Orioles sign closer Ryan Helsley to a two-year contract! – REACTION & ANALYSIS

Orioles sign closer Ryan Helsley to a two-year contract! – REACTION & ANALYSIS

The Orioles have got their closer. I’ll tell you all about Ryan Hley coming up on this episode of the Locked On Orioles podcast. You are Locked on Orioles, your daily Baltimore Orioles podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. Hey there, Orioles fans. Today is Saturday, November 29th, 2025, and welcome back in to a special live edition of the Locked On Orioles podcast, part of the Locked On Network. Now, the number one sports podcast network, your team every day. As always, I am your host, Connor Nukem. And coming up on a special live Saturday episode, we’re breaking down another Orioles big roster move from the winter. This time they have checked off another box on the to-do list for this off season. They have added their closer and it is former Cardinals closer Ryan Hley who signs a 2-year 28 million dollar deal with the Orioles first reported by Jeff Passen and others. It does include a player opt out after year 1, so after 2026. So, it is still not guaranteed that the Orioles have given out a guaranteed multi-year contract to anyone because remember Tyler O’Neal also had a player opt out after year 1. But either way, the O’s have their ninth inning guy. We’re going to talk about the history of Ryan Hley in the big leagues and kind of what he brings to the Orioles, what this means for the bullpen and how this will go well. We’ll talk about reasons this could not go well, right? because it was a struggle for Helsley after he was traded to the Mets last season. And then we’ll just talk a little bit about how the rest of this roster, specifically the bullpen, will play out after getting their ninth inning guy. But that’s all coming up on this episode of the Locked Ono podcast, which is brought to you by Game Time. Download the Game Time app, create an account, and use code locked on MLB for $20 off your first purchase. So, thank you to everyone who is joining live here on the Locked On Orioles YouTube page for this episode. While you’re here, make sure to like, comment, and subscribe to the page. And if you’re listening after the fact on audio, make sure to subscribe or follow the show wherever you listen. That really, really helps us out as well. So, the Orioles have already been very busy this off seasonason. They signed Leo Tiveres to a one-year deal. They reacquired Andrew Kitridge to their bullpen in a trade. Of course, they traded Grayson Rodriguez to the Angels for outfielder Taylor Ward. And now they have their closer, Felix Bautista, who underwent shoulder surgery late last season for a torn rotator cuff and torn labroom. The timeline on that surgery is 12 months. He got it in August. So theoretically, if all goes well, the Orioles could have their All-Star closer back in September of 2026. But after he had just gotten Tommy John two years ago, now it’s a shoulder issue. I think we can feel pretty certain that we’re not going to see Felix Bautista pitch in 2026. And because of that, added to the fact that the Orioles traded away four relievers at the 2025 deadline, even though they got one back in Kitridge, and two others were going to be free agents anyway in Sodto and Dominguez. Everybody in the world knew the Orioles needed a closer. And it became apparent that there were essentially five big time legit closers available in free agency this year. And I think it also became apparent that the Orioles wanted one of them and kind of needed to sign one of them. And that is what they did here by picking up Ryan Helley on this two-year deal. So, let’s start with who is Ryan Hley and how will this kind of in what scenario does this work out for the Orioles? Ryan Helley, a 31-year-old right-handed pitcher who has pitched only for two teams in his big league career, the St. Louis Cardinals and then briefly with the New York Mets this season before hitting free agency for the first time. Helley was a fifthround pick of the Cardinals all the way back in 2015 out of Northeastern State. Did not even pitch at the division one level. Was not a big-time prospect at all. But the Cardinals got him in the fifth round and they saw something in that arm. He began as a starter early in his career, 2015, 16, and 17 as he kind of climbed his way through the Cardinals minor leagues. Even made a start in AAA in 2017. 2018, he was still starting. And then in 2019 in AAA, the transition to the bullpen really happened for Helley. And that allowed him to debut as a St. Louis Cardinal in the 2019 season. and he was really, really good. 24 appearances out of the bullpen, posted a 2.95 erra for a Cardinals team that went to the NLCS that year in 2019. But he wasn’t quite the closer yet, right? He made 12 appearances in 2020. He made 51 of them in 2021 out of the bullpen with a 456 erra. He was just kind of still showing himself as an okay reliever. And then 2022 came along and that is when Ryan Hley went from, hey, this is kind of an exciting arm to this might be one of the best relievers and one of the best closers in Major League Baseball. In 2022, Helley pitches in 54 games for the Cardinals, 64 and two/3 innings. He records only 19 saves, so it’s not like this giant number, but he posts a 1.25 25 erra in 64 and two/3 innings. Just absurd. Was basically the best reliever in baseball. Had a 39% strikeout rate to an 8% walk rate. So even with those crazy stats, his walk rate was low. The strikeout rate was absurd. He was essentially and you know he was he made the all-star team that year in 2022. He broke out to be almost unhitable. And this was coming off a 2021 season where he had a stress reaction in his right elbow. And there were questions about his health coming into 2022. He was certainly healthy and he was absolutely dominant that season. In 22, he also kind of found what his pitch mix would be. You know, in 21 he was throwing mostly four seamers and sliders, but he was still trying to jump in some other stuff, a sinker, a change up. In 2022, he just said, you know, I’m throwing a four seamer averaging 99.6 miles an hour. I’m just going to throw that thing 57% of the time. I’m going to throw my slider about a third of the time and then I’ll drop in a curveball every once in a while, but I’m going to be a fastball breaking ball guy. That’s when he kind of figured that out. And he also figured out that those pitches were unhittable. The slider had a 54% swing and miss rate in 2022. And then he backed it up in 23. Now, he wasn’t as good and he also did have a bit of an injury scare that year. He had a right forearm strain that essentially put him on the injured list from June all the way until I believe he was activated September 1st of that year. So he missed a good chunk of that season. But when he was on the field, it was still 36 and two/3 innings and still a 245 erra for Helsley. And then he got healthy again in 2024. And that was when he really truly became like an elite elite closer. He had 49 saves in 2024. He threw 65 games and posted a 2.04 erra with a 241 fip in that 2024 season. It was strikeout rate down to 30% but walk rate still holding at 8%. He was still looking great. You know, you look at the stuff. He started to change things around a little bit. His four seamer was still sitting 99.6, but he started throwing a lot more sliders. it became his mostused pitch at about 50% over the four seamer and guys just couldn’t touch his slider whether it was a righty or a lefty didn’t really matter because that slider has some really intense movement that you don’t see from a slider like it’s not your prototypical slider. It’s not really a sweeper. It’s almost like a hybrid slider curveball. It kind of looks like that death ball we’ve seen guys throw over the past couple of years where it almost goes more straight down after kind of going right to left at first. that it takes a turn down. It makes it unhittable and it makes it a good slider even against left-handed hitters which kind of protects him from being a platoon’s guy. And that is the pitch that he kind of truly unlocked I think in 2024. It was always good but he really unlocked it an extra step started throwing it more and that took him from hey this guy could be a really good closer to this guy might be the best closer in Major League Baseball in 2024. And that is what Ryan Hley looked like while still putting together a fully healthy season. Now, trade winds started to swirl around him after 2024. The Cardinals were coming off a bad year. They were getting ready to transition from John Mazak to Heim Bloom as their, you know, lead of their front office. And there were a lot of questions about what the 2025 Cardinals would look like. Helley had just the one year remaining before hitting free agency. He was coming off being maybe the best closer in baseball. And many thought, hey, the Cardinals could get a lot for Ryan Helley if they trade him, but they didn’t end up dealing him in the offseason. They brought him back to be their closer in 2025 and he wasn’t the same pitcher, but he was still great. 36 innings, 21 saves, 300 ERA. It definitely jumped up a little bit in the RA department. Strikeouts went down a little bit, walks up a little bit. He was just not exactly the same. But when you dove under the hood, it was hard to find stuff that was different, right? He he was running a 330 Babip. he was getting a little more unlucky with the balls in play that he was allowing. Home runs started to become a little bit of an issue for him even though he actually upped his ground ball rate. He went from a 4.5 home run to fly ball rate in 2022 to a 11.8% home run to fly ball rate with the Cardinals in 2025. So some balls just started leaving the yard against him that generally hadn’t in the past. But if you look at the pure stuff, it’s some of the best in Major League Baseball. He had a 129 stuff plus in 2024 and it was once again 129 with the Cardinals in 2025. You jump around the league, you’re not going to find many closers, many pitchers in general putting up those kind of stuff numbers. I mean, pretty easily from 2022 to 2024, he was a top five relief pitcher in Major League Baseball, full stop. And now he’s with the Orioles. Now, you know, you look at the fast ball’s got a 127 stuff plus that was third best in Major League Baseball this year. The slider is just an unbelievable pitch. It’s a fantastic mix that he has and that’s what the Orioles are going to be banking on, right? It’s a slider at 89. It’s a fast ball at 99 and and you know, it’s sat 99, but he regularly touches 100 and above. And then there’s a curveball and a cutter and a change up he might throw in there. But really, you’re going to see Slider and Force Seamer for more than 90% of the offerings. The issue this year, despite all of that, was that he was a different pitcher with the Cardinals and then he was traded to the Mets at the deadline because the Mets were in it, the Cardinals were out of it. Helley was an impending free agent and he was downright terrible with the Mets. Like a concerning amount of terrible. And this is why if you go back to my free agent closer wish list episode I did a couple of weeks ago back on the 17th I ranked the top six closers out there and I put Ryan Hley fifth on that list and I did say on that episode I put Ailio Pagan sixth and then I said all right here’s a break. I said if the Orioles sign any of the top five guys I will be happy. So they signed number five and I and help you with that. And you know the projection was two years 23 million he gets two years 28 million. pretty much what you would think he would get here. But the reason why despite all that, right, a top five reliever for three years, some of the best stuff in Major League Baseball, he throws a hundred with a wipeout slider. It’s like Connor, why would he be fifth on that list? How could there be four closers? I ranked Pete Fairbanks, Robert Suarez, Edwin Diaz, and Devin Williams all ahead of him on my wish list for the Orioles. And the reason why he was down that low is because how bad it was for those two months with the Mets. So, coming up next, let’s dig into a little bit those two months in New York. How bad did it really get? What was the issue? And can he fix it in Baltimore in 2026? But first, this episode of the Locked Orioles podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. NFL Sundays move fast. One big play and suddenly everything feels different. That’s what makes live betting with FanDuel so exciting. You’re not just watching the game. You’re reacting to it in real time. With FanDuel, you can place bets as the action unfolds. Every drive, every momentum swing, and every highlight moment. Live betting is the best when the game really starts to shift. A receiver gets hot, a defense tightens up, Lamar Jackson hands the ball to the other team, or the momentum flips after one of those turnovers like it did on Thursday night. FanD let you jump into the moment. live spreads and money lines, adjust instantly, player props updates as guys heat up. You can even bet on touchdown scores, drive results, and more. So, if you want to be right in the middle of the action this season, visit fanuel.com and place your NFL live bets all season long. That’s at FanDuel. The game moves fast, and so can you. So, the Orioles have made another big move this off seasonason, reportedly signing closer Ryan Helley to a two-year, $28 million deal that does include a player opt out after year 1. So, he talked about how good Helsley has been over the past few years, like a legitimate top five reliever in baseball when he was with the St. Louis Cardinal specifically in that 2022 and 2024 seasons when he was dominant when he was, you know, picking up 49 saves. In 24, the stuff is electric. You know, we’re talking about that. If you just look at relievers, right, relievers tend to have better stuff than starting pitchers. If you’re just looking at relievers from this year, Ryan Helley was second among qualified relievers in stuff plus at 127 overall. The only pitcher better was Tyler Rogers, who I talked about on yesterday’s episode. Make sure to go back and check that one out with his funky submarine delivery. Among pitchers who don’t throw submarine, Ryan Helley had the best pure raw stuff of any relief pitcher qualified in Major League Baseball in 2025. If you were the Orioles, that is what you are betting on. Stuff plays. Especially for relievers who only generally have to go one inning at a time, even more so than starters. Stuff plays. Stuff leads to strikeouts. Stuff leads to swing and miss. Stuff leads to soft contact. That is what the Orioles are banking on. Now, the issue is there was a fall-off this year. Helley, as I mentioned, was traded to the Mets at the deadline. He threw in 22 games for the Mets, pitched 20 innings down the stretch. Now, he was not going to be their closer, right? The Mets still had Edwin Diaz. They acquired him to be like an awesome setup guy even though he was a closer in St. Louis. So that could have had a little bit to do with it, right? He’d always been in the ninth inning for the last couple of years. He gets moved to the seventh and the eighth. But you look at the raw stats and it’s ugly. A 7.20 RA with a 519 fip in those 20 innings with the New York Mets. His strikeouts were still solid, but they went down. The walks went up. It was really the batting average against, right? It jumped to 298 after it had been 206 in St. Louis the year before. Now, some of that is bad Babbot luck. It was up at 362. That’s certainly going to come down. There was more bad home run luck for him. His left on base percentage fell from like in the 70s to in the 50s with the Mets. That’s something that’s going to normalize. Like some of this is bad luck that’s going to get better. But it was so bad that again I put him fifth on my closer wish list for free agents because you do have to worry that it could it’s not going to get this bad. I guarantee you if he’s healthy, Ryan Hley is not going to post a 7.20 erra this season with the O’s like he did in his 20 innings with the Mets. The stuff is too good. When you are throwing out there the best stuff among all relievers in Major League Baseball, you’re just not going to be that bad over a longer sample size. The stuff is going to win out. Even if you’re having other struggles, that stuff is going to get you enough outs to be at worst a solid middle reliever for your team, right? a s maybe even a solid backend guy because the stuff is truly that good and he still really does have good command which is helpful as well. The issue is he felt like and he’s been very open about this and there’s been some reporting about it as well. Helley felt like he was tipping his pitches when he got to the Mets. It was about his setup. I believe I can’t remember if I think the hands were higher on it because he basically only throws the four seam fast and the slider. It’s it’s mostly a two- pitch mix. And I believe it was the hands were higher on the slider and they were lower on the fastball. And it came because when he was actually traded to the Mets, the Mets wanted him to set up a little bit differently in general. It wasn’t about pitch tipping. It was about, hey, we think if you set up a little differently, you can actually get a little bit better. And what apparently happened was he did that setup. It wasn’t as comfortable for him. He started to tip his pitches a little bit and hitters were all over him. Now, that is certainly a factor here. And what I talked about when I did my closer wish list was the reason why I had Ryan Hley all the way down at fifth is that he was tipping essentially for two months and he knew it was happening and despite adjustments, he couldn’t fix it, right? There was never even really a good stretch that Helsley had with the Mets. If you just pull up his game logs with New York, like he, you know, had three straight outings with zero earned runs. His first three outings with the Mets were pretty good. After that, it’s two runs, one run, two runs, two runs, zero runs, three runs, zero, two runs, zero, one, three, zero, two. He did finish strong. His last six outings were scoreless. So maybe you jump in and say, “Okay, he kept struggling and struggling and struggling to figure it out.” And finally, in his final six outings of the year, he did not he allowed just three total hits in seven innings, did not allow a run and struck out six batters. That’s something you can key in on and say, “Okay, maybe maybe he finally figured out what he was doing.” And in those final six outings, while the Mets, again, the Mets got eliminated on the final day, they were still in it. and Helsley was throwing very important innings. Maybe in those final six outings he figured out finally that tipping issue and stopped doing it and team stopped seeing what he was throwing. If he has figured out the tipping, this is legitimately still with the stuff he has again the best stuff in baseball and good command. This could be the best closer in Major League Baseball. Like the Orioles for a pretty cheap contract of two years 28 million are betting on him being the Ryan Hellley pre2025. And I and I think that’s a good bet, right? Like he would be if not tipping that good that he was he felt unhittable. Ask Cubs fans, ask Pirates fans, ask you know anybody really from the NL Central Reds fans how they felt when they would see Ryan Hley come out of that St. Louis bullpen in the ninth inning. He just felt like a he was a guy who you could not hit at all. Remember a couple years ago when Pete Fairbanks would come out of the Rays bullpen and just be like, “All right, the game’s over.” That’s how at least how I felt. That is how Ryan Hley for three years basically in St. Louis made opposing teams feel when he would have come out of that pen because he’s throwing a hundred with a slider that just nobody can touch. Here’s what worries me still. Even in St. Louis, right, a lot of the reporting was the pitch tipping started happening with the Mets after the trade when they switched his hand position. Even with St. Louis, he was not exactly the same pitcher right before the trade. 36 innings, a three erra. He had been a two erra guy for years. Strikeouts down, walks were up. That’s still a little concerning. You look at the data on his fastball, the VO was slightly down. He went from 996 to 993. I don’t think that’s a a huge issue there. And the whiff rates were still the same. But opponents hit 422 and slug 667 against his four seam fast. It’s really hard to hit a guy who’s sitting 99 to hit 422 against him across a whole season. And if you break it up month by month, like even in April with the Cardinals, they hit 313 against the fastball. In May with the Cardinals, they hit 391. In June, they hit 588 when he was still with the Cardinals against his four seam fast. Something was off with that pitch. You look at the Raw Stuff Plus data on that thing. It still looks good. It was a 105 this year. It was a 107 the year before. It was a 112 the year before that. So he is losing a little bit, but it’s still a good pitch. The velocity is still pretty much the same. It’s just he had a -5 run value on his fourseamer. It was a plus three the year before. His slider’s always been the better pitch despite the VO on the four seam fast. But it getting hit around and hit this hard is concerning. He has had a little drop off on the induced vertical break on the four seam fast ball. That’s kind of the measurement that shows that quote unquote rising action. The ball doesn’t really rise, but it it drops less than you would expect, which makes guys swing underneath the pitch or pop up the pitch. He was on that induced vertical break around 18.5 inches in 22 and 23. He fell down to about 17 1.5 in 24 and 25. Now, that’s not a huge drop off and over 17 is still really really good on that induced vertical break. But the difference between 17 and 18 is like the good fast ball to the elite fastball. And that is the change that happened to Helsley. So even though he really didn’t drop velocity at all, when you drop that IVB, that can make it a different fast ball. And that honestly to me, even though it’s a small drop off, is more concerning than the tipping cuz the Orioles are going to have if they if they’re giving out 2 years, 28 million to this guy, even though it’s not a ton of money, if they’re paying Ryan Hley to be this their closer and he’s been this good, he’s still only 31 years old, the Orioles and their brass and this, you know, Drew French and Mitch Plasm and Ryan Clem and that staff are going to do everything possible to make sure that when Ryan Hley steps on a mound for the first time in spring training in Sarasota, that tipping pitching issue with the Mets is done. And I trust that Helley maybe figured it out on his own because those last six outings were good. I trust the Orioles, if they were going to sign him to this deal, feel confident that either it’s in the past or they can fix it. What concerns me a little more is that the fastball still had a bit of an issue before he went to the Mets and before he was tipping and the data has gone down just a little bit. That concerns you. At the end of the day though, if he’s a three erra closer instead of a two RA closer, but he still has elite strikeout stuff, he’s still going to save you a lot of games. He’s not going to be, you know, one of the great pitchers you’ve ever seen, which he was at times. Steamer projections for him right now are 64 innings and a 333 erra with a good strikeout rate and a a solid walk rate. you will absolutely take that. But I think the Orioles are expecting him to be better cuz up until this year, Ryan Hley just has absolutely been better than that because of how good that stuff is and hopefully it is that good. But there are those concerns of the tipping. So the last question is how does he fit into this bullpen or maybe more importantly what’s the bullpen look like around him? We kind of know how he fits, right? He is the capital C closer for the 2026 Baltimore Orioles. What does this mean for the rest of the off season? What’s the rest of that bullpen going to look like now? Are there more additions coming? We’ll talk about that to finish off the show coming up next. But first, this episode of the Lockdown Orioles podcast is also brought to you by Game Time. The World Cup is coming back to North America for the first time since 1994. And with 48 teams for the first time ever, it’s going to be massive. But let’s be honest, getting tickets, that is usually the hardest part. Well, that’s why the Game Time app is clutch. Finally giving fans a real advantage when it comes to snagging seats. With Game Time, you can track price drops in real time, get alerts when great seats open, and buy tickets the moment they hit the app. It puts the power back in your hands and makes going to the World Cup realistic instead of impossible. I’m still upset DC and Baltimore didn’t get a World Cup hosting, but Philly did. I’m trying to do everything I can to get to Philly for those World Cup games. And to do it, you pull out the app and the layout makes it so simple to scroll through the matchups and compare the seat views. That that seat view feature is a game changer. You can literally see what the pitch looks like from exactly where your seat is before you buy. So, take the guesswork out of buying World Cup tickets and every match, concert, or event with Game Time. Download the Game Time app, create an account, and use code locked on MLB for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Again, download the app, make an account, and use code locked on MLB for $20 off. Swipe, tap, ticket, go. Game time. So, for the Orioles, they have gotten their closer, signing Ryan Helley to a 2-year, $28 million deal with an opt out after year one. So, what does this mean for the current state of the Orioles bullpen? First and foremost, Helley is your ninth inning guy. Again, Felix Bautista, it’s not confirmed that he’ll be out for all of next season, but with the rotator cuff and the the I mean, there’s so much going on in his shoulder right now, the surgery he got, you you really truly cannot trust him to throw any pitches at all for the 2026 Orioles. And that’s why the O’s felt it was such a big deal to go and get a Capitol C closer. And that is what they did. They went and got Hley on this two-year deal. So, he is going to be your ninth inning guy. Who fills in at this point before him? Well, it is nice to have Andrew Kitridge back. The Orioles reacquired him in a trade with the Cardinals earlier this off season. So, Kitri becomes, I think, a reliable eighth inning guy. So, that’s two spots in your projected bullpen filled right now out of eight. I know there are questions and problems with these two guys, but right now sitting in November, I think you still have to project to Year Canó and Keegan Aken to be in this bullpen. I understand they both had their struggles last year, but they both were tenered a contract. They both have had really long track records of success. If the Orioles sign so many good players that those two get kicked out of the pen, like that’s going to be okay. But for right now, you have those two guys as kind of middle relief options for you in the bullpen. I do think it’s imperative that the Orioles sign enough starting pitching that Tyler Wells gets moved to the bullpen. And he shown us he can be a really, really good reliever. Heck, not that the team was good, but Tyler Wells was the closer for a good chunk of the 2021 Orioles. He was even the closer at the end of 23 if you remember that when Felix Baltista went down with the elbow injury in August. By late September, the Orioles had settled on Tyler Wells to be the closer. He had kind of come back from an injury earlier in the year. He closed out the AL East clinching game against the Red Sox. And if the Orioles had been in any kind of save scenario, which they obviously weren’t because they got swept out of the ALDS by the Rangers, Tyler Wells would have gotten that ball in the ninth inning, I think he’s a guy who can be a high leverage guy for you in that bullpen. So that gives you five relievers at that point. So really right now, I would say three spots or up for grabs. I would give an edge to Dietrich Ends to get a spot. The Orioles kind of worked his contract around a little bit to keep him around. Yes, he’s 34. Yes, he’s out of options. Yes, he does have a long track record, but he was really good in multiple different roles for the Orioles. He can pitch multiple innings. He gets righties out better than lefties even as a left-hander. I think he fits really well in this pen. There’s number six. I also think you got to earmark a spot for Rico Garcia at this point, right? I mean, he was just the amount of huge outs for the Orioles down the stretch last year. Maybe that’ll change early in the season. Maybe he gets DF8 at some point, but he was just so so good that Rico Garcia is my guy to throw in there with that seventh spot. In the eighth and final spot, you have a a lot of guys you could move around and potentially turn to, right? All the options you have right now, Jose Espatada had that one really good outing. Cameron Foster and Anthony Nunees who were added to the 40man. Chase McDermott, who is now, I think, a full-time reliever at this point. Yarm Heraldo showed some good stuff last year. Colin Selby has shown flashes. Cade Strad was really good. Grant Wolf Ram showed some flashes. Maybe you’d uh move another starter to the bullpen like a Brandon Young or a Cade Povich or, you know, even a George Soraniano who came over on waiverss and is sticking around, right? All these guys. I think right now I would give that final spot to Cade Strad because he was just the best one out of all those guys out of the bullpen last year. But this is why I say I think the Orioles will sign at least one more reliever. Whether it’s a righty or lefty, we’ll see. But there’s still room for at least one. And I would argue there’s still room to sign two more relievers. A Tyler Rogers type as a setup. an interesting lefty swingman like a Shawn Nukem or or a Caleb Theelbar lefty to put in that bullpen to get a a real lockdown lefty that I think would build even after trading away. Dominguez, Sodto, Baker, Kitridge, Felix gets hurt, Canadian, and Aken look worse. That’s something the Orioles are on track to still rebuilding a really good bullpen in 2026. But the most important part of it was to get a good solid lockdown closer. And while I have my concerns about Hley because of the pitch tipping, he’s just been so so good before that. It is literally the best Raw stuff in Major League Baseball. Can’t be beaten with the stuff right there. I feel good about Ryan Hley in this spot reacquiring Andrew Kitridge. That bullpen is starting to come together. Now, it’s going to be all for not if the Orioles don’t add some more starting pitching to make this team better, but so far they have been aggressive. They have made four, you can say three or four depending on how you feel about Leyota having a roster spot even if it’s just kind of a fifth outfielder, but I’ll throw in there. They have made four moves, Diverus, Kitridge, Taylor Ward, Ryan Hley of guys who I would project right now to be on the opening day roster and are legitimate moves. That’s more aggressive than they’ve been in a long time in any offseason, especially when the calendar hasn’t even flipped to December and we haven’t even gotten to the winter meetings yet. This signing makes the Orioles better. It checks off a box of getting a closer. Michaelas said he wanted one and he got one. That’s also something we haven’t seen a lot where Michaelas says they’re going to do something in free agency and they actually go and do it. Kind of refreshing. Kind of makes you feel good. Kind of makes you feel a little bit more confident about the Orioles continuing to add, especially in the starting pitching department as this off season goes on. But that’ll do it for today’s live episode. Thank you so so much. if you tuned in on YouTube or after the fact, make sure to like, comment, and subscribe wherever you listen or you watch the show. And again, if you have thoughts on the show, you want to talk more about this signing, you want to ask some O’s questions, you can always email me locked on orgmail.com. And if you just jumped in, you’re new to the show, this is your first one, you know, seeing the Ryan Hellley reaction. We’re here still 5 days a week through the winter meetings, then three days a week for the offseason, then we are back to five days a week when spring training starts. You’re not getting more Orioles coverage like this daily coverage here right here on the Locked On Orioles podcast. Wherever you get your podcast, hopefully you join us for the rest of the offseason and into 2026. I will still be back on Monday. We’re finally going to talk starting pitching free agents. Now that they got the bullpen a little more settled, let’s go get that number one. Who is my favorite of the top starters out there? I’ll talk about that on Monday. But until then, I’m Connor Nukem and this has been the Lockdown Orioles podcast, part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day.

The Baltimore Orioles have their new closer, signing RHP Ryan Helsley to a two-year deal! Host Connor Newcomb discusses Helsley’s career so far, how he will help the Orioles bullpen, and how much we should worry about his struggles with the Mets in 2025.

Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!
Gametime
Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONMLB for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime.

FanDuel
Today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel. The NBA and NFL seasons are here, visit the FanDuel App today and start planning your futures bets now.

FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)