Important dates for transactions, awards, and league meetings over the offseason.
The Orioles have racked up 192 regular season wins over the past two seasons and have exactly zero postseason game victories to show for it. Will they be able to make moves this offseason that can help change that story? We’ll start to find out as soon as the World Series ends and roster movement opens up. That could happen as soon as tonight.
Below are the important dates for the 2024-2025 offseason, leading all the way through to next year’s Opening Day.
End of World Series: Free agency
Once the World Series is over, the season is over and so are contracts that run out after 2024. These Orioles will be free agents at that time:
- Corbin Burnes
- James McCann
- John Means
- Anthony Santander
- Austin Slater
End of World Series: 60-day injured list activation
Players on the 60-day IL do not count against the 40-man roster. However, there is no injured list over the offseason, so these players are added back onto the roster. These Orioles will return to the roster:
- Félix Bautista
- Kyle Bradish
- Jorge Mateo
- Tyler Wells
Since Means, who is also on the 60-day IL, is becoming a free agent, he will not be automatically returned to the roster. With the number of free agents equal to the number of 60-day IL players, the Orioles will not face any immediate crunch upon returning these guys to the roster.
Five days after the World Series: Qualifying offers
If the Orioles want to get potential draft pick compensation for a departing free agent, they must extend a qualifying offer of a one-year, $21.1 million contract for 2025. The amount changes every year based on the average of the top 125 salaries in MLB. It seems likely that Burnes and Santander will receive the QO from the Orioles.
Players have ten days to accept or decline the QO. If an Orioles QO free agent declines the contract and goes on to sign a new contract with another team worth at least $50 million guaranteed, the team would receive a 2025 draft pick after the first round. If the contract is below that amount, the bonus pick comes before the start of the third round.
Five days after the World Series: Contract options
Contract option decisions by either teams or players must be made by this date, which will be somewhere from November 4-7. These are the Orioles players who have 2025 team options:
- Danny Coulombe – $4 million
- Seranthony Domínguez – $8 million ($500,000 buyout)
- Eloy Jiménez – $16.5 million ($3 million buyout)
- Ryan O’Hearn – $8 million
- Cionel Pérez – $2.2 million (if declined, goes to arbitration)
Except for Pérez, if the team declines to exercise one of these contract option, that player becomes a free agent. It seems likely that the team will pick up the Coulombe, Domínguez, and O’Hearn options and decline the Jiménez option. The White Sox are committed to pay half of the buyout if Jiménez’s option is declined as part of the trade agreement that brought him to Baltimore.
November 15 – Rule 5 draft protection deadline
This is the date where teams have to add eligible minor leaguers to their 40-man roster to prevent them from being exposed to the Rule 5 draft.
Players who are eligible for the draft this year include anyone who signed at 18 or younger and has been in the minors for five years, or anyone who signed at 19 or older and has been in the minors for four years. Broadly, that’s 2020 or earlier draft signings from high schools and 2021 or earlier draft signings from colleges.
The Orioles have already added, or traded away, players who might otherwise have needed to be placed on the 40-man roster this offseason. There aren’t many decisions left to be made. Based on how the 2024 season went, the most likely eligible Orioles prospect to be added is pitcher Brandon Young. He could be the only one. A year ago, the Orioles didn’t add any new players ahead of this deadline.
November 17 – Non-tender deadline
If the Orioles decide that an arbitration-eligible player is likely to command a salary that they don’t feel is worth it, and they don’t want to risk that the player won’t be able to be traded, they can decline to tender a 2025 contract to that player. Being “non-tendered” makes the player a free agent immediately.
The Orioles have a large group of arbitration-eligible players this year. The list, with projected salaries from Cot’s Contracts:
- Ryan Mountcastle – $6.2 million
- Adley Rutschman – $5.5 million
- Gregory Soto – $4.5 million
- Jorge Mateo – $3.3 million
- Dean Kremer – $3 million
- Ramón Urías – $3 million
- Trevor Rogers – $2.5 million
- Tyler Wells – $1.975 million
- Kyle Bradish – $1.6 million
- Emmanuel Rivera – $1.5 million
- Jacob Webb – $1.5 million
- Keegan Akin – $1.25 million
- Burch Smith – $1.25 million
- Matt Bowman – $1.1 million
For these players, the choice is more about whether the Orioles want this player taking up a roster spot than whether they’re worth the money. Rivera, Smith, and Bowman seem like potential non-tender candidates.
There is a January 9, 2025 soft deadline that will probably spur a lot of settlements of the contracts. This is the date where teams and players have to agree on a contract or else submit salary numbers for formal arbitration hearings. In recent years, nearly every team has adopted a “file and trial” posture, with limited further negotiation past this date.
Awards season
- November 11 – Top 3 finishers announced for BBWAA awards
- November 18 – Rookie of the Year winners announced
- November 19 – Manager of the Year winners announced
- November 20 – Cy Young winners announced
- November 21 – MVP winners announced
If Colton Cowser is the AL Rookie of the Year winner, the Orioles will qualify for a bonus draft pick after the first round next year. There is a pretty good chance we will hear Gunnar Henderson among the top MVP finishers, and possibly Corbin Burnes among the top Cy finishers, though there’s almost no possibility of a win for either of them.
December 8-11: Winter meetings in Dallas
Some years, a lot happens. Other years, not much happens. Last year’s winter meetings, the biggest move to happen for any team was the Orioles signing Craig Kimbrel.
The Rule 5 draft takes place on the last day of the meetings. The Orioles did not select a player last year. They have not kept a Rule 5 player for the full season since Tyler Wells, who was picked in 2020.
2025 is closer than you think
- January 15: Opening of international amateur signing period
- January 21: BBWAA Hall of Fame vote results announced
- February 14(ish): Pitchers and catchers report to spring training (not officially announced yet)
- March 27: Orioles Opening Day in Toronto
- March 31: Orioles home opener vs. Red Sox