Under Mike Elias, the Orioles are yet to invest major assets into big league pitching. Yes, they made the trade for Corbin Burnes heading into 2024, and they have ponied up some cash for one-year free agent deals, but those are relatively low stakes in the modern game. Pair that with a draft strategy that prioritizes hitters above pitchers, and you have a rather narrow lane for dependable mound work in Baltimore. If that approach is going to work, they will need to routinely transform flawed, late-round talents into contributors at the highest level. Nestor German is proving to be a great test case.
German was selected out of Seattle University with the 331st overall pick (11th round) of the 2023 draft. His junior (and final) season at Seattle saw him compile a 5.97 ERA and a 1.430 WHIP with 74 strikeouts over 78.1 innings, most of those frames coming as a starter. It was rough, but the Orioles were intrigued enough by his jump in velocity and prototypical size (6-foot-3, 225 pounds) to make the pick. Two years later it is looking like a wise choice.
In 2024, German pitched at two levels. Between Low-A Delmarva and High-A Aberdeen, he had a 1.59 ERA and struck out 90 across 73.2 innings. His velocity increased and his reportoire evolved. Here is his writeup from FanGraphs:
In his first pro season, he enjoyed a velo bump and sat more 93-95, added a second breaking ball to his mix, and increased his split/change usage compared to college. Each of those new weapons generated its own plus miss rate in 2024, and across 21 piggyback outings (73.2 innings) German was dominant, posting a 1.59 ERA and 11-to-2 K-to-BB ratio
That same scouting report added that if German is able to maintain that sort of performance and velocity, he would climb into the “45 tier” for future value on the 20-80 scale. For FanGraphs, that equates to the ceiling of a major league-caliber pitcher that can work as a number five starter or a useful bullpen piece. That may not sound too exciting, but for an 11th-round selection that got a mere $150,000 signing bonus, it’s fantastic value. It’s the type of development that fuels an organization and may save them from signing a veteran innings eater for $15 million.
So, did German make the jump?
You bet he did. The 23-year-old played at three different levels in 2025, starting back at Aberdeen for six starts, jumping to Double-A Chespeake for 18 games, and finishing up with a pair of starts for Triple-A Norfolk. The performance degraded a bit from level to level as you would expect, but the overall stats are still quite solid.
In total, German tossed 123.2 innings, had a 3.93 ERA, struck out 143, walked 46, and had a 1.181 WHIP. Perhaps the most important bar for him to cross was durability. His innings load jumped by 50 from his debut season, and he stayed off of the IL entirely.
The righty showed some resiliency as well. He was dominant in June, posting an opponent OPS of .491, but then struggled in July when it jumped to .822. Those poor starts didn’t snowball, though. German bounced back to a .560 opponent OPS in August, which led to his late season promotion to Triple-A.
That was enough for FanGraphs to give him the “45” bump, and they now place him as the Orioles’ eighth-best prospect overall and second-best pitching youngster behind Trey Gibson.
MLB Pipeline’s current list is not as juiced on German, but it is not worlds apart. They have him 14th in the organization overall and sixth in the pitching department. And it’s important to note that Pipeline tends to lag on updating their lists outside of “Top 100” types, so it is possible that he jumps up a few notches in their pre-season rankings for 2026.
Pipeline’s bottom line is essentially identical to the one at FanGraphs:
[H]is collection of at least average offerings and relative polish give him the ceiling of a back-end starter if he can build up his workload.
This season that just passed was the most crucial for German. He stayed healthy and survived the promotion from High-A to Double-A, a transition that is widely considered the toughest in minor league baseball. Not only that, but the Orioles also gave him a taste of Triple-A before the season was out. That is an approach they often take with the prospects they hope to put in the fast lane towards Baltimore, and German made the cut.
That does not mean that German will be in the mix for a rotation spot with Baltimore this spring. He’s going back to Triple-A to begin 2026. But it does mean that he could see some early-spring innings with the major league squad. And it puts a promotion to the bigs at some point in 2026 within reach. He won’t be eligible for the Rule 5 draft until next offseason, so the Orioles will want to keep him off of the 40-man roster for as long as they don’t see a need for him in Baltimore.
If/when German is called up, he will go into the rotation depth mix that is currently occupied by Cade Povich, Brandon Young, and Albert Suárez. That feels like more of a 2027 proposition unless Elias fails to properly improve the pitching staff this winter. Could you imagine?