Baltimore Orioles: The Worst Pitching Staffs Of The Decade

Baltimore Orioles starting pitchers didn’t have much success last decade.

With another decade behind us, blogs and websites everywhere are putting together all kinds of fun All-Decade lists from top moments to best seasons and just about anything else you can think of. As much fun as they are to read, especially during the winter months of no baseball and zero offseason activity from the Baltimore Orioles, they are even more fun to put together as you look back at many of the more memorable moments of recent memory.

We have already put together our Orioles All-Decade Team (read here) and we have looked at the top pitchers of the decade (here), while Joe Trezza over at MLB.com has put together a number of All-Decade type lists, including the top ten home runs of the decade.

Most of these pieces have focused on the positives, but let’s switch things up a bit. The Orioles put up five seasons of .500 or better baseball over the last ten years, which included three trips to the playoffs, but one thing that haunted all of these teams was the pitching.

According to Fangraphs’ Wins Above Replacement, Baltimore Orioles starting pitchers were worth 10.0 fWAR in 2016, the best performance of the decade. For context, a 10.0 fWAR season in 2019 would have put the Orioles as the 19th best starting group in the majors, just behind the San Diego Padres.

One may assume that Orioles starters in 2019 put up the worst performance of the decade, but they definitely had some competition. Let’s take a look at the three worst seasons for starting pitchers in Baltimore since 2010 (these numbers do not include any work out of the bullpen, only games started). Did 2019 take the top spot?