The Orioles Need Slugger Pete Alonso To Heat Back Up With Their WIld Card Hopes Dwindling

After a 30-game tear, Alonso last 15 games have been brutal. More DH days might help with the playoffs in the balance

Sep 3, 2026; Baltimore, Maryland, USA; Baltimore Orioles first baseman Pete Alonso (25) watches his home run against the Boston Red Sox during the fourth inning at Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Mandatory Credit: Gregory Fisher-Imagn Images | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

For a solid month there was probably no more impactful hitter in baseball than Pete Alonso.

Maybe Yordan Alvarez. Maybe Pete Crow-Armstrong. They are top MVP candidates for a reason.

But few players in MLB were carrying a lineup more than Alonso was carrying the Orioles for a solid 30 games. He was always going to cool off, of course. With the Orioles in another lost season in terms of meeting Mike Elias’s stated goal of winning the AL East (they are only 17 games out), and trying to dig out of another massive hole, what they couldn’t afford was for Alonso to collapse.

And over the last 15 games, he has collapsed, and this team went from an 8-2 run with Alonso the primary reason why, to 3-7 in their last 10 heading into another crucial game in Toronto today. There are mitigating circumstances, of course, and I suspect when this season concludes we find out that what overmatched rookie puppet manager Criag Albernaz called “a calf cramp” was quite more than that.

Now, Alonso is playing much more first base lately than he was for a stretch, and perhaps they should go back to that, with red-hot Coby Mayo fine there and rookie catcher Samuel Basallo is more than fine there. Oh, and Alonso has a .974 OPS in 19 games as a DH this season, slugging .583 (100 points higher than at 1B).

How Bad Is It?

The Orioles are 7-8 in their last 15 games and a lot of that is due to regression of starting pitcher as many of those guys threw more innings than ever before. And there was no one cut out to pitch the ninth inning regularly after the Tyler Wells trade.

But Alonso going from Babe Ruth to, gulp, Jim Traber, is also a massive and unfortunate development for this team. And, with what Elias is paying him, and the way they construct their lineups, ain’t no way Alonso is doing anything but hitting second or third no matter how bad he scuffles.

                                                Alonso’s Last 15 Games

AVG: .170                 OBP: .318                 SLG: .281                  OPS: .601

HR: 2                          XBH: 2                       RBI: 6                         TB: 15

And what about the previous 30:

AVG: .317                 OBP: .430                 SLG: .698                  OPS: 1128

HR: 11                       XBH: 16                     RBI: 25                       TB: 81

No one expects him to get back to that 30-game tear. Finding a level somewhere between these extremes would be huge.

Dylan Beavers and Mayo are both locked in batting in the top four, Gunnar Henderson shouldn’t be batting above fifth, and if they could get Alonso productive again, perhaps the Orioles can at least remain in the hunt for the final Wild Card spot into the final homestand of the season when they return from facing the Blue Jays and Mets – Alonso’s former team, in his former home stadium, where you know he will amped up as his chases career home run No. 300.

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