As we kick off the month of February, it feels like we’ve reached the unofficial end of the offseason.
Pitchers and catchers should begin rolling into Sarasota sometime in the next couple of weeks and we’ll begin to get answers to the offseason’s lingering questions.
The question weighing most heavily on this writer’s mind is, did the Orioles do enough to address their rotation? Mike Elias & Co. decided (or were forced) to go with a committee approach when it comes to replacing the departed Corbin Burnes.
The front office added MLB journeyman Charlie Morton (41 years old) and NPB legend Tomoyuki Sugano (35) to turn one of the younger rotations in baseball into a more veteran-laden operation.
Between the new additions, the return of a healthy Grayson Rodriguez and the potential return of Kyle Bradish, the Orioles pitching staff has transformed from one that seemed top-heavy at the end of 2024 into an ace-less stable deep with starting pitching options.
Currently, the five projected to leave Sarasota as members of the rotation are last season’s deadline darling Zach Eflin, Rodriguez, Morton, Sugano and Dean Kremer.
During the analytics-led Elias regime and through the tutelage of Drew French and Chris Holt before him, the Orioles have consistently implored pitchers to lean heavily on their best pitch. With that approach in mind, let’s look at the five pitches that will define success for the Orioles top five starters in 2025.
Zach Eflin: Cutter
Eflin has reinvented his approach to pitching several times throughout his career. Early on with the Phillies, he relied mostly on a four-seam, sinker, slider mix. By the time he joined the Rays, he’d ditched the four-seamer for a cutter and slider for a curveball.
The O’s seemed to have liked what they saw from Eflin’s cutter, because as soon as they got their hands on him, the cutter became his go-to pitch.
Burnes has become the MLB’s gold standard among starters relying on cutters, but Eflin’s cutter actually was the better pitch once he joined the black and orange.
Among starters, Eflin trailed only Jameson Taillon in Run Value/100 pitches with his cutter, putting up 2.1 RV/100 compared to 1.5 for Burnes.
In line with the Orioles philosophy, Eflin’s cutter also seemed to get better the more he threw it. Prior to arriving in Baltimore, opponents hit .267 off the veteran’s cutter while he was throwing it just under 27% of the time.
Upon getting to the Orioles, Eflin upped his cutter usage to over 32% and it sent opponents’ average tumbling to .134.
Eflin’s cutter is now the setup for everything he does. The nine-year vet is known for pounding the zone and limiting walks. He combines that impeccable control with his cutter to run his primary pitch away from right handers or paint the outside edge against lefties.
By working both sides of the plate with a right-to-left moving cutter, batters are caught off guard by his sharp, down-breaking curveball. That setup saw opponents swing and miss rate 42% of the time against his curveball with the Orioles. If Eflin can dominate with his cutter again, he could establish himself as the ace Baltimore needs.
Grayson Rodriguez: Changeup
G-Rod made a name for himself in the minors thanks to his four-seam fastball that effortlessly sits in the upper 90s and occasionally reached triple digits. Rodriguez has still been a fastball-first pitcher in the majors, but he’s run into trouble because his fastball has been too hittable at times.
As a rookie, opposition hit .342 against the flame-throwing Texan’s heater.
That number dropped to .291 last year, which is better but still far from good.
What makes a hittable fastball much less hittable is backing up with one of the game’s best changeups. In 2024, Rodriguez tied NL Cy Young winner Chris Sale by putting up 2.1 RV/100 on his changeup, while also holding hitters to a .173 average.
What makes Rodriguez’ changeup especially devastating is his ability to locate it low and away to both righties and lefties.
Most right-handed pitchers throw their changeups as an out pitch to lefties—especially pitchers like Rodriguez, whose changeup naturally fades down and away to lefties. G-Rod excelled last year at also fading his changeup back over the low/outside corner to righties, making it a devastating offering that he should lean on more heavily in 2025.
Charlie Morton: Curveball
With the amount that Morton throws his curveball, you’d think the “Uncle Charlie” nickname for curves was because of him. Morton led MLB last year with 1,183 total curveballs thrown, his fourth straight year leading the leak in total curveballs thrown.
While the curveball usage hasn’t changed, Morton’s approach to his curveball-first philosophy shifted in 2024.
After establishing himself as one of premier strikeout pitchers of the last decade, Morton became much more of a ground ball pitcher in 2024. By pounding the bottom of the zone with curveballs, Morton produced one of the best ground ball rates of his career (47.2%) while also raising his weak contact percentage to above 5%.
Given how hard Morton’s other four pitches were hit in 2024, we may see the Orioles ask him to up his curveball usage even further in 2025.
If he can further lean into the idea of using his curveball to generate ground balls, it should see Morton have a resurgent year while pitching in front of the Orioles athletic infield.
Tomoyuki Sugano: Shuuto/Sinker
Not having seen Sugano throw his first pitch as an Oriole, my expectation is this: Japanese Kyle Gibson with better results. All the scouting reports out of the NPB highlight Sugano’s pinpoint control and willingness to pitch to contact as keys to the reigning Central League MVP’s success.
In watching Sugano’s highlights from the 2017 World Baseball Classic, the right seemed to favor using his shuuto—the Japanese word for his sinker/two-seamer—as a way to attack the strike zone earlier in counts and set up his breaking ball away to right handers.
Similar to Gibson, Sugano doesn’t have overpowering stuff, with his fastballs sitting around 92mph, his slider sitting in the low 80s, a splitter in the high 80s and a curveball in the high 70s. When Gibson was at his best in Baltimore, he was working quickly, attacking the zone and getting hitters to drive the ball into the ground.
Sugano should follow a similar plan as he adjusts to MLB.
His movement on his shuuto seems to be close to Kyle Bradish’s sinker in that it moves more right-to-left than straight down. Sugano doesn’t have anywhere near the velocity that Bradish does, but still expect him to use the two-seamer as the basis for the rest of his arsenal.
Dean Kremer: Splitter
The splitter was a new offering for Kremer in 2025, and it became the best pitch in his arsenal as the season wore on. The Stockton, CA, native had eight starts last year where he threw 20+ splitters. In those eight outings, the right-hander posted a 2.15 ERA—compared to a 5.16 ERA in starts where he threw less than 20 splitters. Kremer threw his splitter much more to lefties than righties (25.6% vs. 10.7%) but both sides of the plate hit under .140 against his new out pitch.
The trick with Kremer will be convincing him to up the volume on his splitters in year two with the pitch in his arsenal. Of 21 pitchers who threw a splitter in at least 100 PAs, Kremer ranked 4th in opponents batting average but 18th in usage percentage. Kremer has often been labeled a tinkerer on the mound, meaning his pitch selection can change drastically from start to start depending on what he feels is working.
If he can get to a place where the splitter overtakes his cutter as the go-to secondary pitch, it could be the key to putting up a career year in 2025 and securing his spot in the rotation.
