The Orioles need to add two starters to their rotation for 2026 to have much hope of contending. The replacements for Tomoyuki Sugano and Zach Eflin need to be much better than either one of them to give the Orioles a chance. And Dean Kremer needs to find a place at the back of the rotation instead of being pushed into more. The other in-house rotation options (Grayson Rodriguez, Brandon Young, Cade Povich) aren’t the players you can pencil into a rotation if you are serious about improving.
The problem
with this year’s free agent class of starting pitchers is that they aren’t particularly ace-like. Every starting pitcher near the top of the free agent rankings has question marks, and maybe in a different year they wouldn’t be the kind of players your favorite team would go after.
But the Orioles do not have the luxury of waiting. They need to make the moves this season to put themselves over the top after their very disappointing 87-loss 2025. To that end, they need to sign a pitcher like Dylan Cease.
Right-handed pitcher Dylan Cease will turn 30 years old on December 28th and has been one of the most reliable starting pitchers in baseball over the last five years. Cease has made at least 32 starts every season since 2021 and in fact leads all pitchers in starts in that span. He never goes on the Injured List. That is in stark contrast to the Orioles, who had just two starters make more than 20 starts last season. Aside from Sugano and Kremer, every other pitcher was either too injured or too bad to pitch a full season.
The downside to Cease is that his results are erratic, to say the least. After impressive seasons in 2021 and 2022, including as Cy Young runner-up in 2022, Cease had a disappointing 2023 with a 4.58 ERA and 1.418 WHIP. There was a lot of trade talk surrounding Cease after the 2023 season, and ultimately, the White Sox dealt him to the Padres, where he bounced back in 2024.
As has become his way, Cease alternated between good and less good seasons in two years with the Padres. In 2025, Cease had his worst season since his rookie year. He posted a 4.55 ERA and made 32 starts, totaling just 168 innings. That’s less than 5 1/2 innings per start. Not great.
But results aside, there are good things in Cease’s pitching profile, which is why he is projected to get a large payday this year. He has always been a high-strikeout guy, and last year his 11.5 K/9 was the best in the league. His fastball velocity is in the high 90s, averaging 97.1 mph in 2025. And per people who are in the know, his slider is one of the best.
Even with his down results in 2025, one look at his Statcast numbers shows that a lot of his numbers remain steady over the past few years. Whiff %, K %, Chase %, all very good every year. There’s no reason to think that will change in 2026. But it will remain to be seen how those stats will translate in results, especially given his up and down nature over his career.
MLB Trade Rumors ranks Cease as the third-best free agent and the best pitcher. They predict he’ll receive a seven-year, $189 million contract. That is a lot of money, an average of $27 million per year. If he got seven years, it would take him through his age-36 season.
The thing that gives me pause about Crease more than anything is the simple fact that he does not pitch deep into games. That’s a dangerous fact for almost any team. But the Orioles are also in a place this offseason where they need to upgrade multiple parts of the bullpen. If they go into the season with a bullpen weakness and a star free agent who can’t complete six innings, that’s not a great mix.
Cease has the potential to have the biggest upside of any free agent pitcher this offseason, though he might be a more volatile choice than Framber Valdez. But like I said earlier, the Orioles have to sign a top pitcher even if that player isn’t a slam dunk. There are no slam dunks out there, and the Orioles are in a position now where they have to take the shot.
It would be great to have the luxury to wait for the perfect pitcher, but that isn’t where the Orioles are right now. They are in win-at-all-costs mode, which means going big for a pitcher with a high upside. And for them, that means Dylan Cease.
