Well, here we are again: yet another Orioles player review that begins with “what could have been.” If you’re reading this, you already know how Félix Bautista’s 2025 went, and you’re either here for catharsis or because misery loves company. Welcome, Birdland friend. Pull up a chair. We have tissues.

Remember 2023 Félix Bautista—the Mountain? The guy who made opposing hitters look like they were swinging pool noodles at bowling balls? That magnificent specimen who posted a 1.48 ERA with 110 strikeouts in 61 innings, turning the ninth inning into his personal kingdom where hope went to die? Yeah, we remember. We remember because we spent most of 2024 watching Craig Kimbrel instead, which is rather like replacing your Ferrari with a shopping cart that has one wobbly wheel and squeaks alarmingly when you push it too fast.

After missing all of 2024 recovering from Tommy John surgery, 2025 was supposed to be The Return for Bautista. The comeback story. And for a few glorious months, it actually was. The O’s closer broke camp with the team, looking like his old self in spring training—almost. The fastball velocity was a couple miles down, and his splitter and slider were works in progress. It wasn’t perfect, but it felt nice to see him back out there.

From April through June, we got glimpses of vintage Mountain. Not quite the dominant force of 2023—the command wandered occasionally, and the velocity wasn’t quite back to “absolutely terrifying” levels—but it was good enough to make us believe again. Through the first half, Bautista converted 18 of 19 save opportunities, posting a solid 2.41 ERA while whiffing 48 hitters in 33.2 innings. That strikeout rate was down a tick from his gargantuan 2023 days, but we weren’t complaining!

I would say that the All-Star break marked a turning point in the season, but Bautista made only one appearance in the second half. It came on July 20, against Tampa Bay, when he threw just an inning but managed to walk three hitters. Clearly, all was not well. Four days later, the team put Bautista on the 15-day IL with right shoulder discomfort. Within one three-week stretch in July, the Orioles lost five core pieces of the bullpen: four due to trades, one, the most valuable, due to a sore shoulder. By late August, the team announced that the big righty was suffering from shoulder impingement requiring rotator cuff and labrum surgery. His season was over.

The numbers tell a story of promise, interrupted: 35 appearances, 19 saves, 2.60 ERA, 50 SO in 34.2 innings. Actually, it just makes me sadder, because even a diminished Mountain is still a dominant closer.

The revolving door of replacement closers from July through September was grimly familiar—Keegan Akin here, Yennier Cano there, everyone hold your breath and pray. It worked about as well as you’d expect, which is to say it worked until it didn’t, at the worst possible moments.

Looking ahead to 2026, the question, alas, is how to plan for a year in which Bautista doesn’t throw a single inning, and whether they need a one-year replacement or someone more permanent.

Two lost seasons and a truncated third don’t exactly inspire confidence. The shoulder injury on top of the elbow surgery creates a concerning pattern, like a house where every time you fix one leak, water starts pouring from somewhere else.

Then again, when Bautista is good, he’s so good. Is the Mountain worth waiting a year for, and when he’s back, will he still be the Mountain?