September is the month of the walk-off win for the Orioles, apparently. The team didn’t have a single walk-off win until August, and now they have four in their last six. Is this just noise? The grace of the baseball gods?
It at least could be a combo of better hitters manufacturing runs in clutch situations (thank you, Jeremiah Jackson, Dylan Beavers, Emmanuel Rivera, and Samuel Basallo) and a better bullpen carefully protecting what the starters gave them.
The position player call-ups have made a big
difference, but then again, it’s not such a shocker that calling up top prospects would make a lineup better. On the other hand, the bullpen’s recent performance does warrant some explanation. After all, it’s not common you take apart a team, sell it off for parts, and end up having it perform better.
This was a total tear-down, remember. On or by this year’s trade deadline, the Orioles had shipped off relievers Seranthony Domínguez, Gregory Soto, Bryan Baker, and Andrew Kittredge in exchange for prospects. They’d also lost a lot of other relievers for various reasons. Some pitched badly and got sent down to Triple-A: Cionel Pérez, Corbin Martin, Chayce McDermott and Yaramil Hiraldo. Some pitched badly and ended up elsewhere: Matt Bowman (the Astros org), Roansy Contreras (Colorado), Cody Poteet (a free agent). A couple are injured: Scott Blewett (elbow), Colin Selby (hamstring) and closer Félix Bautista, lost for the season with a new injury (shoulder).
Lots of change among the relievers, and lots of forced tapping into reserves. Yet somehow, a new outfit of Shawn Dubin, Dietrich Enns, Rico Garcia, Kade Strowd, Grant Wolfram, Albert Suárez, Keegan Akin, and Yennier Cano has held the line.
More than held the line, actually: since September began, this collective of randos is baseball’s best bullpen. And by a lot, actually: their 1.25 ERA well outshines the next best, which is Seattle’s (2.37).
How to explain this? Word is, they’re getting lucky, with a FIP of 4.00 and a BABIP of .180. But it’s not only that. This outfit has been masterful at avoiding hits (lowest opposing average in MLB, third-best WHIP), stranding runners (best in the bigs), eliciting ground balls (fourth-best), and avoiding hard contact (fourth-best).
This is a massive turnaround, to be clear, which you can see in the fact that on the season, the Orioles’ bullpen numbers are overall quite bad. They have the 23rd ranked bullpen by ERA (a none-too-impressive 4.43), plus a WHIP of 1.393, and an overall 1.6 WAR, according to Fangraphs (the best, San Diego, has 6.7 WAR). Over the year, this outfit also walked more batters than all but Washington and the Athletics.
It is strange that people who were actually given real contracts (Kittredge, Domínguez, Soto) are being outplayed by a bunch of waiver wire pickups, but that’s where we are.
Who’s leading the turnaround? Some shocking (albeit unsustainable) numbers are being put up this month by:
- Grant Wolfram (0 ER, 2.2 IP),
- Shawn Dubin (0 ER, 3.1 IP),
- Kade Strowd (0 ER, 3.1 IP),
- Dietrich Enns (1.42 ERA, 6.1 IP),
- Rico Garcia (1.42 ERA, 6.1 IP),
- Albert Suárez (1.50 ERA, 6.0 IP), and
- Keegan Akin (2.08 ERA, 4.1 IP).
Even Yennier Cano, bringing up the rear, has a 2.45 ERA in 3.2 innings, his best since a scoreless March/April (9.2 IP).
Is it a rising tide lifting all pitchers? Lucky contagion? It’s not bad opponents, despite Pittsburgh being bad, because the Orioles also did this against San Diego and Los Angeles.
A few of the new guys have found weapons they didn’t used to. Rico Garcia has developed a plus curveball (+3) and slider (+4). Dietrich Enns, who’s been a revelation this year, has a ruthless changeup tha resembles his fastball. Grant Wolfram, a 27-year-old rookie, possesses a good slider/fastball/curveball combo. Yennier Cano has a new grip on his changeup.
That the Orioles’ B-team bullpen is outperforming the original A-team is surprising. It’s not like the pitching coaches have changed, midway through the season. Whatever this is, it’s encouraging. That’s the glass half-full account The glass half-empty version: maybe our front office’s A-team was bad. Seranthony Domínguez and Gregory Soto had heat, but little control, and it never really worked out for them. Yet this is the same front office that miraculously unearthed gems from out of nowhere in Dietrich Enns and Rico Garcia.
Will most of this bunch be back next season? A 1.25 ERA is not sustainable, and especially not from a collective of journeymen. But I’m guessing we see tryouts for all, barring severe regressions down the stretch, and offers for many.
So far, against all odds, none of a random selection of backup bullpen relievers has been in in the least disappointing. It’s unexpected, but it’s one of the reasons Orioles baseball has gone back to watchable again.
The team finally living up to its early-season promise—with a completely different, unplanned set of pitchers. Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good.
