The strikeout numbers dropped while the walks stayed high in 2024
Trace Bright is probably an Orioles prospect you haven’t given much thought to. He spent the 2024 season with the Double-A Bowie Baysox and did not have impressive stats enough to make many people sit up and notice. Still, MLB Pipeline ranked him as the fourth-best pitching prospect in the Orioles’ farm system (#12 overall), so it would be nice for the Orioles if he could show improvement moving forward.
Bright was drafted in the fifth round of the 2022 draft out of Auburn University. He has progressed steadily through the minor leagues to this point. He appeared in a few games with the Low-A Delmarva Shorebirds the year he was drafted, then started 2023 with the High-A Aberdeen IronBirds. He spent nearly the entire season with Aberdeen but got promoted to Bowie to end the season.
This past year, Bright made 27 starts with Bowie with an uninspiring stat line of 4.18 ERA, 1.482 WHIP, 4.8 BB/9, 9.6 K/9. None of those are particularly good, but the walk rate is what jumps out most. The troubling thing is that it’s not an outlier, not something that crept up as Bright started facing tougher competition. He was walking everyone when he was in college as well.
At Auburn, Bright did not have great results in the ERA or walks department, but he did put up pretty good strikeout rates. He has a 60-grade curveball that he can play off of his mid-90s fastball and that combo helped him to rack up those strikeouts. But his command is poor which is how he ended up walking 4.1 batters per nine in college, and he hasn’t improved that since coming to professional baseball.
In 22 games with Aberdeen in 2023, Bright struck out an impressive 13.8 batters per nine innings, which meant he was someone you could dream on a little bit, even with 48 walks in 82.2 innings. But with Bowie this year his strikeouts dropped to a more human 9.6 per nine innings, while his walk rate stayed high. He also began to allow hits at the highest rate of his minor-league career.
Without the gaudy strikeout rate, Trace Bright goes from intrigue to disappointment. FanGraphs, who ranked him as the #32 prospect on the Orioles, has nice things to say about Bright’s curve and fastball, but due to his long arm action and lack of control they project him for long relief ultimately.
Turning 24 at the end of this month, Bright is younger than the average Double-A player but not so young that he should be expected to be in over his head. But he’s young enough that a repeat of Double-A isn’t an indictment of his talent and he still has a chance to improve.
It seems most likely that a Double-A repeat will happen as the Orioles try to harness Bright’s talent. But it’s a tall order to ask a guy to cut down walks when he hasn’t been able to do so in either college or pro ball. But if he is able to do so without losing any more of his strikeout prowess, he could find a home with the Orioles in the bullpen.
Double-A Bowie is where Bright should start the 2025 season and hopefully the third time will be the charm.
Previous 2024 prospect reviews: Heston Kjerstad, Frederick Bencosme, Justin Armbruester, Leandro Arias, Brandon Young, Creed Willems
Tomorrow: Braylin Tavera