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After a flurry of offseason moves that were necessary to compete in the loaded American League East, the Baltimore Orioles<\/a> are off to a tough start to the 2026 season. After losing six of their first nine games, the Orioles have won the first two games against the Chicago White Sox<\/a> in the Windy City.<\/p>\n There were questions surrounding Baltimore\u2019s starting rotation before the season started. Depth was a question, and it is already being tested. They called up Cade Povich from Triple-A<\/a>, and he was forced into action on Sunday against the Pittsburgh Pirates<\/a>. Chris Bassitt was roughed up and lasted just two innings, allowing six runs on six hits.<\/p>\n It\u2019s early in the season, and the Orioles rank in the bottom half of MLB<\/a> in terms of team ERA<\/a> at 4.11. That\u2019s not going to keep them hanging around all summer long. Injuries are likely at some point, and Mike Elias\u2019 depth will be tested. They have free agent depth options, and they were linked to one free agent to sign for depth.<\/p>\n Baltimore Orioles Linked To Free Agent Tyler Anderson<\/p>\n Former Los Angeles Angels<\/a> left-hander Tyler Anderson remains unsigned. He joins Lucas Giolito as one of the two top starting pitchers currently available. Last season for the Angels, the 36-year-old made 26 starts. He went 2-8, but he had a 2.0 WAR in 136.1 innings with 104 strikeouts and a 4.56 ERA.<\/p>\n Zachary D. Rymer of Bleacher Report<\/a> listed some landing spots for the top remaining free agents two weeks into the season. Baltimore was a landing spot for Anderson.<\/p>\n \u201cIf nothing else, Tyler Anderson posts. He made at least 25 starts annually between 2021 and 2025, altogether averaging 5.7 innings per start. Anderson did end last year with a 5.50 ERA over his last 15 starts, so he wasn\u2019t exactly on an upswing headed into the offseason. All the same, there aren\u2019t many better guys to turn to for innings right now,\u201d wrote Rymer.<\/p>\n The Atlanta Braves<\/a> were the best landing spot for Anderson, as was Giolito. However, the case could be made that the Orioles are a team that could use him. Singing him and letting him begin in Triple-A is an option.<\/p>\n Orioles Need Pitching Depth To Compete in the AL East<\/p>\n The AL East is a gauntlet this season. The New York Yankees<\/a> are off to a good start, but there are questions surrounding just how good their rotation is. Meanwhile, the Toronto Blue Jays<\/a> and Boston Red Sox<\/a> are struggling. As for the Tampa Bay Rays<\/a>, they are a wild-card team in terms of being tough to play against.<\/p>\n It\u2019s just two weeks into the season; however, when the dust settles on the season, pitching wins games, and they will be the difference for a lot of teams. Baltimore made the moves this offseason offensively by landing Pete Alonso, but they missed out on some of the top arms.<\/p>\n Framber Valdez ended up singing with the Detroit Tigers<\/a>, and Dylan Cease landed<\/a> with the Blue Jays. Baltimore needs to take a flyer on a free agent option, and Anderson, a two-time All-Star, is a low-risk, high-reward option.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tScott Roche<\/a> Scott Roche covers college football, NFL, NBA and MLB for Heavy.com and has three decades of sports writing, covering everything from college to professional sports. More about Scott Roche<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Orioles\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty After a flurry of offseason moves that were necessary to compete in the loaded American League East,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":430689,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2374],"tags":[143,47,2538,5,4,125],"class_list":{"0":"post-670408","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-baltimore-orioles","8":"tag-baltimore","9":"tag-baltimore-orioles","10":"tag-baltimoreorioles","11":"tag-baseball","12":"tag-mlb","13":"tag-orioles"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116369638080327018","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=670408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670408\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/430689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=670408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=670408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=670408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}