Zach Eflin may come into spring training as the presumptive ace of the Orioles, but it’s Grayson Rodriguez who will be the biggest difference maker in determining just how good this staff will be.

The flame-throwing Texan can best be described as up and down through his first two major league seasons. His rookie season was marked by a horrid first crack at the majors before an impressive return to the majors after the All-Star break.

In 2024, G-Rod had plenty of starts where he looked like a future star, but ultimately the season was marred by two upper-body injuries, the second of which ended his season in early August.

Heading into the 2025 season, the Orioles and fans have different expectations when it comes to Rodriguez.

After the O’s saw ace Corbin Burnes leave for the Diamondbacks—and only replacie hdim with veterans Charlie Morton and Tomoyuki Sugano—Rodriguez now must assume the role of No. 2 starter behind Eflin.

The two biggest areas of improvement for the Orioles flamethrower are establishing his breaking ball and limiting the home run ball. Coming up through the minors, Rodriguez’s best secondary offering was his plus changeup.

We saw that put into action when G-Rod’s changeup finished second to Michael Lorenzen in Run Value/100 pitches.

That development came at the expense of his slider in particular, with opponents hitting .250 and slugging .563 on the pitch.

As his go-to out pitch against right-handed hitters, Rodriguez needs to find more success with his slider to limit the damage done by RHB. Righties hit .280 off G-Rod last year (compared to .205 by lefties) and had an OPS nearly 200 points higher.

Home runs also continued to be a big problem for the former first-round pick in 2024.

Through 238.2 career innings, Rodriguez has allowed 31 HRs—an average of 1.17 HR per 9 innings. It’s not a horrible number by any stretch (the major league average was 1.14 in 2024), but it’s a number everyone in Birdland would like to see come down.

The Orioles were 8-1 last year in games where Rodriguez didn’t give up a long ball, and 6-5 in games where he did.

If Rodriguez irons out those deficiencies in his game, he has the talent to be the Orioles’ next All-Star-level pitcher.

His combination of elite velocity, great changuep, excellent spin on his breaking balls and elite extension caused by his 6’5” frame makes him an imposing presence for any opposing hitter.

Rodriguez put up 11 quality starts in 20 outings last year and he was starting to show the ability to get deep in games before injuries derailed his season.

FanGraph’s ZIPS projections have Rodriguez projected to finish third among Orioles pitchers with 2.1 WAR in 2025. Perhaps the most concerning part of the projection is ZIPS’s prediction that Rodriguez will make only 22 starts in 2025.

The rest of his projected stats are as follows:

121.2 IP, 9.61 K/9, 2.66 BB/9, 1.11 HR/9, 3.77 ERA, 3.64 FIP

Most of these numbers represent a slight improvement from last year, with innings going from 116.2 to 121.2, ERA going down from 3.86 to 3.77, BB/9 going from 2.77 to 2.66 and FIP sinking slightly from 3.66 to 3.64.

The only number FanGraphs isn’t projecting to increase is his strikeout numbers, with a prediction they drop from 10.03 to 9.61—which would still put him among the game’s best strikeout pitchers.

The case for the over

Whether he hits the over on the innings and starts will presumably come down to the health.

Through his first two seasons, G-Rod has never made more than 14 consecutive starts without being demoted or landing on the IL.

The Orioles seemingly slow-rolled his return from the lat injury that ended his season so that he could be fully healthy for the start of 2025.

Early reports out of Sarasota are that Rodriguez is in “great shape” and is welcoming the challenge of stepping into a bigger role in the rotation.

When healthy in 2023 and 2024, Rodriguez showed that he is the type of pitcher who gets better the more he’s exposed to major league hitters. As such, whether or not he improves on his 2024 numbers will largely come down to his health.

If Rodriguez can reach the 30 start/175 IPs thresholds, he’ll likely do enough to earn the No.2 spot in the rotation—or better.

The case for the under

While it’s still too early in his career to slap him with the “injury-prone” tag, Rodriguez would hardly be the first big-bodied, hard-throwing starter who struggled to stay off the IL.

He suffered a similar lat injury in 2022 to the one that ended his 2024 season.

The Orioles’ flame-throwing Texan has a similar build and pitching style to former Nationals’ All-Star Stephen Strasburg, another pitcher who struggled with injuries throughout his career.

If injuries are part of his season again in 2025, we may be left wanting more from the former No. 1 pitching prospect.

Another thing to keep in mind with G-Rod is that, as a reverse splits pitcher, he will be negatively affected by the changes to the left field wall in Camden Yards.

Long balls were already a problem for Rodriguez in Baltimore, where he allowed 18 HRs in 124.1 home innings.

If he starts giving up more big flies due to the dimension changes, that could also deflate his overall numbers.