Orioles new pregame drill is suddenly fueling stolen base surge

Over the past few seasons, it has felt like the Baltimore Orioles weren't taking advantage of their speed. With a few exceptions, most of the Orioles young players they've called up over the years have had speed, but outside of Gunnar Henderson, large stolen base numbers eluded them.

Early this season, when the Orioles only had three stolen bases through their first 13 games, it seemed like they were going to continue to be one of the less aggressive base-stealing teams in all of baseball. The first base coach, Jason Bourgeois, did something that nobody had seen before.

The 80-inch flat-screen TV was not hard to spot as an oddity during the Orioles' warm-ups. Reporters covering the team snapped photos of the giant screen positioned between first base and the mound and asked Bourgeious what it was for as soon as he was made available.

Bourgeois explained that the TV was showing alternating videos of opposing pitchers performing their normal windups or pickoff moves. The idea was to give the players a better feel for what pitchers do on the mound, and pick up on any tells that they're about to either pitch or try to pick them off.

Orioles coach Jason Bourgeois is trying new things and getting results

Watching video of opposing pitchers before a game is not a new idea. With the iPads, players are watching videos all the time, tune into any game and pay attention to when the camera pans to the dugout, and see if they don't half the team examining their iPads to pick up on tells and see if a pitcher might be tipping or any manner of things that can be gleaned from video.

What is novel and unique about Bourgeois' approach is the way it positions the video to the player. Players on bad teams often complain that they're given the analytics and video but not much direction. There's a big difference between a coach telling you to make sure to watch a video on the opposing team's starter and a coach wheeling out a massive TV onto the field and displaying a custom video mashup for you to train with.

The memory of standing on the dirt where you're going to play in a couple of hours and looking at a giant TV is going to stand out more in your mind when you're in the game, much more than a video your coach emailed you on an iPad in the clubhouse. It's much more visceral, it's much more real. You get on first, and you see the pitcher that was on your coach's field TV, and it's triggering.

More than anything else, rolling the TV out onto the field sent a message. We're going to steal bases. There is an implied "don't make me waste my time" factor with the way Bougious deployed the TV. If you get on base and don't steal after your coach went through the trouble of finding five extension cords and getting that TV on the field, it's honestly kind of rude.

The Orioles have responded really well to this. In the 13 games before the TV, they stole three total bases; in the next five, they stole eight. It's clear it's now a focus, and it's yielding results. Hopefully, the enthusiasm for steals spreads, and the Orioles' many fast players take more advantage of their speed to help the team win games.

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