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Baltimore Orioles: 3 takeaways from the Birds’ first home series win of 2018
The Baltimore Orioles rode steady run production and a pair of strong starts to their first home series win of the year.
They didn’t always look like a well-oiled machine, but the Baltimore Orioles still managed to take two out of three games from the Detroit Tigers over the weekend. With their 5-3 victory on Sunday, the Birds clinched their first home series of the year, a nice consolation to cap off a rough April.
The offense was consistently solid, scoring either five or six runs in all three games. As has been the case for most of the season, Manny Machado and Trey Mancini did a lot of heavy lifting, and they got a big assist from Pedro Alvarez, who appears to have found his power stroke after a slow start to the season.
But in the end, it was Baltimore’s starting pitching that played the biggest role in the outcome of the series. The Orioles got two good starts from Chris Tillman and Kevin Gausman, winning both of those games; their lone loss, featuring a seven-run performance from Andrew Cashner, was sandwiched in the middle.
In the end, the Orioles outscored the opposition 16-12, good for one of their best three-game stretches of the year. The offense is humming along nicely, but the rebuilding Tigers aren’t exactly a marquee opponent. Time will tell if the O’s can keep it up against the Angels, who boast a superior pitching staff.
Until then, here are three takeaways from the Orioles’ big weekend series.
1. Pedro Alvarez is back
The Orioles are a big-hitting team on paper, but with Mark Trumbo and Jonathan Schoop on the DL and Chris Davis off to an abysmal start, that power hasn’t come across on the field. Through Saturday, they were tied for 11th in the AL with 29 home runs, well behind low-budget squads like Chicago and Oakland.
Enter Alvarez. The former first-round pick headed into the weekend sporting a meager line of .192/.323/.346, but he made up for that lack of production with four majestic home runs — two on Friday night and two on Sunday afternoon.
Take a look at his insurance moonshot in the eighth inning of the rubber game:
With the power surge, Alvarez improved his slash line to .237/.357/.576, one of the best on the team. MLB has no shortage of powerful corner players who can’t play defense, but if Alvarez keeps it up, he could draw modest interest at the trade deadline.
It’s not like he hasn’t produced in the past — he hit 20 doubles and 22 home runs for Baltimore in 2016, good for a .504 slugging percentage. He also co-led the NL in homers back in 2013, tying with Paul Goldschmidt. If Alvarez can continue to swing the bat like his younger self, the Orioles will benefit immensely.
2. Andrew Cashner needs to get it together
When Cashner signed a two-year deal with a team option for 2020 over the winter, it appeared that the Orioles had given themselves some flexibility. The contract length was a good fit for a contending team, but the reasonable price tag — $6.5 million this year, $9.5 million next year — would allow Dan Duquette to package the righty in a trade if things went south.
One month into the season, the Orioles own one of the worst records in the league, and Cashner’s trade value appears lower than ever. The 31-year-old faced a Tigers team that hadn’t scored a run in 22 innings when he took the mound on Saturday, and that streak was over by the fifth at bat of the game. All told, he gave up six earned runs in four innings, striking our four men and walking three others.
But while Cashner’s season ERA of 4.76 is unsightly, the worst may be yet to come. His 5.48 FIP suggests a huge regression from last year; this is corroborated by a dip in velocity that has been present all season.
In fact, Cashner headed into Saturday’s game having stranded 85.9% of his baserunners, one of the best marks in the bigs. In other words, he got lucky in his first few starts, and this weekend’s straggler could be much closer to the real Andrew Cashner.
If Cashner can turn things around, he’s a solid veteran arm who could have real value on the trade market — but until then, this looks like yet another bad contract on Baltimore’s payroll.
3. The Kevin Gausman redemption tour is real
Gausman enjoyed a breakout season in 2016, posting 4 Wins Above Replacement; last year, he was roughly half that valuable, as his ERA jumped by more than a full run.
Through his first four starts of this season, Gausman appeared to be continuing that downward trend — his numbers included a 5.57 ERA, a 6.09 FIP and a whopping 2.57 home runs per 9 innings. Fans across the country suffered flashbacks to past instances of the Orioles ruining perfectly good pitching prospects.
And then, something awesome happened: Gausman started pitching like an All-Star. It started last Monday, when he mowed down the Indians in eight two-run innings. He wasn’t quite as good on Sunday against the Tigers, lasting just under six innings, but he still managed to pitch well, gamely working around five hits and three walks. All told, his ERA for the week was a rock-solid 1.98.
Check out some of the highlights from his latest start:
Gausman’s season numbers aren’t quite as good as Dylan Bundy’s, but with a few more strong outings, the Colorado native can challenge his fellow former first-rounder for bragging rights as the Orioles’ best young arm. That there are enough young pitchers on the roster to even entertain such a debate is a reason to smile in itself.
Next: O's injury report: Trumbo set to return soon
What was your biggest takeaway from this weekend’s series? Let us know on social media, and keep it here at Birds Watcher for more updates on the Baltimore Orioles.