3 Orioles prospects whose hot starts you probably haven't noticed

The Baltimore Orioles may not have the league's top-ranked farm system anymore, but that doesn't mean the cupboard is bare when it comes to prospect talent. In fact, three weeks or so into the 2025 Minor League Baseball season, many of the hottest performing prospects down on the farm in Birdland happen to be pitching prospects.

That happens when, contrary to popular belief, the Orioles have become a well-respected organization for pitching development.

Two pitching prospects in particular are off to highly impressive starts their first few turns through the rotation, beginning with RHP Michael Forret. A consensus top 30 prospect in the Orioles system, Forret has made three starts for the High-A Aberdeen Ironbirds and is sporting a 0.61 ERA with a 36.5% strikeout rate and .067 batting average against.

The one blemish that has stood out in watching his first three starts has been the stretches where his control can falter a bit, but after walking five batters through his first two outings, Forret put together a dominant outing this week, striking out nine with just one walk and no hits allowed in five innings.

A 14th round pick out of the JUCO ranks in 2023, Forret has seen his velo increase a couple of ticks (now sitting in the mid-90s), he's added more than 15 pounds to his 6'3" frame, and he's up to seven pitches now in his repertoire. After logging 60 productive innings in High-A to end the 2024 season, Forret should get the bump up to Double-A in the near future, should his current level of performance continue.

These 3 Orioles prospects are off to scorching-hot starts in 2025

As good as Forret's numbers have been early on, his teammate Braxton Bragg has him beat. The 24-year-old right-handed pitcher has logged 16.1 innings across his first three starts, allowing a grand total of zero earned runs. He's also sporting a 30% strikeout rate and 8% walk rate. Bragg was an 8th round pick out of Dallas Baptist in 2023 and hasn't appeared on a top 30 prospect list since being drafted, but is trending towards making his first list after posting a 30% strikeout rate and 5% walk rate in 96 innings at the Low-A level last season.

On the hitting side, Vance Honeycutt is off to a strong start after being selected in the first round of last year's draft. The strikeout rate is still very high, but he's rocking a 23% walk rate and a 75% contact rate with an 8.4% swinging-strike rate, this after a 59% contact rate 17% swinging-strike rate in a small sample last season.

But there's an outfielder one level below Honeycutt down in Low-A Delmarva off to a very strong start that may be noteworthy. That would be 21-year-old outfielder Kevin Guerrero. Guerrero was traded to the Orioles back in 2022, along with LHP Antonio Velez and a Player To Be Named Later who would eventually become RHP Yaqui Rivera (currently pitching very well in a relief role for Double-A Chesapeake), for relief arms Tanner Scott and Cole Sulser.

Guerrero instantly became an intriguing prospect in the Orioles system with positive reports coming from his time in Miami, but he struggled in Low-A last season after just an ok year in the Florida Complex League in 2023. He's back with Delmarva and off to a very strong start.

Through his first 10 games, Guerrero is hitting .400 with a .526 on-base percentage and a 196 wRC+. He also has four doubles and seven walks (18.4% walk rate) over that span. At the time of the trade, Guerrero had above-average grades on hit, speed, and fielding tools and according to his 2022 prospect report from when he ranked 29th in Miami's system, the belief from some was that Guerrero was going to be a long-term project with more than enough intriguing tools to potentially be worth the wait. Now 21 and much bigger physically, could we finally be seeing the Kevin Guerrero breakout? It's going to take a lot more than 10 games to know for sure, but it's worth monitoring for now.