Ranking Orioles’ Remaining Series by Import for Playoff Implications

The Orioles have put themselves in a position where every game matters and every series matters.

No matter who they are playing, and where they are facing them.

They have been chasing the standings in the AL East since mid April, when they fell below .500 not-yet-to-return. It took four months just to get to one game below .500 and they simply can’t stop the surge now if they are to continue making a playoff push when the schedule turns tougher this week and the O’s return to Baltimore.

There isn’t much wiggle room and they could certainly use a sustained winning streak like the one that propelled the Guardians into the final Wild Card spot (for now). And as I see it, the current series with the Rockies is among the most critical of all, because not only is it in the moment, but like every other opponent on this 10-day road trip, Colorado’s vast weaknesses line up very well for the Orioles to continue doing damage.

And they simply must.

Here’s how the series for the rest of the season stack up, as we enter the final month of the regular season.

Guardians, Sept. 7-9

These are head-to-head games against the team that is, for now, the greatest competition to sneaking into the playoffs. Cleveland always has legit pitching and a lot of it, and the Orioles have been a bottom 10 starting lineup and, especially bottom tier in the top five spots of the lineup, all season. Getting them at home has to be to Baltimore’s advantage.

The oddity here is that “Guard-Ball” as they call it in Cleveland – a version of pitching-first, defense fueled small-ball – isn’t playing nearly as well at home as on the road (37-32). Landing slugger Jo Adell before the deadline has added punch to the lineup. Cleveland is 8-2 in the last 10 games and hosts Toronto next.

At Rockies, right bleeping now

There is no better time than the present when the chore is this big.

Colorado has the worst home ERA in the NL, and while the back end of the bullpen might not be as bad as Washington’s, this ballpark is working against them, not for them, in terms of pitching. They have won just two of their last eight games. The Orioles have to finish this road trip strong and at least win this series.

They face soft-tossing Tomo Sugano, a former Oriole, in this series, and he has the kind of junk-balling approach that tends to give them fits. Before that game Wednesday, the Birds are slated to face Gabriel Hughes (6.61 ERA) and tonight it’s Tanner Gordon (5.38). These might not be must-win games, but they are close.

At Blue Jays, Sept. 11-13/ vs. Blue Jays Sept. 21-23

I don’t think Toronto has what it needs to get in the playoffs, but crazy things happen and this team did come out of nowhere to nearly beat the Dodgers in the World Series last year and they have some pedigree. Like the Orioles. there have been many times when it looked like they would fall into the abyss, and the ever-forgiving AL just welcomes them back to the pack.

Playing on that unforgiving surface in Toronto isn’t always great, especially this deep into the season with the bumps and bruises mounting. Also, two of the Orioles right-handed bats who have mashed Blue Jays pitching up there over the years – Ryan Mountcastle and Canadian Tyler O’Neill – are on the IL. The Orioles worked some serious magic against the Jays in May the last time they came to Baltimore, and the Jays, for all of their faults and with Vlad Guerrero clearly not himself all season, enter play today just a half game behind the Orioles.

At the very least the Orioles must hold serve here and split these games.

Red Sox, Sept. 4-6

It’s not uncommon for a team to go on a tear on a road trip and then let-up some when it gets back home. You kind of take some things for granted and just expect the good times will continue to roll. Heck, the Orioles just succumbed to this themselves earlier this month, when they took three of four at Tampa to finish a 10-day trip on a high and then got swept by the Yankees at Camden Yards.

This is also the return of Adley Rutschman, one of the most overhyped players in modern Orioles history whose trade away didn’t slow this Orioles down at all, as we told you it wouldn’t. They had to get the always-injured, sad-sack catcher out of here and they did for a haul of teenage prospects. Whether Rutschman stays healthy enough to make it to this midweek series is always in question.

(The guy is not cut out for Boston and we told you he would suffer greaty as soon as he got there).

How much he even plays if healthy is another question – dude has a .499 OPS with Boston and went 0-for-4 Sunday. He’s struck out 15 times in 15 games and has nine hits. Gulp. But like most former Orioles who have seemingly little respect for Orioles baseball failure Mike Elias, he will surely bring it for this series. Boston is going to the playoffs it certainly seems and might be on cruise control here with its seeding looking fairly set.

The Rest

Look, the Orioles have to make all of the above worthwhile before we get to the other three teams left on the schedule. We can’t get ahead of ourselves with this crew.

The Mets (Sept. 14-16) have been better lately though their season was a disaster. They should be loose through with nothing on the line. The Brewers (in Baltimore Sept. 18-20) have a real skipper and they play elite baseball all the time with a true professionalism sorely lacking under Elias with any consistency. Will they be worried about holding off the Dodgers for the top seed in the National League? They are going to be a tall task no matter what.

We tend to think the Yankees won’t have much to play for in the final series of the season at the end of September, nearly five games behind the Rays now. They might either be resting vets for the playoffs or going all out for a division title. Too soon to know. The Orioles have not been able to hit their pitching all season.

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