As of Sunday, the season of every Orioles minor league affiliate is over. None of their teams made the postseason to extend their run of play. None of their teams were, as teams, any good. No different from the big league club in that regard. Or at least none of the full-season teams were good. The Florida Complex League Orioles, who played a 59-game season, were pretty good. So at least we’ve got that going for us.
That’s not to say there was nothing good going on with a number of individual players
as these teams were working their way through their seasons. There was bad and there was ugly, but there was also good. Here’s how things went at each of the levels.
Triple-A Norfolk Tides
Final record: 63-84
The good
The prospect duo of Samuel Basallo and Dylan Beavers, who ended up being promoted to MLB one day apart from each other, were amazing. Beavers posted a .934 OPS, including a batting average over .300, OBP above .400, and slugging above .500, in his 94 games with Norfolk. Basallo hit 23 homers in only 76 games and cleared Beavers’s impressive OPS by 32 points. As bad as things went with different levels of the organization this season, it’s great that their two most-hyped high-level prospects were able to produce at Triple-A to force MLB promotions.
Even a guy who was not on anyone’s prospect radar before the season, Jeremiah Jackson, was able to get in on this act. Jackson’s year actually started out at Double-A, then he dropped a 1.073 OPS after arriving at Norfolk and made his way up to Baltimore before either of the prospects did.
Smaller, but still interesting: Two late-season arrivals into the bullpen, Cameron Foster and Anthony Nunez, who joined the organization in July trades. Foster had a 3.38 ERA while striking out 23 batters in 15 innings with the team. Nunez ended at a 3.45 ERA and held batters to just a 0.894 WHIP over his 16 games.
The bad
The Orioles were desperately in need of reinforcements to either their major league bullpen or rotation at multiple points in the season and if they gazed down at their Triple-A pitching staff, they had the likes of Chayce McDermott (6.21 ERA), Corbin Martin (5.82 ERA), and Thaddeus Ward (5.34 ERA). If someone like Cameron Weston had done better than a 4.59 ERA and 1.485 WHIP over his time in the rotation, we might have seen him in Baltimore, but that’s not what happened.
The ugly
Ahead of his Rule 5 draft decision year, Jud Fabian dropped this batting line: .183/.322/.349 and struck out about 32% of the time. I don’t think that’s going to get him onto anyone’s 40-man roster. Heston Kjerstad got sent down the minors, did even worse than when he was in MLB, and was eventually just placed on the injured list with vague “fatigue.”
Trey Gibson is going to be listed in “the good” at Double-A, but here, he’s part of the ugly. After getting promoted to Triple-A and earning some late-season top 100 prospect list love, Gibson made seven Tides starts with a 7.98 ERA and 1.807 WHIP. Just no sustaining good vibes with pitchers around here.
Double-A Chesapeake Baysox
Final record: 59-77
The good
Although Enrique Bradfield Jr. was limited to just 50 games here due to some injuries (not good), there’s no arguing with his .393 OBP and 26 stolen bases while active. Seeing how he performs at Triple-A next year is going to be crucial. He’s getting some Arizona Fall League time this year to make up for some of the missed time. 22-year-old Creed Willems finished with the exact same OPS as Bradfield (.779) across 105 games. It’s just hard to know what to make of a righty C/1B with that batting line. Will he be protected from the Rule 5 draft this offseason? It feels to me like he must be, but I have no idea what his future role might be.
The affiliate saw a lot of good things going on with its pitching staff. Gibson, ugly above, was very good here across ten starts – hard to believe, but his season started with Aberdeen (where results were also bad) – like a 1.55 ERA, 0.898 WHIP good, with 68 strikeouts in 52.1 innings. Really good! Tyler Neighbors, one of the guys acquired in July, allowed just one run in 15.1 innings after the trade.
My hyphenated cousin Juaron Watts-Brown had some good things going for him after being traded here, with a sub-1 WHIP, though he was quite homer-prone. We’ll see if that was bad luck or an enduring problem. Nestor German gets in the good list as well with a 3.78 ERA and 1.099 WHIP over 18 games. The Orioles really need to get some good results from some of these guys in Norfolk next year.
The bad
Braxton Bragg’s 2.32 ERA and 1.125 WHIP in nine starts (plus three good ones in High-A before this) would be on the good list except for the fact that the reason he only made twelve total starts is he needed Tommy John surgery, wiping out this year and probably most if not all of next for the prospect. Another TJ guy from this roster was Patrick Reilly, whose season was ended after just three starts.
Although there were a number of positive pitching stories on the team, not everyone did so well. Zach Fruit finished with an ERA over 7. Trace Bright and Alex Pham were each dropped out of the rotation after some rough results.
The ugly
This was the Chesapeake Baysox batting line as a team: .212/.304/.338. That is u-g-l-y you ain’t got no alibi territory. The good news about this is that there’s nobody who really counted as a prospect before the season who made a meaningful negative contribution as a Baysox batter. So, they didn’t get here because of prospects flopping. They’re going to need to find some good hitting prospects from somewhere. Also good news about that: We had a couple of good stories at levels below this.
High-A Aberdeen IronBirds
Final record: 57-72
The good
As you know if you’ve followed this space through the season, I’m conducting the hype train for Aron Estrada, the 20-year-old switch-hitting infield prospect who, in 81 games for the IronBirds, batted .284/.369/.429 – that’s a 135 wRC+ for this level. At the major league level, guys hitting in this area include: Freddie Freeman, Bryce Harper, Bo Bichette, and José Ramírez. Not to lose sight, either, that Estrada was promoted to Double-A and put up another .855 OPS in 27 games there.
One guy who escaped the “curse of the high 2024 draft picks” (see below) was outfielder Austin Overn, who overcame a rough April in which he batted just .186 to play his way to a .753 OPS with the IronBirds – and he had an identical OPS to that in 30 games with Chesapeake to close out the season.
There were a variety of different pitching positives going around as well. One was Carter Baumler, the 2020 draft pick who’s been on a Kjerstad-like “so many different injuries” plan up til now, and he finally had a healthy year and it went pretty well: 2.04 ERA and 1.084 WHIP across 28 games of relief and three levels. Young lefty Luis De León struck out 107 batters across 87.1 innings and three levels this season. July arrival Wellington Aracena had a good ERA over five games (2.35) though he’s going to have to work on that walk rate (5.9 BB/9 as an IronBird).
Worth his own paragraph: Righty Michael Forret, who missed a chunk of the season but still was able to combine for a 1.58 ERA for 19 games between Aberdeen and Chesapeake, with batters hitting just .157 against him overall, and only three homers allowed out of 282 batters faced. There’s something worth keeping an eye on there.
The bad
The absolute flop of the high 2024 draft picks was the worst thing going on here, the worst of which is still to come in “the ugly” below. For Griff O’Ferrall and Ethan Anderson, it was a tough first full pro season. O’Ferrall slugged under .300 and Anderson hit only three homers in 70 games. Despite this, each of these guys ended up getting promoted to Double-A before season’s end. O’Ferrall’s small sample size there was better than Anderson’s.
The ugly
For the last time this year, I ask the question: How many times did Vance Honeycutt strike out? Friends, it was a lot: 178 strikeouts in 101 games. He had a strikeout rate of just about 41%. That is almost unbelievable.
Low-A Delmarva Shorebirds
Final record: 51-79
The good
Nate George only ended up playing 43 games for the Shorebirds, because last year’s 16th round pick started his age 19 season in the FCL (23 games) and did so well that he finished it with Aberdeen (21 games). OPSing over 1.006 in the rookie league, .901 for Delmarva and .773 for Aberdeen, particularly with a strong finish after a tough first couple of weeks with the IronBirds, George was phenomenal this year. He also stole 50 bases in 87 games!
One other player who caught my attention a bit this season here was Yasmil Bucce in his age 20 season. Bucce, part of the same international signing class as Basallo, has been slower to develop, but his arrival in full season ball a year before he’d have been drafted (if he was an American college student) is interesting: .255/.401/.413 in 81 games here, enough to get him promoted to Aberdeen. He only played 15 games there before going on the IL.
Outside of those two, there wasn’t a ton going on at this level until the 2025 draft picks arrived. Wehiwa Aloy had the kind of Low-A debut you’d hope from a college bat, as he batted .288/.356/.500 in 20 games. I dig that.
The bad
Take your pick of relatively young bats that did not launch the way George or even Bucce did this year. Braylin Tavera (20) had a .675 OPS over 108 games. Luis Almeyda (19) finished with a .662 OPS in 53 games here. Younger still, Joshua Liranzo (18) had a .567 OPS in 54 games. (Liranzo had some good numbers in 24 FCL games.)
The ugly
Two pitchers share the ugly. One, Keeler Morfe, entered the season with some hype building over his hard throwing, but he only ended up pitching in nine games due to a finger injury, and in those nine games he had 24 walks in 15.1 innings. No, that’s not a typo. The other, Twine Palmer, arrived from the Ramón Urías trade and he just had a horrible time after joining the Orioles – 20 earned runs in 19.2 innings.
Florida Complex League Orioles
Final record: 35-24
19-year-old Cuban outfielder Jordan Sanchez dominated this level, batting .293/.421/.529 in 54 games. He got a later start than peers of his age due to having to come over from Cuba, but this was a fine introduction to US minor league ball. An even younger outfielder, now-18-year-old Stiven Martinez, had some positives with his .730 OPS in 49 games.
Not to be forgotten is another young player, Andrew Tess, who like George got a modest overslot bonus in a double-digit draft round last year, who posted an .826 OPS over 54 games. It’ll be interesting to see what this C/1B does over a fuller season with Delmarva next year.
Dominican Summer League Orioles (2 teams)
- Final record (Black): 21-32
- Final record (Orange): 20-34
It’s hard to even know who to highlight here, so I’ll just call attention to two age-17 players who had some solid batting numbers: outfielder Starlin Mieses – about whom I’ve never in my life thought before starting this paragraph – hit .280/.464/.424, and fellow outfielder Lisandro Sanchez went .317/.395/.467 in 49 games. A late arrival to the organization, infield prospect Wilfri De La Cruz from the Andrew Kittredge trade, hit a combined .258/.465/.400 between Cubs and Orioles DSL teams.
**
The winner of the final Orioles minor league player of the week poll was Reed Trimble, whose late surge for Norfolk has gotten him some more attention on the fringe than he had in any of the injury-plagued seasons earlier in his career. Trimble won 74% of the vote in a two-way poll with the excellently-named Blake Money. This was Trimble’s second weekly win.
The final tally of three-week winners: Samuel Basallo, Dylan Beavers, Nate George
Two-time winners: Braxton Bragg, Trey Gibson, Reed Trimble
Single-week winners: Enrique Bradfield Jr., Brandon Young, Vance Honeycutt, Alex Pham, Adam Retzbach, Yasmil Bucce
The Orioles will announce their player development awards for the season – minor league pitcher and batter of the season – some time during this final home series, perhaps as soon as today. I’ll guess Trey Gibson for pitchers and Nate George for batters.
