The Orioles Need To Keep Riding Blaze Alexander While He's The Hottest Bat In MLB

On April 27, you would have been hard pressed to find any hitter in MLB scuffling more than Blaze Aleander.

The transition to a new team, and a new league, going from Arizona to Baltimore just before spring training, and being asked to play seemingly every position except catcher and try to contribute in a lineup in which the middle hitters were mostly doing nothing, was not exactly how anyone would have drawn it up.

Regular third-baseman Jordan Westburg would miss the entire season with an elbow injury and Jackson Holliday would miss the first 60 games of the regular season with a broken hand, thrusting even more on the newcomer. And on April 27 it showed, with an excruciating .172/.238/.190 line through 65 plate appearances (.428 OPS), with Alexander also having to try to add speed and action on the base paths for what had been a station-to-station offense.

Since then, no one has hit safely with more success in all of MLB than Alexander. And it’s not even close. Alexander is batting .383 since April 28, .023 higher than Otto Lopez (Miami) and contributing 12 extra base hits and continuing to be their most useful glove no matter where he goes. It’s been unreal, honestly, with Alexander’s .991 OPS since that date sixth on the planet, tucked right between Astros superstar slugger Yordan Alvarez and Mets superstar slugger Juan Soto among league leaders over his last 105 plate appearances.

He and Leody Taveras have kept whatever this team is together and mildly relevant within a terrible American League by consistently being sparkplugs at the bottom of the lineup, though they can only do so much. Even during Alexander’s run as a generation hitter, the O’s are 17-21. But there’s nothing more that could be asked of him.

“He’s made a lot of great adjustments,” rookie skipper Craig Albernaz said of Alexander heading into June. “He works his tail off. But also his calling card is being able to play everywhere. When you play a multitude of positions at a high level like Blaze does, it takes a little bit of toll on your body. So we want to make sure – that’s the biggest thing – how his body is recovering and where he’s at ... He's such a weapon off the bench as well.”

I’d suggest while he’s batting .400 you ride him as much as you can, skip. But I’d also advise you stop soiling yourself talking about a 21-year old catcher and think a little longer before speaking the next time you are asked about your best player getting plunked as ridiculous retribution in a blowout loss like Saturday.

On-Base Machine

The crazy thing is about Alexander’s .427 OBP in this span, is that he’s still only walking 5.7% of the time during it. So, yeah. Regression is coming. And for as hard as he’s drilling the ball, a ridiculous .429 batting average on balls in play feels like it’s from a different galaxy. That too, will tumble, though some refinements to his pre-swing mechanism could help him remain a vital hitter here.

While batting average will tumble, if he can offset it with a few more walks, we know he can pressure a defense when he is on base. He and Taveras also can contribute to the small-ball cause with sac bunts (Taveras is superior but Alexander could get there) and bunting for base hits when the defense doesn’t show sufficient respect.

Clutch Gene

Alexander, even in the depth of his initial slide, had a knack for putting the ball in play with men on base. He and Taveras, again, have been elite contributors with runners in scoring position for a team that routinely will leave eight to 10 on base in those situations. Big boppers Gunnar Henderson and Pete Alonso have been largely lost in these situations.

On the season. Taveras leads the Orioles with a .967 OPS with RISP and Alexander is second at .895. Without them, this club is already 10-games under .500 and buried. (And that might be their reality when they head back from this daunting 10-game road trip, anyway).

Golden Glove

Alexander made an exceptional throw from right field on Sunday to nearly nail a runner at home, the kind of thing we rarely see from the Orioles’ regular right fielders. He is, without question, the best third baseman and second baseman on the team, and you get the feeling questions about Coby Mayo’s play at third, coupled with a bad pitching staff, will lead to Alexander there with some regularity.

Mayo was showing signs of a breakthrough but has gone back to more of a platoon role against lefties with this alleged contending team already fighting for its season. They cannot afford to give away extra outs – though they do it all the time – and I suspect we see quite a bit of Alexander on this road trip, perhaps even more up the lineup.

Henderson continues his meltdowns and he should sit for a bit, and I’d hope they’d be smart enough to put Alexander at short in that instance and not Jackson Holliday, who needs every rep possible to try to become a passable MLB second baseman.

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