[Anderson] Mike Elias might be the most hyperrational exec in MLB history when it comes to pitching—for better and for worse. He’s been in charge of the Orioles for seven years now and he’s never: 1) signed a pitcher to a guaranteed multi-year contract; or 2) drafted a pitcher with a top-50 pick.

28 comments

1. I dunno if rational is the right word

2. In a very literal sense yeah he’s minimizing risk.

3. The Orioles offered Burnes $180M and had agreed to a three-year deal with Hoffman before the Orioles failed him on medical. Elias, of course, is very cautious with pitching commitments, but I don’t think he’s as inflexible as the tweet implies.

4. When you can’t develop it for shit, you usually never get a chance to sign it long term.

5. To be honest I think I’d rather be a team that can develop/draft hitters than pitchers.

   Since the get good pitchers, can’t get good hitters teams are Pirates and White Sox.

6. I think cheap might be a better word than hyper rational.

7. So rational yet have horrible pitching

8. 2) Makes sense because TINSTAAPP exists, but 1) is just being cheap, I think.

9. Being rational implies he is doing the “correct” thing, but results would argue otherwise.

10. ‘Hyperrational’

    This dude is def in this Reddit reading this

11. Only one pitcher he has drafted has pitched in MLB (and it was in relief)

12. How exactly does he expect to get good pitching?

13. I prefer to just call him a big puss.

14. and they’re winless in their 2 postseason appearances in that time.

15. He Hyperrationalized his way right into a bottom 5 pitching staff. What a credit to his superior intelligence.

16. They also have a whole lot of nothing to show for it

17. This is like saying that buying a car is a bad investment because it loses value quickly

    Like yeah that’s true, but it doesn’t change the fact that I do actually need to have a car

18. And the results speak for themselves!

19. That must be why the Orioles have such a great pitching staff

20. Is it hyperrealistic to blow years of contention because you don’t have pitching?

21. Of their high picks the only who’s bad is Kjerstad. And the first pitcher off the board was Max Meyer. Not really missing out

22. Part of me understands it. The Orioles pitching staff has been stung badly by pitching injuries over the past few years. Off the top of my head, we lost guys like John Means, Felix Bautista, Kyle Bradish, Grayson Rodriguez, Zac Eflin and Tyler Wells for extended periods of time, with many of those injuries overlapping. Still, we need to make a splash this winter and I hope Elias will be willing to make the leap.

23. Oh yeah? How about ultra-rational? Everyone that has a ticket to a game throws a test pitch. The best pitch signs a one-day contract.

24. Orioles will be in on all two-way players from here on out.

25. I wouldn’t call it hyper rational or rational at all. It’s like never leaving your house because you’re afraid of germs. Yeah, you limit the risk of getting sick but you also miss out on the rest of the world.

    I really hope that if they learned nothing else from 2025 they learn that you have to invest in pitching somehow. There’s multiple ways to build a good pitching staff but they all require some risk. But you have to pick on of those ways and risk some downside.

26. The results speak for themselves

27. Man, really depends on your definition of rational. If rational means maximizing your chances of achieving the goal of winning a title, refusing to spend on pitching isn’t rational.

28. And the Orioles haven’t won a playoff game since he took over. And the only two years they *made* the playoffs are also the only two years they were in the top half of team ERA.

    Hitters are safer, but you need pitching to win.