not the end of the world. But man, that that you got to beat this team. This team, yeah, it’s a bobble. It’s a fast player, but you got to make that play exactly, exactly. So, so early on, it it had that same feel to it, where once again they can’t get to one game over or one game under 500, and like I said, Kobe Mayo against the lefty. I mean, it’s like a video game at this point. I Literally, have have a feeling every time Kobe Mayo goes to the plate against a lefty. Now, I’m kind of waiting for him to hit a home run. I mean, that’s that’s how silly and absurd it is. I mean, that’s why it’s kind of been amazing to me on this road trip that there’ve been some instances where a lefty reliever’s been in, and and I’m kind of looking at it and saying, why is the opposing manager leaving a lefty in the face Kobe Mayo? I mean, I know as a starter on Sunday, but but he got them back in the game. And if you recall the the finale in St. Louis, even though they lost that game, Mayo had a three run homer to get them in back into that game to give them a chance. So he’s really done a nice job and. Quietly, he’s starting to hit righties a little bit better too. I mean, there there’s a guy that a lot of people
Nestor Aparicio 15:06
you’ll pencil him into the lineup next year, and you can feel like maybe you’re on to some. Yeah,
Luke Jones 15:11
I mean, you’re you’re still okay. Where does he play, right? I mean, is he just going to be the DH primarily? I mean, how does that work with Basio? How does that work? I think
Nestor Aparicio 15:19
you hit him so many ground balls in the in the off season, you can give him a glove. He’s he’s young and athletic. They have to figure this out.
Luke Jones 15:26
I mean, it’s tough. I mean, he ain’t a
Nestor Aparicio 15:28
first baseman where you got 150 million dollar first baseman.
Luke Jones 15:30
Right. I mean, that’s what’s tough about it. I I really don’t think he’s a third baseman, right? And they’re not playing him very much at third base. And a young
Nestor Aparicio 15:36
catcher who’s probably not really a catcher. Not going to be not going to be 130 game catcher. I mean,
Luke Jones 15:40
Bessel’s a catcher, but right, he’s not going to be the he’s not going to be the catcher who’s catching 135 games behind the plate. So you have to figure that out. I mean, Mayo’s not a bad athlete. I’ve wondered at a couple different points why don’t you look at a corner outfield spot, you know? But but that’s like a that’s a winter long project if you’re going to do something like that. We’ve talked about Jackson Holiday. Hey, dude, do you want to make
Nestor Aparicio 16:05
150 million dollars, or do you want to be a 12 million dollar 218 guy that’s Dave Kingman?
Luke Jones 16:10
Well, well, to be clear, it’s because he could be
Nestor Aparicio 16:12
a better player than that.
Luke Jones 16:13
I mean, Mayo, I don’t think it would be a case where he would balk at it. I think it’s just a matter of how do you go about doing it. Can he do it? Right. I mean, we’ve talked. I don’t want to sit here and just. What is
Nestor Aparicio 16:24
he doing in October, November, December? Except Chag and Fly by. No,
Luke Jones 16:27
I know, and I know. I don’t want to go down. I don’t want to blabber the point too. Like me working on you know
Nestor Aparicio 16:31
part of my business. It’s like there’s parts of it I’m not good at that I got to work at. Like that. And when you’re 25 and you’re trying to make money, he hasn’t been good enough at third base. He’s not going to play first base here. No, I don’t think they’re going to move him. You know what I mean? Yeah, I don’t know. He’s a nice piece, though. He’s a nice piece for another team to take a bat.
Luke Jones 16:47
Well, you know, and that’s the other thing you look at as far as just this team in the big picture, right? We’ve talked about it. I mean, they’re they’re going to have to, no matter if they make the playoffs, no matter if they advance to the division series, even they’ve got a lot of work to do with this. They got to find better players
Nestor Aparicio 17:05
that can catch the ball. Of
Luke Jones 17:06
course, of course. I mean, they they
Nestor Aparicio 17:08
can’t put this kind of defense. They can’t put nine Kobe Mayo’s out in the field this year. No,
Luke Jones 17:11
and next year. I mean, their outfield offensively isn’t good enough, right? I mean, I know Tavarez had a big game over the weekend, right? I mean, that’s been a nice story. Good enough to
Nestor Aparicio 17:19
play wild card baseball this week, Luke. Come on now, you’re
Luke Jones 17:22
not count. You’re not. We can we can embrace this and have fun with this while also acknowledging the standard can’t be that you’re a 500-ish kind of team and hoping that the playoff race is bad enough that it gives you a chance. Might not even have
Nestor Aparicio 17:36
a frigging season next year. You better enjoy this. Oh sure, sure, of course. But
Luke Jones 17:39
well, no, I mean, I but but with Mayo, I mean, there are a lot of people, myself included, at various points saying this guy needs to go back to the minors. What are they doing here? All that, it’s a testament to him. I mean, he is an absolute force against lefty pitching. I mean, he is unbelievable against lefties, and I think if you look at his splits since the beginning of July. He’s been he’s been decent against right-handers since then. He’s been better against righties than early in the year when he was an automatic out against righties. Well, if you only put him
Nestor Aparicio 18:11
out there against lefties,
Luke Jones 18:12
he’ll never figure out a righty. And that and that’s and that’s what’s tough, right? And that’s always been the issue. One of their issues over these last few years is trying to trying to find the sweet spot between contending because you’re supposed to be contending and development because you know that just because they’re young players and even when they’re young players that are having success you know that that doesn’t mean development’s complete and that’s what’s been tricky but you know between Mayo and you know you said it I mean Gunnar Henderson fantastic game and played some really good defense over the weekend. Really good defense over the weekend, and you know we we’ve seen that. He, I’ve said all along with his defense, he has the athleticism and the arm and all of the tools to be a good shortstop. It’s been just maddening with the lapses, right? He misses easy ones. I mean, all of that. Do I? Do I? Does do I think that necessarily translates to that he’ll be a above average shortstop if they keep him there? I can’t say that. You know, I I’d feel better about him at third base long term, but in the short term, you’re hoping Sunday is the start of him getting going because we’ve seen this before, right? He had the big triple against the Phillies that Friday night, where you know he he pounds the ground in celebration late in the game. You know the Orioles win that game, and then what happened? He stopped hitting, and the Orioles lost the the next couple games right after that, right? We know that all of these stretches can be very fleeting, and we’ve seen that. But if you get a version of Gunnar Henderson that gets hot, and they kind of need it, because by the way, Pete Alonso’s cooled off here over the last few days. He was going to at some point in time. I mean, Pete wasn’t going to hit 400 the rest of the way. You need him to get going again, and I’m I’m sure he will. But if you get a version of Gunnar Henderson that. Isn’t going to hit two home runs every day, but looks a little bit more like this guy. You know that that certainly goes a long way in helping this team’s chances for for the month of September. And I found it interesting that Friday night they gave him the night off. Right? I mean, he pinch ran late in the game, but he got the night off. We haven’t seen Gunnar sit, and it was kind of interesting to see him have this kind of game just a day or two after he sits like that. I don’t know. Maybe he needed a breather. Maybe he needed a mental break. Maybe that helps him. So, but you know, they they did what they needed to do, right? That they’re doing what they needed to do on this road trip. I mean, even St. Louis is not a team that was playing at a very high level. Take two out of three from there. Good. Play the A’s. A’s have been, I mean, rebuild era terrible kind of baseball, right? I mean, well, the Rockies
Nestor Aparicio 20:51
are 33 games under 500,
Luke Jones 20:53
right? The Rockies have lost 11 of their last 13, right? They’re 52 and 85. They’re on the rending as awful. Yeah, they’re rent. They’re on their way to losing 100 games in in what a fourth straight season, I think it is for them. 100 plus losses. So that’s why I said. I mean, if you don’t come a minimum, if you don’t come home 500 after winning two out of three, I mean, really get those bats
Nestor Aparicio 21:15
out in that thin air out there and hit hit a dozen home runs the next three nights. Well, they’re gonna they’re
Luke Jones 21:19
gonna see their old friend Segano, he’s going to pitch one of those games. I think you know we we don’t know exactly what the Orioles’ rotation is going to look like for this. I mean, it seems like Kade Povich is on the way to joining them. Keep in mind rosters expand on Tuesday, but you look at the three pitchers that Colorado has slated to to face them: Tanner Gordon, 5.38 ERA; Gabriel Hughes 6.61, and Tomiyuki Segano, our old friend, a 5.2 ERA. I mean, you’re talking about three starting pitchers that you should, I emphasize, at those mile
Nestor Aparicio 21:54
high ERAs is what they got exactly.
Luke Jones 21:57
But on the flip side, your pitchers are going to be pitching in in that thin air too. So, but I mean, this is this is why I wrote it late last week. I mean, they needed. I looked at these six games and said, “Why can’t you do what the Guardians just did? The Guardians just they what put them in position to to lead the wild card race? They had a six and zero road trip against the Rockies and the Angels, Orioles. It’s like, can you do the same thing against the A’s and the Rockies? I mean, same caliber. You know, literally facing one of the one of those teams, and the other team’s been just as bad. So, but but that’s where you look at this. I mean, this is where you get above 500, and then you come home and you say, all right, now you’re in a position when you’re a potentially a game, you know, two games over 500 or 500, you’re in a position now where you’re not looking at these series and saying, “Oh, we need to sweep the Red Sox, or we need to sweep the Guardians, or we need to sweep the Blue Jays, because you know you’re not going to do that, right? You’re not going to sweep all these teams. Now you’re in a position where you say, “Hey, can you win a series? In the case of a four-game set with the Red Sox, if you can at least split, you’re still in good. You’re in good shape, most likely, right? So that’s where you look at, and that’s why I just said you needed to make your hay on this road trip. I mean, because there there aren’t a ton of games in September where you say that’s a sure series win. That’s a sure series win. I mean, just not how it works. So, how are you feeling about their pitching in a general sense? I mean, look-it’s amazing. I’ve said this, I’ve written this, I’ve talked about this for months and months. The bullpen, despite the fact that they haven’t had Ryan Helsley most of the year, they traded away Tyler Wells at the deadline. You know, Felix Batista’s-he’s got a few appearances on his rehab assignment, and it seems like it’s going pretty well. His velocity is not where it was pre-injury, but he’s still throwing like 96 miles per hour. You know, so we’ll see. You know, I think I don’t think you’re expecting anything there, but if he’s feeling good and he’s look, it’s looking good. You can throw him in the mix, sure, but their bullpen continues to outperform the perception. I mean, those guys. You know, I was disappointed to see Rico Garcia start looking again like he did in June and July a little bit more that for for my than my liking. I mean, that that was a little disappointing. But Cano’s been really good. Hoppy and and Cam Sanders, I mean these these guys, I mean they they’ve all had an outing or two where you say oh that didn’t look so good, but they’ve also done some really nice things. Yeah, they weren’t on the team in July, so yeah, we’re talking about guys here that and they have good arms, right? I mean and and if you have good stuff, we’ve seen this. You can parlay that into pitching well. Like we’ve seen all kinds of random bullpen arms pitch great for two or three weeks or get three
Nestor Aparicio 24:46
outs, get three or four outs. That’s all you got to do,
Luke Jones 24:48
right? So, like you know, am I going to sit here and say that I have an overwhelming amount of confidence in the bullpen? No, but I have to. I can’t ignore what they continue to do, which is outperform. How they’re perceived, right? I mean, how many times do you see fans or even media talk about, oh, this bullpen, this bullpen? Well, go look at it statistically. It’s been pretty good. I mean, it really has been so better than the parts of you know journeyman, this guy, of former infielder converted to a pitcher. You know, there’s some stories here that make it interesting if they make it to October, but there’s stories that in the middle of May you and I are talking about it. We’re like, well, I don’t know where they came up with this Nunez guy.
Nestor Aparicio 25:30
We’ll see how he is in September, right?
Luke Jones 25:32
You you know I’ve been bullish on him though, big picture wise. Now, when he’s been sent down, yeah, I mean he’s he’s had he had stretches this season where he really struggled, but I don’t know how you don’t watch him as much as we’ve had an opportunity to watch him and not say there’s the potential for a really good late inning reliever. I mean, he’s got the sweeper, he’s got the the split change, he’s got out pitches against righties and lefties. I mean, we saw what was it a few outings back where he had like 14 swings and misses, which is just like silly for a bullpen arm to have. I mean, so he’s got good stuff now. Does that mean he’s going to get it done for them and pitch in some really huge? I mean, he’s going to kind of have to, right? I mean, they have to pass the baton. I mean, you can’t pitch. You know, it can’t just be Cano, Kittridge, and you know, like your best arms every single night. You’re gonna play the
Nestor Aparicio 26:24
Blue Jays six times. They got the Red Sox this weekend. They got Cleveland. They got big games. They’re gonna have sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth inning emergencies because Mayo or Alonzo’s gonna hit a home run to put them up five to four, and they’re gonna have to come in and that’s the way these games have gone. I
Luke Jones 26:38
mean, you you’re gonna need every. You can’t hide anyone in the modern day in the bullpen. I mean, you really can’t. There might be one guy you can do that with, but your eight-man bullpen, you need. I’ve said this. You’ve heard me say this a lot the last few years. the The best bullpens that are well equipped to navigate September, let alone October. I mean, you really need four or five guys that, reasonably speaking, can pitch in just about any situation. Because you just know, like, your closer is not going to be available every single night. Your eighth inning guy is not going to be available every single night. So, and you’re not
Nestor Aparicio 27:15
going to be able to match up against three, four hitters and lefty, lefty, lefty, right? You might match up a
Luke Jones 27:19
little, but you’re not. You can’t do that every single reliever every single night against every single pocket in the lineup. You want to do that. I mean, you’ve got to have guys that can can manage and and face righties and lefties. I mean, it’s just that simple. So, but I give them credit. I mean, rotation wise, I’ve said it. You know, I’m I’m I don’t want to say I’m overly concerned about Bradish, but I’m watching Bradish carefully at this point in time. Brandon Young continues to just you know he’s at he’s past his career high, but he continues to pitch well. He continues to say he feels good. I mean all that, but I do wonder, especially with them being in the midst of this stretch where they haven’t had an off day. I wonder if we’ll see Povich slotted in, and they’ll at least go six man for a turn, maybe two turns through the rotation, because you gotta you gotta be mindful of it. I mean, it has you know Bradish. It’s not like Bradish has been awful for the last month, but
Nestor Aparicio 28:14
but you’re not getting 110 pitches in seven innings out of him right now. Yeah,
Luke Jones 28:18
I mean that certainly not a 110, right? I mean, I’m not saying it needs to be 70 pitches either, but I think you just need to be mindful, right? How’s the velo looking? How’s the stuff looking? How’s he feeling? And so much of that is what’s going on between the starts, right? Their bullpen day. How are they recovering? All of that. And again, I’m not saying that he’s going to be shut down. He should be shut down. Anything like that. No, you just need to be aware, right? I mean, this guy’s been through a lot over the last few years with with his arm, and and he’s thrown a ton of innings this year compared to the previous two years, right? So you just need to be aware of that, especially if you’re of the mind that you’re going to still continue to be in this thing through the end of the month, and oh yeah, you might be playing a few games, you know. In I guess it would be very late September, right? Is the first round of the playoffs, but you know you’ve you’ve got a chance to to to do that. So you want to kind of you know you don’t want to shut anyone down, but you also need to. These are assets. These are investments, right? These are human beings beyond that that you wanna you wanna do right by in terms of if guys need a day if you need to go to six man rotation whatever it might be right if you need to have a bullpen day so but but you know to go back to your original question with the pitching I mean look I mean their their pitching is a big reason why they’re even in this spot, right? We talked about it from late May through the summer. Their rotation easily exceeded expectations, especially when you consider they got what two innings out out of Zach Efflin all season before he has Tommy John surgery, and Bassett missed two months with a back injury. If if anyone had told. You that before the season, you would have said, “Okay, if Brad, unless Bradish and Boz are really, really that good, because no one was talking about Brandon Young back in March, right? But but you would have said, hearing that man, Bradish better be really good, Boz better be really good, Dean Kramer better be. They miss Dean Kramer for how much time this season before they traded them, right? So, it’s not as though the rotation things have gone perfectly yet. That group, they did a lot of heavy lifting. They kept the Orioles even in this kind of position, right? Because we know the offense had large, long stretches where they weren’t doing a whole lot at all, right? And we’ve talked about the guys that have disappointed this year with the bat, so you know I, I, and I think I’d say this about any team that has guys that you know are either approaching or exceeding career highs in innings, guys that have you know you know at least some you know injury history. I I’d say that about any team that you get to September, you’re you’re holding your breath a little bit more to make sure guys are holding up and feeling good and still effective and all that. But I’d be lying if I didn’t say that you know this pitching is, and I think that’s what’s been frustrating about this season as a whole is the pitching has really exceeded expectations. You know, it’s been their offense and their defense that have really let them down big time. Not that we thought the defense was going to be really good because we, I think, we identified that was a weakness on this team. But I think how weak it was for for stretches of this season is what was disappointing. And you know, their offense was supposed to lead the way, and you know, for long long stretches of this season, it hasn’t come close to doing that. So, but they’re pitching. You know, I feel good about it. I mean, do you have a bona fide ace in the way that some of these other teams do that are, you know, making their push or already in a playoff position?
Luke Jones 31:55
No, but collectively, this group has has done a nice job, and you know the bullpen big time because, man, I you know I wasn’t high on this bullpen at all, and they found a way. I mean, even with Michaelias trading away Tyler Wells, they found a way to, for the most part, have a bullpen that’s given them a chance to win more often than not. And I would not have necessarily said that at different points going back to the off season and even earlier this season.
Nestor Aparicio 32:25
Here’s Luke Jones. The Orioles are in the pennant race for real. They’re up late in Colorado. Rocky Mountain Oysters have had them out there at Coors Field. We’ll be back home this weekend. Luke will be at the ballpark and football. A little bit of a quiet period here. We’ll get back to all that. But up late with Colorado all week long. You can reach Luke at Baltimore. Luke out on the interwebs. Any breaking news happens first on the WNST Tech Services. All brought to you by Coal Roofing and Gordian Energy, and of course, I will have the Raven scratch offs to give away when we fire this thing up again next week for the Maryland Crab Cake Tour presented by the Maryland Lottery, as well as our friends at GBMC and Farnham and Dermot, they are the comfort guys. He is Luke. I am Nestor. Baseball ahead, meaningful baseball. Who knew? We’re this close to September, and that’s almost October. We’re Baltimore positive. Stay with us.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
