BALTIMORE — We haven’t appreciated Orioles pitcher Trevor Rogers nearly enough.
That’s understandable considering just how disappointing this season has been overall and how badly Rogers flopped last August upon being acquired from Miami at the trade deadline. By the time the 27-year-old left-hander — who hurt his knee before spring training to delay his start to 2025 — made his season debut at Fenway Park in late May, manager Brandon Hyde had been fired the previous weekend and the Orioles were already toast sitting at a miserable 18 games below .500 through 50 games. That’s not to mention the fact that ex-Orioles outfielder Kyle Stowers — one of two players traded to the Marlins for Rogers — was thriving and on his way to making the 2025 All-Star Game.
Little did anyone know when Rogers tossed 6 1/3 shutout innings in that May 24 nightcap of a doubleheader against Boston that it would be the start of one of the more impressive runs in club history, especially since he wouldn’t make his next start for Baltimore for another 3 1/2 weeks before moving into the major league rotation for good. He couldn’t save this overall failure of a season for the Orioles, but Rogers is one of the biggest reasons for hope for a 2026 turnaround.
He demonstrated that once again against the New York Yankees on Friday night.
Facing a club still needing to protect the top wild-card spot and hoping to catch Toronto for the AL East crown, Rogers was masterful over six shutout innings in a 4-2 win, allowing only one hit and striking out seven to lower his season ERA to a microscopic 1.35 ERA over 17 starts covering 106 2/3 innings. His club-record 15th consecutive start allowing two or fewer runs included a season-high 17 swinging strikes, which reflects the offseason work Rogers made to improve both his strength and stuff and get back to where he was as a rookie in 2021 when he finished second in NL Rookie of the Year voting and was an All-Star pitcher.
“I probably told you a few starts ago, ‘You’re waiting for the other shoe to drop, the other foot to drop.’ I don’t think we’re waiting anymore,” interim manager Tony Mansolino said. “I think this is kind of what he is and what he used to be, and I think he got his body healthy. I think it’s been reported that he fixed the issues that he had, and he’s kind of just turned back the clock to what he was, part of the issues. He’s just been really, really good.”
How good? Rogers leads the majors in ERA among pitchers with at least 100 innings pitched since that debut on May 24. For context, AL Cy Young favorite and Detroit ace Tarik Skubal owns a 1.94 ERA over that same time while NL Cy Young favorite Paul Skenes carries a 1.83 mark over that stretch.
8
Where should Rogers fit in that Cy Young discussion anyway?
That he didn’t pitch for the better part of 2 1/2 months of 2025 obviously matters when compared to the likes of Skubal, Boston’s Garrett Crochet, and Houston’s Hunter Brown making 30-plus starts and approaching 200 innings this season. However, an ERA that far south of 2.00 and 6.0 wins above replacement ranking behind only Skubal and Brown among AL pitchers shouldn’t be ignored either. With opponents batting .233 on balls in play against Rogers and his fielding independent pitching mark at 2.43, one would argue against him maintaining that absurdly low ERA over a full season, of course, but the peripherals still reflect an elite starting pitcher worthy of consideration.
The Orioles are 13-4 in games Rogers has started this season and 60-77 otherwise.
With voters filling out a five-man Cy Young ballot at the end of the regular season, Rogers is deserving of some fourth- or fifth-place consideration. That’s quite a contrast from a year ago when he was playing out the string struggling even at the Triple-A level and not in the conversation to be part of the Orioles’ postseason plans.
“It’s full circle. I actually just saw a memory on my phone of my wife and I hanging out in an Airbnb in Norfolk this time last year,” Rogers said. “Just the amount of work that I’ve put in [and] the pitching department, the strength department that’s helped me so much, I’m just thankful the Orioles have helped me turn my career around. I can go on and on about how much they’ve helped me and what this organization means to me.
“But at the end of the day, I’m just happy that I can be consistent and continue to help this team win games and finish strong and look forward to a good 2026.”
While Mike Elias and the Orioles have much work ahead to make this roster worthy of serious contention next year, it’s not difficult picturing Rogers and Kyle Bradish — who’s looked fantastic in his four starts since returning from 2024 Tommy John surgery — as part of a postseason rotation.
At a time when the Orioles were at their lowest back in May, Rogers arrived to provide some much-needed hope. And he hasn’t stopped ever since.
