Orioles built depth, but skipped the one thing they needed the most

The Baltimore Orioles were among the most active teams in the league this entire offseason. Trades, signings, you name it, the O's were in on it. After a last-place finish in the AL East, sitting on their hands was not an option.

Individually, there are some moves that look very good. Off the field, Pete Alonso has been great, and his presence in the lineup can be transformative in 2026. Swiping Andrew Kittredge back from the Cubs for cash after extracting a promising 18-year-old shortstop prospect in Wilfri De La Cruz from Chicago just a few months earlier looks like a stroke of genius.

With all the moves, one has to look back at what priority No. 1 truly was. Getting an ace was paramount. Mike Elias said so, himself. They missed on that front, instead opting for a trade to acquire Shane Baz, a reunion with Zach Eflin, and signing Chris Bassitt. That's certainly a lot of depth being added, but is it enough?

Some, like the rival executive whom Ken Rosenthal spoke to, think so. “They have a really good lineup, good thump, some high upside bets in the rotation, a good history of building bullpens, and they didn’t mortgage the future to compete in ‘26,” the executive said. “I think they will be in the wild-card hunt.”

We disagree. We think that with a few tweaks, the Orioles could have preserved most of their haul while sacrificing a little rotation depth for certainty at the top.

Orioles had an active offseason, but the totality of the haul is still lacking

Assuming everyone is healthy, the Orioles rotation has six capable starters. Trevor Rogers, Kyle Bradish, Chris Bassitt, Shane Baz, Zach Eflin, and Dean Kremer. There's also adequate depth in the form of Cade Povich, Tyler Wells, and Albert Suarez. That depth is needed because four of the six top starters: Rogers, Bradish, Baz, and Eflin are all injury concerns.

But are six starters really necessary? Are we sure that one of these intriguing but risky arms can ascend to become a true front-of-the-rotation starter? No.

And when you look at the AL East gauntlet, something really stands out. The Boston Red Sox have a legit Cy Young candidate in Garrett Crochet, plus another horse at the top in Ranger Suarez, as well as depth for days. The New York Yankees have Max Fried, who has three top-five Cy Young finishes on his resume, the return of 2023 AL Cy Young winner Gerrit Cole, plus loads of young arms chomping at the bit. The Toronto Blue Jays also have six capable starters, and their big splash, Dylan Cease, was a top-four Cy Young finisher in two of the last four seasons.

All of those teams have potent lineups as well, so it's not like Baltimore can simply outslug them. Between Bassit and Eflin, the Orioles are spending $28.5 million this season. Ranger Suarez will make an average of $26 million annually. Would the Orioles have been better off signing Suarez instead and rolling with Povich as the sixth starter in the event of injury? Yes.

Or they could have non-tendered Ryan Mountcastle and put the nearly $7 million he'll make into the pot and paid Framber Valdez. If they really didn't want to spend the money, they could have saved the prospects they swapped for Shane Baz and his 4.87 ERA and used them on Freddy Peralta. That wouldn't have precluded them from still going out and signing Bassitt or Eflin if they still chose to do so.

As Rosenthal notes, even with all these additions, the payroll has only risen by about $20 million. Are we really satisfied with that after David Rubenstein told us last year that he doesn't have a financial limit? Or let's go back to what Elias told us at the beginning of October, when he said the best arms "are always going to command long deals" and he wouldn't take going there off the table. Well, we got a pair of one-year deals for mid-rotation veterans instead.

The Orioles are a better team today than they were this time last year. There is no debate about that. But is their quantity-over-quality approach, especially in the starting rotation, enough? Not when you play in the AL East, it's not.