In the aftermath of the trade deadline, a number of 2025 Orioles find themselves elsewhere. Many of the key, core players remain. The rest of the season is going to be spent seeing how those guys are able to respond to these circumstances. Can they build some hope back up for next year? In two of the five games over the last week, the team answered yes. It could have been worse.
This series looks at each Orioles game, the most crucial play that happened in it and who was involved, and the Oriole who contributed the most positive to a win or negative to a loss. As we all know by now, it’s been much more losing than winning. These determinations are made using the Win Probability Added stat, which you can find in game logs on Baseball Reference or FanGraphs.
Here’s how that looked over the past week:
Result: Orioles lose to Cubs, 1-0Record: 50-60The biggest play: Dylan Carlson grounds into double play to erase leadoff runner in fifth inning (-11%)The biggest goat: Tyler O’Neill (-.200 WPA)
Talk about a hard-luck loss for Trevor Rogers (.219 WPA). He allowed just four hits in eight innings, and the Cubs didn’t even need to get a base hit off of him in a crucial situation to score their lone run. The game’s only run scored on a second inning sacrifice fly, a play that, since it led to a Cubs out, barely moved the needle in win expectancy (-1%).
The Orioles offense, alas, was worse, recording just three hits combined against a parade of Chicago pitchers that started with Cade Horton and included recent ex-Oriole Andrew Kittredge. No Orioles batter made a positive WPA contribution in the game.
Result: Orioles beat Cubs, 4-3Record: 51-60The biggest play: Gunnar Henderson hits three-run go-ahead home run in the eighth inning (+60%)The biggest hero: Henderson (.586 WPA)
With one swing, Henderson turned things around from the Orioles losing by two runs to winning by one run. Short of doing the same thing in the ninth inning, or doing it at home and having it be a walkoff hit, that’s about as big of a WPA adjustment as any one play can do. Speaking of walkoff hits, would you believe that the Orioles still don’t have one this season? Actually, you probably would. It’s just one more marker of a disappointing offense that’s had particular trouble coming back once it falls behind.
There were 16 straight scoreless innings for the Orioles offense before their four-run explosion in the eighth. Even in this one, they got out-hit by the Cubs, 8-7. It was bad! But Henderson made it better, and Keegan Akin held on for the save (.188 WPA). Spoiler alert: Akin’s going the other direction in the next game below this.
Result: Orioles lose to Cubs, 5-3Record: 51-61The biggest play: Ryan Noda ties game in ninth with two outs, driving in man on second (+32%)The biggest goat: Keegan Akin (-.370 WPA)
As 29-year-old Ryan Noda stepped up to the plate for his first Orioles at-bat with two outs in the ninth inning and the tying run in scoring position, I thought to myself, what a perfect symbol for this season to have this guy up in a key situation to waste it. Noda stuck it to the haters by coming through with the clutch hit, driving home Colton Cowser. The Milkman had gotten himself on second base by leading off with a double (+20%), and he was still standing there until Noda came along.
It took two batters for Akin to blow it. One of them wasn’t his fault, as it was a Jordan Westburg throwing error (that maybe should have been picked by Coby Mayo) that let the leadoff man on base in the first place. Then Akin gave up the walkoff homer to former Oriole Justin Turner, who is 40 years old and who had a .583 OPS for the season. Come on now, Keegan. We were just trying to feel good about you as a late-inning high-leverage option and everything.
Result: Orioles lose to Phillies, 13-3Record: 51-62The biggest play: Corbin Martin gives up three-run home run to Harrison Bader, giving Cubs 6-3 lead in sixth inning (-33%)The biggest goat: Martin (-.416 WPA)
Martin entered the game with a man on first base and two outs in a tie game. When he left, there were STILL two outs, and the Orioles were losing 7-3 with the Cubs still having bases loaded. After his replacement, Yaramil Hiraldo, gave up a grand slam to allow all three of the inherited runners to score, the Orioles were down, 11-3. There’s our perfect symbol for the season after all: A guy who probably has no business being on any major league roster coming in and turning a tie game into a laugher.
Although the Orioles at least managed to score three runs here, this was still a pretty bad game for the offense, as they only got five hits. O’Neill hit a two-run homer and Westburg had a solo shot, and that was the entirety of their run output. After Westburg’s homer, Henderson hit a single, then the next 18 Orioles were retired in order. This was a lineup with seven of nine guys who we’d like to see do well to feel better about next year, and on the whole, they didn’t.
Result: Orioles lose to Phillies, 5-0Record: 51-63The biggest play: Max Kepler hits two-run home run off Dean Kremer, giving Phillies 3-0 second inning lead (-13%)The biggest goat: Kremer (-.171 WPA)
So, about that struggling offense… well, they did it again. Five hits, and this time there weren’t any homers, so it was just a sad output where nobody did much of anything. Westburg had two of the team’s hits and also got hit by a pitch, so he had fully 50% of the times the Orioles got on base on the day. That’s a hard way to win unless your starting pitcher is absolutely perfect, which Kremer, of course, was not. On some days, allowing four runs in six innings can be good enough. When your offense gets shut out, that is not one of those days.
Result: Orioles beat Phillies, 5-1Record: 52-63The biggest play: Jeremiah Jackson gives Orioles 1-0 lead with fourth inning RBI double (+15%)The biggest hero: Trevor Rogers (.238 WPA)
If you’re wondering where Coby Mayo’s three-run home run checked in, that was a lesser swing of about 11%. Scoring first is a great thing to do, better even than padding a slim lead with an Earl Weaver Special. Jackson getting a couple of months of playing time to show what he can do after his surprisingly great minor league performance is one of the low-key interesting things going on with the Orioles for the rest of the season. Finding a quality reserve player out of nowhere would be a positive, if Jackson can turn out to be a quality reserve player out of nowhere.
Rogers continuing to be what he’s done so far this season would also be a big help for the team in having some good feelings going into next year. This wasn’t his most dominant outing, with a lot of traffic on the bases (eight hits, two walks). He held the Phillies to just one run, though, limiting the damage in a fifth inning rally and keeping them from scoring even after they got two men on base in the sixth.
This time last week, the best Orioles hitter by WPA was Ryan O’Hearn (2.14) and the best pitcher was Félix Bautista (1.90). Going forward, I won’t be listing players who are no longer with the organization in this section. Here’s how things stand now:
WPA (hitters): Gunnar Henderson (2.19), Colton Cowser (0.94), Gary Sánchez (0.52)WPA (pitchers): Trevor Rogers (2.29), Bautista (1.90), Kade Strowd (0.15)fWAR: Henderson (3.2) leads hitters, Rogers (2.1) leads pitchers
It’s a tough sign for the players who have been around all season that Sánchez is the #3 batter by this ranking, despite having played in just 30 games and not being all that good. Yes, I’ve skipped over players who got traded away, but actually, the only guy traded who was above Sánchez is O’Hearn. Similar for the pitchers, Strowd coming in third with just a 0.15 is sad stuff. I am, however, pleased to see that someone has finally overtaken Dean Kremer in pitcher fWAR.
In last week’s update, the worst Orioles hitter by WPA was Tyler O’Neill (-0.73) and the worst pitcher was Charlie Morton (-1.34). Players who are not with the team any more are listed separately in this section. Here’s who’s got the worst overall numbers:
WPA (hitters): Dylan Carlson (-0.93), Jackson Holliday (-0.89), O’Neill (-0.87)WPA (pitchers): Cade Povich (-1.34), Yennier Cano (-1.10), Brandon Young (-0.96)WPA (not here now): Heston Kjerstad (-1.94), Charlie Morton (-1.34), Kyle Gibson (-1.25)fWAR (active): Corbin Martin (-0.2) for pitchers, Carlson (-0.8) for hitters
Holliday showing up high on this list hurts me. He’s been slumping lately, but it’s the baserunning that really gets him down here. Without that, he’d just be in the slight negatives, barely remarkable.