Orioles get a gut punch from recent power rankings

This year, the MLB standings are as tightly compressed as they've been in years. A quarter of the season is over, and there's not a single team in the American League that is more than four games out of a playoff spot. The National League is a bit more differentiated, but some of the worst teams in that league by record are teams that many people are optimistic will, at some point, claw their way back into the playoffs.

It's rare to get this far into a season and only have one or two teams that are really out of it because of their record. There are teams that everyone agrees aren't very good, probably won't make the playoffs, but up until this point, fans of 90% of the teams in the league can convince themselves they have a shot at the playoffs.

With the standings this compacted, the exercise of creating power rankings becomes more subjective than ever, and rankers are freed up to rank teams by how their talent stacks up and not feel obligated to move teams around based on their record. Which is why it was so painful to see The Athletic's MLB power rankings rank the Orioles 28th in the league, ahead of only the Rockies and Giants, who are the only two teams that are already basically eliminated from the playoffs based on their division.

At 19-24, the Orioles have the same amount of wins as the Tigers, who were ranked ninth in these power rankings so the fact that they find themselves at the very end of the rankings means the rankers looked at their roster and what they've done so far and said "you're not better than your record, in fact you're much worse than your record."

So the question becomes, is this a fair ranking?

The Orioles deserve the National media skepticism they're getting

The Orioles objectively have a bottom-five rotation in baseball. Starting pitching is really important when it comes to forecasting future success. If a team has three or four really good starters they can trust to keep them in games, it's easier to find wins on the schedule even if your offense has flaws. This is certainly why several teams with similar or worse records than the Orioles are ranked higher than them. It's hard to look at what the Orioles rotation has done this season and think it's going to get a lot better.

The other thing that wasn't mentioned in the power rankings article but has to be part of the equation is that the Orioles aren't getting positive contributions from most of the players on their active roster. Offensively, they're being buoyed by four players, and only one of those four is in the lineup every day. On the pitching side, all their best pitchers are relivers; their best starter by WAR is Zach Eflin, who pitched a whopping three innings before leaving his first start with a season-ending injury.

The Orioles are like one of those Viking boats with all the oars, and only like five guys are rowing. It feels like a matter of time before they get tired and the ship sinks.

The Orioles have the potential to make this ranking look very silly

Now that the opposition has been acknowledged, it's time to make the case for the Orioles, which can be summarized in a few short words: Be for real. There's not a nice way to say this, but there are a bunch of teams that are much worse than this Orioles team. Several teams that they've either swept or soundly beaten in series already this year are ranked well ahead of them.

It would be uncouth to go through each team ahead of the Orioles and list off the reasons they're worse, so just focusing on the Orioles, the main reason for optimism that they are in fact, not the 28th best team in the league is that they have too many talented players with strong track records that are going to play better at some point. Gunnar Henderson is not going to finish the season with an OBP of .263. Pete Alonso is not going to hit .210 for the year, and Kyle Bradish is not going to have an ERA in the high fours when the season is over.

The Orioles have talent, and that talent is mostly healthy. They just need their best players to be their best players, and they'll prove to the doubters that they're not the 28th best team in the league.

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