2021 ZiPS Projections: Baltimore Orioles

After having typically appeared in the hallowed pages of Baseball Think Factory, Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections have now been released at FanGraphs for nine years. The exercise continues this offseason. Below are the projections for the Baltimore Orioles.

Batters

The 2020 Orioles were hard not to like. There was no reason to think they would be competitive, yet they hung around the edges of the playoff race until a 5–14 finish dropped them out of contention. I won’t lie: It was somewhat satisfying to this Baltimore native to watch the O’s beat out the Mookie Betts-less Red Sox for fourth in the AL East and take their first trip out of the basement since 2016.

It’s doubtful, though, that 2020’s surprising run was the leading edge of something bigger. Anthony Santander’s .261/.315/.575 campaign may have been enough to elevate him over the rest of the team’s deep stable of Quad-A sluggers, but a lot of the winning was due to good years from players like José Iglesias and Tommy Milone, who were never going to be part of the core going forward. What is encouraging is that unlike the Phillies of several years ago, the front office didn’t learn the wrong lesson from the team’s ephemeral success, resisting any July attempt to stockpile random veterans.

The makings of a competent offense are present more so than in recent offseasons, with much fewer negative WAR projections. The larger problem is that there’s just not a lot of star talent in this lineup. Adley Rutschman is the team’s best chance to swim against that current in the short-term, and there’s a great deal of potential remaining in Ryan Mountcastle‘s bat, but other prospects like Heston Kjerstad, Gunnar Henderson, Jordan Westburg, and Terrin Vavra are going to take a little longer. And as great a story as Trey Mancini’s comeback from colon cancer is, by the time the O’s are ready to compete for real in normal seasons, he’s likely going to be in another uniform.

Santander and Austin Hays form two-thirds of a competent outfield, with the mess in left still to sort out. Parting with fringe yet useful players like Renato Núñez and Dwight Smith Jr. is unfortunate, but the O’s need to be looking at higher-upside players such as Yusniel Diaz. Don’t get too excited about him getting Dwight Evans as his top offensive comp — Dewey was a late bloomer — but there’s still potential there, even if it was disappointing that he didn’t find his way onto the 2020 roster.

The low number next to the first basemen on the graphic is largely due to the presence of Chris Davis, whose presence on the roster is getting harder to explain. There’s little justification for him ever getting another plate appearance in Baltimore: His bat isn’t coming back any more than the pit beef sandwich I once lost in the Patapsco River when I slipped on a water taxi.

Hanser Alberto, who wasn’t tendered a contract, was no more likely to contribute to the next good Baltimore team than Nuñez was, but the competent second baseman with a game built mainly around contact is a rarer breed than in the old days, and it was fun to have a little variety. You can’t put Old Bay on everything. I’m hoping the O’s give Ramón Urías, another underdog middle infielder, a similar chance to succeed.

Pitchers

Alex Cobb’s splitter was nasty for the first time in years, and it was enough to give him his best projection in years. No, he’s still not the pitcher that he was with the Rays, but it would be nice to see him put together a few normal, healthy seasons, even if it mainly makes him trade bait. Tanner Scott was terrific last season, and he’s one of two current pitchers with a notably bimodal distribution to his projections (the other is Michael Kopech). In layman’s terms, the computer saw him as having a higher chance either of stardom or being a bust than being just a normal, middling player. If Scott can keep the walk rate in the fours instead of the sixes, as he did in 2020, the former becomes the more likely result. Trying him out as a starter is less crucial now with the O’s looking relatively deep in pitching prospects.

Speaking of those pitching prospects, the loss of the minor league season was a tough one for Baltimore’s farm system. The organization doesn’t have any elite hurlers in the high minors, but they have a plethora of interesting “wait-and-see” guys nearing the majors who lost an entire year of live baseball. We got to see a bit of Keegan Akin and Dean Kremer, but nothing from Zac Lowther, DL Hall, Michael Baumann, or Grayson Rodriguez, a blow for the team.

Whether it’s good news or not that Kevin Smith, acquired from the Mets for Miguel Castro, is projected as the best pitcher on the roster despite topping off at Double-A Binghamton is a philosophical question I’ll leave to you. I faced a mildly angry mob of Mets fans last year when I did not make an official projection for Smith, but ZiPS is a huge fan of his work so far. If he’s as good in Baltimore as the computer expects, the Castro trade will be a highlight of Mike Elias’ tenure.

ZiPS projects only Scott and Paul Fry to be better-than-average among the relief corps. One might actually consider this a good thing; the Orioles have no use for a top bullpen in 2021.

Players are listed with their most recent teams wherever possible. This includes players who are unsigned, players who will miss 2021 due to injury, and players who were released in 2020. So yes, if you see Joe Schmoe, who quit baseball back in August to form a Finnish industrial death metal fourth-wave ska J-pop band, he’s still listed here intentionally.

Both hitters and pitchers are ranked by projected zWAR, which is to say, WAR values as calculated by me, Dan Szymborski, whose surname is spelled with a z. WAR values might differ slightly from those which appear in the full release of ZiPS. Finally, I will advise anyone against — and might karate chop anyone guilty of — merely adding up WAR totals on a depth chart to produce projected team WAR. ZiPS is assuming that the designated hitter will continue in force in 2021; if it does not, there will be widespread minor adjustments across the board come April.

ZiPS is agnostic about future playing time by design. For more information about ZiPS, please refer to this article, or get angry at Dan on Twitter or something.