All anyone wants to know is where the pitching is going to come from, and what it’s going to look like, when forecasting any level of Orioles success going forward.

You can focus on Kyle Bradish or Tyler Wells and their returns from injury, and you’d be right. You can parse the progress of Brandon Young and Cade Povich in the rotation, and you’d be right. But not many would look at Kade Strowd. For one particular reason, I suggest you do.

Strowd had the honor of being the first pitcher drafted by Mike Elias to throw a pitch in an Orioles uniform when he debuted in May. And though Strowd has been slow to earn leverage roles, he has fared quite well. Since his most recent recall from Triple-A Norfolk on July 24, Strowd has allowed just two earned runs in 18 2/3 innings for a 0.96 ERA, albeit with a 4.48 xFIP, given he has a 1.23 WHIP and is striking out 6.8 batters per nine.

So, there’s certainly some luck baked in, but there’s also the part where big league hitters are batting .198 with a .238 batting average on balls in play against Strowd, and he’s been hard to square up.

That particular trait — stuff that plays well in the zone — is something the Orioles have sought on the farm and in the big leagues for a while. For that and many other reasons, given Strowd’s elevated walk rate, interim manager Tony Mansolino has challenged him to be aggressive in the zone with his fastball and stay ahead of hitters rather than creating traffic on the basepaths.

But Strowd’s success seems to be coming from his vast repertoire of pitches. Typically, once someone gets to the bullpen, their arsenal is edited so just their best pitches get used. Strowd has been adding them as the years go on, and he’s probably in this position because of those additions. And he may not be the only pitcher in the Orioles’ bullpen with five pitches to work with. That’s all by design.

Strowd’s primary pitch in the big leagues has been a cutter he added in 2024. He said it was a tweak on his existing slider, which was of the harder variety with similar movement. That carried him to Norfolk after several seasons in Double-A, and a two-seamer he worked on all of last year but didn’t use in a game was the addition that separated things this year.

“I can move the ball to the left pretty well,” Strowd said. “I’ve always struggled moving it to the right, and they’ve kind of told me a way we can throw something that feels natural, where it feels like you’re throwing it to the left and it ends up moving to the right. That’s the two-seam, and it’s been a pretty good weapon so far.”

Beyond the cutter, his sinker has been Strowd’s second-most-used pitch against righties this year in the majors at 21.6%. His sweeper is more of a late-count weapon against righties, and he’s also thrown some four-seamers and curveballs to righties thus far.

The sweeper hasn’t been used for left-handed hitters, but he has used the curveball, which has a 32% whiff rate against lefties. His four-seamer is also an effective pitch against opposite-side hitters.

Since the alternate training site during COVID, part of the emphasis for young Orioles pitchers has been developing multiple weapons for both sides. Strowd has always been a reliever, but they’re not exempt from that pursuit. It’s obviously more prevalent a pursuit for starters, given they’ll have to face a lineup multiple times, but often the best relievers come from a starter’s development track.

Chayce McDermott, who will get a nice opportunity the rest of this season in the bullpen, used six pitches even in relief once he made that transition at Norfolk. A trio of top pitching prospects to join the Norfolk rotation in the second half —Trey Gibson, Levi Wells and Nestor German — have thrown six, six and five pitches, respectively, in their time there thus far.

This emphasis on diverse pitches mixes and ways to attack hitters from either side of the plate at an early stage naturally leads to a broad array of pitches as prospects get into the high minors and the big leagues. The hope is for all of them to be starters, but the natural byproduct of that will be relievers who pitch like starters. Strowd is kind of one of them. And it’s kind of working.

On the pod

Paul and I took some time to dive into last week’s news of Mike Elias’ secret wintertime promotion to president of baseball operations, which is exactly as silly as it sounds. I wrote about it last week in the moment, as well. We probably could have talked for five hours about it.

Ballpark chatter

“That’s the goal next year, to be more available and doing what I can with my training program to be in a good spot. Freak accidents are going to happen. You can’t control everything out here. But just coming into the season, spring training, as well prepared as possible is going to be the goal for me, of course. It’ll be a little extra motivation for 2026.” – Orioles outfielder Tyler O’Neill

If I’m not mistaken, most of O’Neill’s introductory call with the Orioles and all the spring training coverage I remember of him was about his training program, how he was trying to be less bulky, and how he was shaping up physically.

Hopefully he finds something that works, because I only count his most recent wrist issue as a “freak accident.” As for the rest, he has to prove he can avoid that next year. He gets a mulligan this year from me, but there’s only one coming his way.

By the numbers

.439

Gunnar Henderson entering Tuesday with a .439 slugging percentage — well below his career average, with just 16 home runs — is one of the more puzzling parts of this Orioles season. I just don’t get it. Considering he’s still hitting the ball hard at good angles and making decent contact, it stands to reason that this is correctable. I feel like with an offseason to break things down, it will be a fix that feels easy in retrospect. When that happens, it’s back to MVP-caliber play for Henderson. That will only bode well for the Orioles.

Talent pipeline

Keagan Gillies

There was a time this newsletter didn’t exist, if you can believe it. And in that time last season, I wrote about how Keagan Gillies looked to be on the fast track to Baltimore out of the Bowie bullpen.

Well, last year went sideways for him, but now that may actually be true for the 2025 MLB All-Star Futures Game participant.

He’s at Triple-A Norfolk now and has a 1.54 ERA over his last 10 appearances, with 12 strikeouts and a .943 WHIP in 11 2/3 innings. He seems the type who might get popped in the Rule 5 draft if the Orioles don’t add him. Maybe they do it in September just to see what it looks like.

For further reading

🌟 A remarkable resurgence: Danielle will be missed when she moves on to her great opportunity in Montgomery County next month, but I’m glad we got this Trevor Rogers story before then.

🤦‍♂️ He said what? Announcers have been disciplined for less, so I have to assume this is the last we ever see of Brian Roberts. What a shame.

🔍 The storylines worth tracking: Andy had a nice breakdown of what’s worth watching the rest of the way for the Orioles.