Worldwide Sports News

Happy Friday Junior everyone!

The Athletics have decided on Brewers executive Cam Castro as their next General Manager. Like most modern front offices in the sport these days, the GM title isn’t what it once was. The top job is now President of Baseball Operations, the job that went to Taylor Smith recently. Even with that being said, the GM job is an important one one way or the other, and it looks like the A’s landed on a good pick for their next one.

Castro’s time with the Brewers saw him help draft and develop tons of talented pitchers. Just looking at a list of former pitchers for the Brew Crew over the past decade and you see tons of quality starting pitching such Corbin Burnes, Brandon Woodruff, Freddy Peralta, and more recently Jacob Misiorowski. And then you have studs in the bullpen seemingly every year, with the team able to say bye to Josh Hader and Devin Williams and simply plug in Trevor Megill, who had a dominant season as Milwaukee’s closer (and could be on the trade market).

Smith himself comes from more of an analytical background but also oversaw good pitching development at his previous stops in Tampa and Boston. It’s likely Smith is going to be the big-picture voice of the front office moving forward while Castro is in charge of the pitching development. That’s a tall task for this organization, one that has struggled to produce consistent pitching at the big league level.

While Castro’s primary focus is likely to be on revamping the farm and the development system, don’t be surprised to see the A’s connected to names he might be familiar with from his days in Milwaukee. If baseball ends up with a salary floor, could we see the A’s make a play for former Brewers ace Freddy Peralta? That’d sure be one way to soak up all that sudden payroll space. Maybe the team is enamored with one of Milwaukee’s young pitchers like Logan Henderson, Robert Gasser or Aaron Ashby, all of whom are young and fit the A’s timeline. Could Castro convince Smith that trading four years of first baseman Nick Kurtz in exchange for four years of an ace in Henderson? If the A’s believe in Tommy White, that’s not the worst trade idea in the world.

The A’s are going to be making moves in their pitching department this offseason. Trades, signings, under-the-radar additions that will end up paying huge dividends during the dog days of August and beyond. One thing A’s fans can know is that Castro has a good track record, and he’ll be directly linked to any and all pitching additions the Athletics begin making over the coming months and years.

Have a great Thursday A’s fans.

A’s Coverage

• Athletics Hire Cam Castro As General Manager
• Taylor Smith’s Improbable Quest: A Quality SP
• A’s trade RHP prospect to Red Sox for outfielder Eaton
• Three A’s Officially Elect Free Agency
• After standout year, No. 7 prospect Taylor could factor into A’s ’27 plans
• Q&A: Smith discusses his new role as youngest head of baseball ops in MLB
• Taylor Smith’s Improbable Quest: A Quality SP
• Why A’s Bringing Back Sonny Gray Could Make Sense
• Optics vs. Infrastructure: Taylor Smith’s First Dilemma
• Athletics Hire Taylor Smith As Next President of Baseball Operations
• Realistic Shea Langeliers trade offers the Yankees, Cubs and Reds can make
• A’s Max Muncy Undergoes Knee Debridement
• The five biggest questions facing the A’s this offseason
• Inside the A’s State-of-the-Art Las Vegas Ballpark
• How technology will shape fan experiences at the A’s Las Vegas ballpark
• Pitching prospect Huggins growing his game with the help of this A’s Hall of Famer
• ’Be a sponge’: No. 19 prospect leads A’s Fall League group with do-it-all mentality
• A’s LHP prospect Richardson shows off health and resiliency during Fall League homecoming
• Get the best of Athletics Nation on the new SB Nation app

MLB News & Interest:

• MLB increases cap and floor in latest proposal, sets 2028 target
• Pujols, Ensberg to interview for Astros manager opening (sources)
• Angels Yet To Begin Interviewing GM Candidates While Awaiting Sale Approval
• Guardians’ Clase, Ortiz described as ‘cheaters’ at pitch-rigging trial
• Hot Stove rumors: Gunnar, Mets, Rasmussen, Marte
• Phillies Likely To Pursue Left-Handed Setup Man
• Team-by-team breakdown of every free agent
• UPDATED 2027-28 MLB Free Agents
• Former MLB star Mark Teixeira wins U.S. House seat in Texas
• Today in Baseball History

Best of X:

This is coming from a Brewers guy:

The correct take:

Love love love it!

AFL update:

One candidate that lost out on the A’s GM gig:

The offseason has barely begun and yet it has already been an eventful one for the Colorado Rockies.

On October 15, they fired pitching coach Alon Leichman after just a single year with the team. This past Monday, they hired Ethan Katz as his replacement.

On the surface this all seems pretty simple:

• Leichman, in his first season as a head pitching coach, oversaw a pitching staff that had the worst ERA, the second-worst FIP, and the fifth-worst fWAR in all of MLB.
• Before his brief foray as the assistant pitching coach for the (barely) playoff-bound Houston Astros, Katz was the Chicago White Sox primary pitching coach for five seasons.

When just looking at the basic facts, the Rockies have simply pivoted from a coach whose first results were poor to one with more experience; totally mundane.

The drama, however, comes from the details.

Some of those details may have come out in the latest edition of the DNVR podcast in which host Christian Saez shared a summary of conversations with both Leichman and unnamed members of the Rockies front office.

According to DNVR, the reason for the Rockies moving on from Leichman wasn’t purely results based but instead part of a fundamental inability for Leichman and the other members of the coaching staff to align on a shared vision for Rockies pitching.

Last offseason, the newly-appointed Rockies front office took the approach of bringing in the best pitching minds they could find, assuming that a melting pot of different approaches and ideas would lead to the best results. Instead, it appears as though competing ideas simply led to players getting mixed messages over the course of the season.

The variety of “experiments” that the Rockies came into the 2026 season attempting to run with their pitching staff (pitch suggestions from the dugout, heavy use of openers, etc.) were reportedly Leichman-led efforts. Leichman, as quoted on the DNVR podcast, characterized his tenure this way: “I felt like they brought me in and then after the month of May we struggled, they ditched everything that I wanted. I couldn’t get one voice to the players and ultimately paid for it.”

According to DNVR, the coaching staff spent a full week after the season attempting to resolve their differences in philosophies and to create a consensus about the path forward. When they were unable to arrive at a resolution, the front office essentially chose which side to move forward with in order to make sure that they had a unified plan in place next season.

The odd thing about this, from the outside perspective, is that the Rockies best pitching results in 2026 were very clearly during the early portion of the season when their experimentation was in full swing. If the front office was choosing between two sides of an internal debate, it is confusing, given our limited information, why the side that yielded the worse results this season was ultimately chosen.

The thing is, while we have a fairly robust picture of what Leichman’s vision for pitching in the organization was, we don’t have as clear an idea of what the alternative vision being espoused, presumably, by some mixture of director of pitching Matt Daniels, assistant pitching coach Gabe Ribas, and bullpen coach Matt Buschmann actually entails.

The initial external reaction to the DNVR podcast I’ve seen has likened the organization’s rebuke of Leichman’s ideas as a return to the Bud Black era of pitching philosophy. Given that Black, and everyone from his pitching department, are gone this seems overblown.

For instance, Buschmann (along with Brandon Stone, Rockies manager of performance science) appears to be at the forefront of the team’s recent adoption of wearable tech in the form of Catapult Vests and Plantiga inserts to track and measure player biomechanics.

Those sort of efforts are less visible on the broadcast than something like the use of openers, but are tangible steps into the world of modern baseball. The Rockies don’t seem poised to mimic the cutting edge style of the Brewers and Rays that many would like, but let’s be clear that this is still an organization years ahead of where it was in 2025.

What’s more, as far as I can tell, there is no current indication that new pitching coach Katz is anti-analytics or preaches a Bud Black style one-size-fits-all sinker forward approach.

In a lengthy interview with SoxOn35th.com from 2022 when he was with the White Sox, Katz described himself as “very hungry for information” and “very open-minded.” The key part, from Katz’ perspective is effectively communicating that information with his players: “You got to get to know the person and the player and basically understand, okay, he could handle this information, or he can’t handle this information. [For some], this might be too much. I’m going to save this for the right time, or if he has a question, dumb it down for him if he needs it.”

Granted, those are all pretty standard, non-specific answers. I tend to think that interview does more to show that Katz has had media training than it does to give a deep insight into his relationship with modern analytics. There is something to be said, however, for him knowing the right things to say for a public audience.

While the overall record of the White Sox declined over the course of Katz’s tenure as pitching coach, there were still many success stories on the mound.

• Reynaldo López had an ERA north of five in the two seasons prior to Katz’ arrival in 2021. After Katz became the pitching coach, López racked up four straight seasons with an ERA- 20% better than league average.
• After two straight seasons of Dylan Cease running elevated home run and walk rates, Katz oversaw his transformation into a Cy Young candidate in 2022.
• Erick Fedde came back to the states from the KBO after having flamed out with the Washington Nationals earlier in his career. Under Katz, Fedde put up 4.6 rWAR before the trade deadline when he was traded to the St.Louis Cardinals.
• Even late in his tenure with the White Sox, Katz was able to strike gold by successfully transitioning Garret Crochet from a flamethrowing reliever that had never started a professional game into a genuine ace.

While the team as a whole was falling apart, Katz managed to help all four of these pitchers perform on the field and become appealing trade targets for contenders. The Crochet and Fedde trades in particular brought back many of the 2026 White Sox key contributors.

This is all to say, Katz has many more recent examples of successfully getting results from his pitchers than anyone that the Rockies had employed in the Bud Black era. His methodology may not be as obviously boundary pushing as Leichman’s, but that doesn’t mean he represents a clear step backwards in terms of tangible results.

Regardless of whether or not the front office chose the optimal side of the pitching philosophy divide, it is necessary for the organization to have a unified vision. Having multiple different coaches telling players to do radically different things can only lead to confusion or mistrust.

Last offseason, Paul DePodesta credited this sort of organizational misalignment as the source of his failure during his time as the general manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

“I was really young [31] at the time. What I knew how to do at that point, or what I felt I knew how to do, was build a roster that could win. I had been incredibly fortunate — I had been in Cleveland, had been in Oakland, and both of those teams had done nothing but win. So I had an idea of ‘This is what it’s going to take to win, and that’s the job.’ And we did it the first year.

“Then it didn’t take long after that to realize that’s not the whole job. It’s a necessary part of the job — it’s why you do it. But it really isn’t the whole job. The whole job is actually building an organization, not just a team. I look back on that now and realize I made a lot of mistakes in terms of bringing that organization along, being able to bring in people from different departments, tying together baseball and business.”

Leichman himself seemed to agree with the sentiment that it was not productive to have different members of the coaching staff pulling the players in different directions. As quoted on DNVR, Leichman said that ultimately “My job was to get everyone on the same page, and I couldn’t.”

Let’s just hope that under Katz, the Rockies are now all on the same page.

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Good morning everyone!

The Mariners introduced Jason Kanzler as their new manager, while the Astros and Angels look to fill out their group of decision-makers. Let’s get to all of that and more.

In Mariners news…

• Kate Preusser broke down a 2020 podcast appearance by Jason Kanzler to get a sense of his mindset on coaching.
• Kate also provided the most important takeaways from Kanzler’s introductory press conference.
• This is an interesting trio to appearing together representing the Mariners (Cal was actually there too, apparently. Maybe he was in the bathroom.)

Around the league…

• The Astros are hiring Brewers senior vice president of player development and performance Cam Castro to serve as their new general manager.
• Albert Pujols will reportedly interview for the Astros’ managerial opening.
• The Angels have not yet started the process of interviewing general manager candidates while they wait for the sale of the team to be formally approved.
• The Mets are hiring former catcher A.J. Ellis to serve as their major league strategy coordinator.
• The Braves’ latest financial report reveals they have created a cushion of profit through their real estate investments which will help offset potential losses from a lockout.
• Ben Clemens at Fangraphs tried to figure out why this postseason was so pitcher-friendly.

Jyun-Yue Tseng was born on November 7, 2001 in Taichung, Taiwan’s second-largest city behind Taipei. He attended the verbosely named Taichung Municipal Taichung Industrial High School and developed into a standout baseball player, at first as an infielder and later as a pitcher. On July 20, 2020, he was one of 123 amateur players to enter into the CPBL Draft, and the right-hander was one of 48 players who were selected by a professional club, with the Fubon Guardians picking him in the seventh round of the process.

The 19-year-old Tseng made his professional debut in 2021 and quickly established himself as one of the preeminent relievers in the league, appearing in 57 games and posting a 1.80 ERA in 55.0 innings, allowing 36 hits, walking 16, and striking out 62 while saving 12 games. For his efforts, he was named the 2021 Rookie of the Year.

He followed up his Rookie of the Year campaign with statistically similar seasons over the next few years, cementing himself as one of Taiwan’s best relief pitchers. In 2022, he posted a 2.86 ERA in 50.1 innings over 47 games, allowing 35 hits, walking 18, and striking out 64 while saving 20 games. In 2023, he posted a 1.22 ERA in 51.2 innings over 54 appearances, allowing 29 hits, walking 17, and striking out 60 while saving 18 games.

After the 2023 season ended, Tseng was able to get the Guardians to post him, but he did not find much of a market outside of Taiwan and opted to remained with Fubon. In 2024, he posted a 1.52 ERA in 47.1 innings, allowing 36 hits, walking 14, and striking out 63 while saving 6 games. His streak of utter dominance ended in 2025, when he posted a 3.00 ERA in 36.0 innings over 34 games, allowing 30 hits, walking 13, and striking out 28.

Yue returned to the Taiwanese National Team in the 2026 World Baseball Classic, appearing in a pair of games and notching a single save, throwing 2.0 scoreless innings, not allowing a hit or a walk while striking out two. Returning to the Guardians for the regular season, the right-hander would go on to post a 1.57 ERA in 51.2 innings, allowing 48 hits, walking 13, and striking out 65 while saving 25 games.

After the season ended, the 24-year-old right-hander filed for international free agency and the posting request was approved by the Guardians.

The 5’8”, 150-pound right-hander would be one of the shortest pitchers in Major League Baseball. He throws from a high-three-quarters arm slot with a long arm action through the back, utilizing a hitch in his leg lift and wrapping his wrist during the full extension of his arm circle.

Tseng throws a fastball, cutter, slider, and splitter, with the latter being an exceptional pitch in Taiwan. The right-hander sits in the low-to-mid-90s with the pitch and tops out in the high-90s, flirting with triple digits. While the spin rate for the pitch is merely average for a four-seam fastball, hovering around 2300 RPM, the right-hander attacks batters from a flat approach angle thanks to his size and release point, heightening the pitch’s perceived induced vertical break that it otherwise does not produce through spin.

Tseng’s cutter, slider, and splitter are all pedestrian pitches, with all three sitting in the mid-to-high-80s. He is able to command all three, and the pitches tunnel well with one another and his fastball, but none have any standout pitch characteristics.

This morning, the great folks at Baseball America released an updated top 10 list of Washington Nationals prospects. I really respect the work that BA does, so this list holds a lot of weight to me. While most of the list consisted of familiar names, there were a couple surprises as well.

As you can see, Eli Willits was ranked as the Nats number one prospect, and his tool grades are very impressive. His hitting ability and speed are considered elite tools. Meanwhile, his fielding and arm are above average while his power is seen as average. Willits is a well-rounded player, who also has standout tools.

In the writeup, BA said that his pure bat to ball skills were merely above average instead of elite. However, his plate discipline is so good that it helps boost his hit tool. We saw that in his first full professional season, where Willits walked at a 17.7% clip. Power has always been seen as his weakest tool, but even that was better than expected in 2026.

The 18 year old hit 14 homers, 27 doubles and 8 triples in 114 games this year. Willits posted a 100.4 MPH 90th percentile EV, which is below average, but some of the other numbers are more encouraging. His average exit velocity was 89.2 MPH, which is actually slightly above big league average. Meanwhile, his max exit velocity was over 110 MPH, which is very good for an 18 year old. Power will never be the best part of his game, but this season Willits showed he has plenty of juice.

At the end of his writeup, BA said that Willits is tracking like an All-Star shortstop who could lead the league in stolen bases and runs. With 62 steals on the season, Willits’ base running ability is elite. When I saw him in person, that aggression on the basepaths was one of my main takeaways.

We already know a lot about Eli Willits though. He was the number one overall pick in the draft and is a player Nats fans have been following. However, Samil Serrano is a teenaged prospect fans might not be as aware of. The biggest surprise of this BA list is that Serrano was ranked as the Nats 5th best prospect. He was ahead of bigger names such as Devin Fitz-Gerald and Chris Hacopian.

Serrano is a very young player, having just turned 18 a few days ago. He was the Nats biggest international signing this past year, inking a deal with $1.97 million. His stock only rose in the Dominican Summer League this year. He put up great surface level numbers, but his underlying data was even better.

In 48 DSL games, Serrano hit .310 with a .968 OPS and became a DSL All-Star. Impressively, Serrano walked more than he struck out this season. He might be the best pure hitter to come from the Nats international ranks since Juan Soto. The only competition would be Luis Garcia Jr., but Serrano has better plate discipline and power at this stage.

There was one stat in Baseball America’s writeup that made me pop up in my seat. Serrano ranked in the 90th percentile of DSL hitters in contact rate, chase rate and 90th percentile exit velocity. The only other player to meet that criteria in the statcast era is Jesus Made, who is now the best prospect in baseball. 

We still need to see how he does when he arrives in the US this year, but it is easy to see why BA is so bullish on him. Even at this early stage, it is clear to see that he is a special offensive talent. Serrano has the ability to hit for average and power. While he is not some exceptional athlete, his hitting ability is good enough to carry his profile.

On the defensive side of the ball, Serrano plays center field right now. He is seen as having good instincts in the outfield, but average speed means he is likely to be a corner outfielder. However, he has enough athleticism and arm strength to be a good defender in right field.

The Nats have not had a lot of great international prospects in recent years, but Serrano is one. His stateside debut is something I will be watching very closely. He will probably start the season in rookie ball, but do not be surprised if he is with the Fred-Nats and putting up solid numbers in the summer.

This is the type of prospect who could rise on to top 100 lists before too long. On MLB Pipeline’s rankings, he is the Nats 16th best prospect, but I assume he will rise when that is updated. 

Putting Serrano in the top 5 is an aggressive ranking from BA. There are safer prospects who have a much longer track record that are behind him in the rankings. However, this boldness shows just how high the industry is on Serrano. By this time next year, we could be saying some things about Serrano that sound outlandish right now.

Baseball America is behind a paywall, so I do not want to spoil the entire list. They do great work though and if you are passionate about prospects, I would highly recommend subscribing to them. This list was fascinating. It made me even higher on Willits and made me think about Samil Serrano in a different light.

Maybe the best moment of the 2026 season was Joe Musgrove’s return to the San Diego Padres. He spent two seasons away from the sport rehabilitating his right elbow after Tommy John surgery. Musgrove re-entered at the most important time, pitching in the postseason.

Unfortunately, there was no storybook ending because the Padres were eliminated from the playoffs in the division round. But his season debut was well worth the wait. 

From hometown to the big leagues

His bullpen entrance re-energized Petco Park. The Friar Faithful gave the hometown boy a resounding hero’s welcome. The love affair began when Musgrove came home to play for his childhood team.

He cemented his place in the hearts of the Friar Faithful on April 9, 2021, throwing the franchise’s first-ever no-hitter in just his second start with the Padres. But he elevated his legendary status the following year, delivering a dominant road performance to eliminate the New York Mets in the Wild Card round.

His season debut was a night Musgrove once feared might never come. Other starting pitchers have come back to pitch effectively after Tommy John surgery. However, his rehab struggles were alarming. Every time Musgrove’s return to the mound appeared imminent, an unexpected injury pushed back his return date. 

The physical setbacks were the darkest days of his rehab. 

Rehab setbacks clouded Musgrove’s recovery

The rehab program was one step at a time; sometimes, Musgrove needed to go backward to move forward. For him, the biggest challenge was staying patient and allowing his elbow to heal because the right-hander was tired of sitting on the sidelines.

If you have ever been sidelined with a sports injury, your return to the sport is replayed endlessly in your mind throughout rehab. Rarely do expectations align with reality. 

Musgrove’s road to recovery was a grueling two-year process. It was bumpy with a few detours, but he kept his emotions in check when speaking with the press after every rehabilitation setback. It is hard to remain calm when your career is hanging in the balance.

Unsung hero: San Diego Padres

Hoping for a smooth debut, Padres manager Craig Stammen brought Musgrove in to start a clean inning rather than enter the game with runners on base. However, the appearance did not begin well; Musgrove gave up two hits and a walk before settling down to strike out two batters, preserving an 8-0 victory over the Chicago Cubs in Game 1 of the National League Wildcard Series. He came back to pitch two innings against the eventual World Series champions, the Milwaukee Brewers, in Game 1 of the National League Division Series. 

In that outing, Musgrove fanned two and hit a batter, which mirrors his style of pitching. The right-hander loves challenging hitters by throwing inside without hesitation.

Yes, Musgrove has some areas that need improvement, including becoming more consistent in repeating his delivery. This will allow him to execute his pitches better. Musgrove is looking forward to the challenge and expects to be better next season. 

The Friar Faithful embraced his return, and the night could not have gone better.

Musgrove’s return to the roster was a proud moment for all.

Padres News:

• He gave the Padres more than what many expected, so what grade did Lincoln Zdunich of Gaslamp Ball give reliever Yuki Matsui?

• Pitcher Francis Pena is impressing in the Arizona Fall League and is sending a message to the San Diego organization that he wants an opportunity to join the big league club.

• Alex McCoy will compete in the AFL All-Star Game.

• Prospects Jagger Haynes and Tirso Ornelas are a couple of the biggest names leaving the Padres’ organization.

Baseball News:

• Here is a list of free agents who improved their earning potential with their play in 2026.

• According to reports, the Baltimore Orioles are open for business and will listen to offers on Gunnar Henderson.

• This is what teams can expect from Japanese slugger Teruaki Sato when he comes to MLB.

• Albert Pujols is set to get another managerial interview, this time with the Houston Astros.

Major League Baseball on Wednesday announced rosters for the Fall Stars Game, with two Dodgers and the possibility of more for the All-Star Game for the Arizona Fall League.

Third baseman Chase Harlan and pitcher Luke Fox were named to the National League roster for the Fall Stars Game, which will be played on Sunday night at Salt River Fields in Scottsdale, a 5 p.m. PT game that will be carried by MLB Network.

There is also a final vote, in which fans will be able to select one more player for both the National League and American League teams. The three choices for the final NL roster spot includes Dodgers prospects Eduardo Quintero and Charles Davalan, plus San Diego Padres infielder Justin DeCriscio. Voting runs on MLB.com through Friday at 5 p.m. PT.

You might recognize most of these names from the Baseball Prospectus top Dodgers prospect list, which was unveiled on Wednesday. Quintero is ranked the third-best prospect in the system, Davalan is seventh, and Harlan is eighth.

Harlan is hitting .276/.403/.586 with 17 RBI in 16 games for the Glendale Desert Dogs in the AFL, with five home runs, two of them coming since the calendar flipped to November. Fox has a 4.09 ERA in five appearances and 11 innings in the AFL, with 14 strikeouts (28.6-percent strikeout rate) and four walks, and no home runs allowed.

Harlan and Quintero did not play on Wednesday for Glendale, but Davalan did, continuing to log innings at second base as the outfielder tries to add to his toolbox. Davalan walked on Wednesday but was otherwise hitless in three at-bats.

Davalan on Wednesday was one of 10 hitting prospects from the Arizona Fall League analyzed by Ian Cundall at Baseball America, specifically with his move to second base in the circuit.

“He has made most of the routine plays, but his lack of range was noticeable, and his reads off the bat were a step slow,” Cundall wrote. “It will be interesting to see if the Dodgers continue to pursue this route with him heading into 2027, as it could slow down his ascension to the big leagues. With his offensive potential, however, it would maximize his value if he can develop into at least a playable second baseman in a part-time role.”

Wednesday scores

Surprise 2, Glendale 0

Thursday schedule

12:30 p.m. PT: Glendale vs. Mesa

AFL live streams

Earlier this week, MLB officially announced the finalists for the major end of season awards. The Phillies have some representation despite the disappointing end to their season, as Cristopher Sánchez, Don Mattingly, and Jhoan Duran all are among the nominees. Here’s the full layout of who is a finalist for what award:

NL MVP

• Pete Crow-Armstrong, Chicago Cubs
• Shohei Ohtani, Los Angeles Dodgers
• Brice Turang, Milwaukee Brewers

AL MVP

• Yordan Alvarez, Houston Astros
• Junior Caminero, Tampa Bay Rays
• Bobby Witt Jr., Kansas City Royals

NL Cy Young Award

• Jacob Misiorowski, Milwaukee Brewers
• Cristopher Sánchez, Philadelphia Phillies
• Chris Sale, Atlanta Braves

AL Cy Young Award

• Dylan Cease, Toronto Blue Jays
• Parker Messick, Cleveland Guardians
• Cam Schlittler, New York Yankees

NL Manager of the Year

• Don Mattingly, Philadelphia Phillies
• Pat Murphy, Milwaukee Brewers
• Walt Weiss, Atlanta Braves

AL Manager of the Year

• Kevin Cash, Tampa Bay Rays
• Chad Tracy, Boston Red Sox
• Will Venable, Chicago White Sox

NL Rookie of the Year

• Carson Benge, New York Mets
• Sal Stewart, Cincinnati Reds
• JJ Wetherholt, St. Louis Cardinals

AL Rookie of the Year

• Kevin McGonigle, Detroit Tigers
• Parker Messick, Cleveland Guardians
• Payton Tolle, Boston Red Sox

NL Reliever of the Year

• Jhoan Duran, Philadelphia Phillies
• Trevor Megill, Milwaukee Brewers
• Mason Miller, San Diego Padres

AL Reliever of the Year

• Bryan Baker, Tampa Bay Rays
• Cade Smith, Cleveland Guardians
• Louis Varland, Toronto Blue Jays

So, what are your predictions for the winners? Will the Phillies bring home any individual awards?

May 21, 2022. That’s the day that was supposed to forever change the course of the Orioles’ franchise.

It was the day that Adley Rutschman, the Orioles’ wunderkind catcher, made his major league debut. The 24-year-old received a raucous standing ovation from the Camden Yards crowd as he took the field, and few could forget the indelible image of Rutschman doing a 360 to soak in the atmosphere before donning his mask, giving a slight nod as if to say, “Yeah, I belong here.”

Rutschman brought the kind of pedigree that few O’s rookies could ever match. He was a former #1 draft pick, only the second in Orioles history, and was the top-ranked prospect in baseball as he destroyed minor league pitching all the way up the ladder. In an O’s minor league system that had been replenished with young talent since the hiring of Mike Elias in 2018, Rutschman was the leader of the pack, the franchise cornerstone who would usher in an era of perennially contending Orioles teams. The future of Baltimore baseball was incredibly bright.

Now look at us. Four years later, the Orioles still haven’t won a postseason game in the Elias era. And Rutschman, the linchpin of the Birds’ expected renaissance, is gone, traded away to a division rival while he was on the injured list. All that’s left in Birdland is a big old mess.

It’s safe to say that the Adley Rutschman Experience in Baltimore didn’t turn out as anyone expected. Which is not to say he was a bust. In fact, the first three years of his career could hardly have been more successful in terms of his on-field production. Adley racked up 12.9 bWAR from 2022-24, the third-most in Orioles history for a player in his first three seasons (behind Gunnar Henderson’s 15.8 and Nick Markakis’ 14.0). Rutschman was AL Rookie of the Year runner-up in 2022, and collected a Silver Slugger award, two All-Star selections, and two top-12 AL MVP finishes in that three-year span.

You could make a legitimate case that Adley was the best catcher in baseball at the time, or at least the one with the brightest career in front of him. And his arrival did, indeed, usher in an era of homegrown O’s prospects who brought postseason baseball back to Baltimore for two years, including a 103-win season and an AL East crown in 2023. But in both seasons, the Birds were swept out of the postseason.

As Orioles fans are all too painfully aware, though, Rutschman’s career — and the Orioles’ fortunes — took a nosedive starting in mid-2024. From June 22 to the end of the season, Rutschman batted a horrendous .192 with a .574 OPS in 77 games as the O’s limped into the playoffs. A prevailing theory among O’s fans is that Adley was battling a secret injury during that time, though Rutschman never admitted as much. Distressingly, his 2025 was even worse: oblique strains in both his legs landed him on the IL twice, and in 90 games he batted just .220/.307/.366 with nine home runs, a major reason why the Orioles collapsed to a last-place finish.

Rutschman entered the 2026 season with something to prove. A few things, actually. He needed to prove he could still hit like the Adley of 2022-23. He needed to prove he was still the Orioles’ go-to catcher even after the O’s committed an eight-year contract to Samuel Basallo in 2025. And he needed to prove he could still be the bedrock of the Birds’ return to contention.

Rutschman was unsuccessful on the last of those points and only somewhat so on the other two. He played the lion’s share behind the plate while he was on the team, starting 49 of the Orioles’ first 98 games. And his bat was the best it’s been in three years. He posted a 116 OPS+ for the Birds, batting .251 with a .764 OPS, sparking gleeful cries of “Adley is so back!” from O’s fans who’d been long awaiting his return to form. His defense, too, was vastly improved over the past couple of years, particularly when throwing out basestealers. Rutschman’s 33.9 CS% was the best mark of his career and far outpaced the MLB average of 22.7. He led all AL catchers with 21 caught stealings.

Adley’s early-season heroics earned him his third career All-Star selection, serving as the Orioles’ lone representative at the Midsummer Classic in Philadelphia on July 14. It turned out to be his third-to-last game in an O’s uniform. During the Birds’ series in Houston to start the second half, Rutschman suffered left wrist inflammation that landed him on the 10-day IL — and, though we didn’t know it at the time, wrapped up his Orioles career.

As the O’s continued to wallow in mediocrity at the Aug. 3 trade deadline, Rutschman’s name was bandied about as a trade candidate. Logically it made sense, due to the Orioles’ commitment to Basallo and Adley’s 1.5 years until free agency, but still it came as a shock to much of Birdland when Elias actually pulled the trigger on a deal. Especially shocking is that the O’s traded him to division rival Boston, of all places, for Carlos Narváez and four prospects.

And just like that, it was over. Adley Rutschman, the one-time face of the franchise, was unceremoniously jettisoned by the Birds while on the injured list, leaving so much unfinished business with the team he was supposed to lead to the promised land. He’ll always be remembered fondly by most O’s fans, and his up-and-down five-year Orioles career brought more highlights than lowlights. Ultimately, though, Adley Rutschman never quite lived up to the inordinate hype that accompanied him. And the Orioles’ early success after his arrival in the majors didn’t last.

The return package for Rutschman, which featured top Red Sox pitching prospect Anthony Eyanson and several other highly-regarded youngsters, was widely praised. Still, to see a much-ballyhooed #1 draft pick come and go from Baltimore without the O’s ever winning even one playoff game is a rather damning indictment of Elias’s vision for the organization, and if I were the owner of the team he’d have gotten his pink slip some time ago. But David Rubenstein doesn’t see it that way, and so Elias remains, albeit with a heavily restructured front office. Perhaps someday the Orioles will finally find that cornerstone player who can return to the franchise to championship glory.

As for Rutschman, he’s surely got more years ahead of him to torment the Orioles, as he did in his return to Camden Yards with the Red Sox on Sept. 3 when he smacked two home runs to beat the Birds. He’ll be under contract with Boston for 2027 before reaching free agency at age 30, and I’ll be fascinated to see what kind of contract he gets. How much will teams be willing to pay for an aging catcher whose offense has fluctuated wildly from year to year?

It’s strange to think that the Orioles will open the 2027 season without Rutschman behind the plate for the first time in five years. And it’s frustrating that his tenure with the Birds didn’t pan out like we’d dreamed of. But thanks for the memories all the same, Adley.