With the return of Kyle Bradish and John Means on the horizon, we look at the biggest change each pitcher needs to make in order to keep his rotation spot.
Another week, another concern for this up-and-down Orioles team. Last week we were all wringing our hands over the offense after struggles against Kansas City and Pittsburgh. That’s no longer much of a concern after the O’s’ bats came alive against Boston and Milwaukee, putting up 35 runs and 12 home runs over their last six games. The concern of the week has now shifted to the Orioles’ pitching staff, particularly the back end of the rotation.
Even after injuries to Kyle Bradish and John Means in spring training, no one’s faith in the top two of the Orioles rotation ever wavered. Corbin Burnes is a Cy Young winner, Grayson Rodriguez a former top pitching prospect—and so far this season, they’ve pitched up to those expectations. If you look at the American League leaderboards for innings pitched, ERA, strikeouts or WHIP, you never have to scroll far to find Burnes or Rodriguez. More importantly, the Orioles are a combined 7-0 when their two best pitchers start.
The back three of this rotation—Dean Kremer, Tyler Wells and Cole Irvin—are providing the majority of the Orioles’ pitching concerns. Baseball stats often involve a lot of complicated math but in this case, it’s simple: if the O’s are 7-0 when Burnes or Rodriguez pitches, that means they’re 3-6 when the other three take the mound.
That’s not to say they’ve been outright horrible—though their combined ERA of 5.79 doesn’t exactly paint that picture. The trio have had starts where they pitched well enough and the bats didn’t back them up. They’ve also had starts where they put the Orioles in a hole, but the bats were able to dig the team out of it. Then they’ve just had starts where they were flat-out bad.
The silver lining for these struggles is that it’s unlikely all three stick in the rotation for the entire season. After all, both Bradish and Means still figure to play big parts in this Orioles season. Kremer, Wells and Irvin essentially have two audition periods going forward: one to keep their spot once Means is called up in April or May, and another to stay on as the fifth starter when Bradish is ready to return. With that in mind, we look at the key to every starter’s improvement as they hope to keep their rotation spots.
Dean Kremer: Take inspiration from Kyle Bradish and Corbin Burnes
At face value, this may seem like I’m telling Dean Kremer to just pitch better—which admittedly isn’t the best analysis or advice. However, where Kremer could stand to be more like Bradish and Burnes is not just in his results, but his approach.
Kremer’s go-to pitch this season has been his four-seam fastball, which he throws about 32% of the time. The only problem with this approach is that Kremer’s fastball is getting hammered. In 2024, opponents are hitting .368 against the heater with a .895 slugging percentage. Three of the four home runs and four of the seven total extra-base hits Kremer has given up came off his fastball.
Bradish had a similar problem as a rookie when his fastball was statistically one of the worst four-seamers in baseball. Bradish’s solution: make the four-seamer a secondary offering instead of his go-to pitch. From his rookie season in 2022 to last year in 2023, Bradish cut his fastball usage from 44% to 22%. Instead of throwing a lot of early count fastballs, he started throwing more first and second-pitch sliders and the strategy of pitching backwards propelled him toward a top 5 finish in Cy Young voting.
Kremer has the arsenal to follow Bradish’s example. Kremer’s cutter has great horizontal movement and at times it looks like a slider. The average horizontal break on Kremer’s cutter is 5.6 inches, double the horizontal break of Burnes’ cutter. Kremer has always been better about locating his cutter down in the zone, whereas his fastball tends to end up over the plate. The more Kremer establishes himself at the bottom of the zone, the better he’s able to set up his downward-breaking curveball and splitter. There’s no guarantee that Kremer can throw his cutter enough to make it his primary pitcher, but in Bradish and Burnes he has the perfect examples of how he can adjust his approach to find better results.
Tyler Wells: Pitch less to contact
What I wanted to write when it comes to ways Wells can improve is “stop sucking so much in the second inning.” After all, opponents are hitting .500 off Wells in that frame and he has a 21.00 ERA. Again though, that’s maybe not the most actionable advice for the big 6’8” righty.
Wells loves to live in the zone, as evidenced by his extremely low walk rate. This approach was successful for Wells for much of last season, as he led MLB with a 0.93 WHIP in the first half last year. This year, however, batters are clearly finding it much easier to hit what Wells is putting in the zone.
To a certain extent, Wells getting hit hard on his pitches in the zone is not that surprising. Wells doesn’t throw particularly hard, with his average fastball velocity sitting in the 28th percentile. The O’s righty’s fastball also has below-average horizontal movement, meaning he doesn’t get much late movement that can cause hitters to swing and miss. The end result is him pounding the zone with a fastball that is easier to hit, and that fastball getting pounded in return.
Unlike Kremer, I don’t think limiting his fastball use is Wells’s path to success. Wells’s best secondary pitch is his changeup, and you can’t properly set up that changeup without throwing your fastball. Instead, the former Rule 5 pick needs to be willing to throw more pitches outside the zone.
Hitters are chasing 35% of Wells’s pitches outside the zone—good enough to put him in the 90th percentile. If he can start throwing more fastballs just off the plate, he’ll get more weak contact on the heater instead of it getting blasted. By working more early count sliders away from righties, or changeups away from lefties, we should see more soft dribblers and swings and misses. Wells’s five-pitch mix means he can effectively attack hitters from all different angles and doesn’t need to only live in the zone. As soon as he starts spending a little more time outside the zone, we should see a more effective Wells.
Cole Irvin: Find a pitch you can consistently throw for strikes
Watching Cole Irvin pitch can be both mesmerizing and maddening at the same time. Perhaps more than any other pitcher on the Orioles staff, Irvin gets a ridiculous amount of movement out of all his pitches. His sinker will dart down and away from righties and run back over the outside corner against lefties—all at the last moment before it crosses the plate. Irvin throws his curveball where it starts in the left-handed batter’s box and then whips back across the zone. His cutter and changeup also show impressive side-to-side movement that can keep hitters guessing.
The biggest problem with Irvin and all his impressive movement is it feels like even he doesn’t know where the ball is going once he releases it. Too often he tries to throw his sinker down and away to righties and it either ends up way too down or way too away. The curveball is an even bigger guessing game. Sometimes he executes it perfectly, clipping the outside edge or burying it inside against right-handed hitters. Other times, it’s six inches outside or way above the zone or just spinning in the middle of the plate.
Irvin almost has the opposite problem as Wells in that he doesn’t throw enough quality strikes. If he could start to consistently locate his sinker on the bottom third of the zone, it would better set up the rest of his wildness. Curveball that’s at the top of the zone instead of the bottom where it should be? That’ll freeze hitters who are sitting on a low fastball. Cutter that runs a bit too far inside? That’ll generate more late swings and weak contact if hitters are trying to hit something that breaks down and instead, it breaks in on them.
Currently, hitters just ignore Irvin’s pitches that dance around the outside of the zone as they wait for something left over the middle. If the lefty can find just one pitch that he can consistently locate in the zone, it’ll make all of his pitches that much more effective.