What the Orioles Can Learn From the Two World Series Franchises

The Brewers and Rays, two of the smaller market teams in MLB, who have been knocking on the door for years, didn’t eliminate monster-payroll teams like the Dodgers and Yankees from the playoffs by accident. It's by design.

They are elite front offices run by some of the best and brightest in the game. The antithesis of what Mike Elias has managed entering his ninth year of a ridiculous and endless rebuild in Baltimore. Despite being hired by John Angelos, the former owner, with the Brewers and Rays in mind as models, Elias has largely stocked his failure front office with cronies from the Astros or Cardinals and even his latest hire, alleged “GM” Jared Banner, is from big-market roots.

As we hear it, the Orioles has interest in landing certain candidates from Milwaukee but couldn’t get them to be sufficiently interested, which makes sense; Elias should be on his last legs and he has as much power as ever and he refuses to adjust and change and get much of anything right. And by keeping widely disliked people like Sig Mejdal in his org it’s clear this wasn’t really a GM opening.

Nevertheless, we can certainly hope that watching these two franchises secure the right to play the final series of the season and with one of them assured of winning he first World Series in franchise history, some of the commonality of their success is not lost on Elias. We could hope he is paying attention to the vast ways in which these franchises have passed him by and what they share in common that runs counter to his pathetic attempts to build an October roster.

It’s fair to assume, nearly a decade on the job, that Elias may just be born to lose in this role, and he might be squirming at all the ways the Brewers are Rays expose him for the fraud that he is:

They Actually Scout!

Oct 22, 2026; Milwaukee, WI, USA; Milwaukee Brewers General Manager Matt Arnold speaks a press conference before a workout session prior to the 2026 World Series on Friday. Mandatory Credit: Michael McLoone-Imagn Images | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Believe it or not, the Rays and Brewers invest in people and let them do their job and don’t scout off numbers on a computer screen. They would never tell what’s left of a scouting department, as Mejdal did according to baseball analyst Kyle Glaser (who explained as such on “The Daily Flock Show") not to bother writing up pitchers because Mike and Sig had that covered with their models.

Instead of gutting their orgs of their most-experienced scouts who could provide the most detailed check and balances against their supercomputer – the way Elias couldn’t wait to run off BJ Surhoff and Dean Albany – these winning franchises are among the industry leaders investing in such human capital. Our buddy Glaser explains it incredibly well right here:

For my old friends at @BaseballAmerica, I compiled the sizes of each team’s scouting staff.

Note that many teams frequently renowned for their technology and analytics (Dodgers, Rays, Brewers) also have some of the largest scouting staffs in MLB. https://t.co/Iu4577ReKe pic.twitter.com/uXtBTzeZgF
— Kyle Glaser (@KyleAGlaser) October 22, 2026

Elias has bragged about how small his circle of trust is; when you surround yourself with sophomoric suck-ups and make fealty and genuflection core tenants of any front-office or manager hire, you end up 39 games out in the AL East the last two years while it took an act of God wiping out their stadium in 2025 to keep the Rays from out-performing all projections and expectations as they always do.

It takes human beings to turn Drew Rasmussen into an ace and to repeatedly fleece Elias in all those trades, and to steal Junior Caminero and know when to sell high. And for the Brewers to reinvent Quinn Priester and Kyle Hamilton and Dustin May on the cheap. Sorry Mikey.

Defense Matters

Oct 18, 2026; Cleveland, Ohio, USA; Tampa Bay Rays shortstop Taylor Walls (6) and second baseman Richie Palacios (1) react after defeating the against the Cleveland Guardians in game five of the ALCS for the 2026 MLB Playoffs at Progressive Field. Mandatory Credit: David Dermer-Imagn Images TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

These franchises know they can’t overspend for sluggers, so they maximize the margins and use the entire field with their offense and defense approach. It’s not just about trying to out-launch-angle your opponent.

They help those pitchers by making run prevention a hallmark through their entire org, while Elias plays top prospects at three positions and leads the league in errors and unearned runs and doesn’t even try to find gloves to cover him at essential positions or even on the bench.

The Rays and Brewers take runs off the board and frustrate opponents with their positioning and instincts and consistency, as well as their flare for the dramatic in the infield and outfield. It is the antithesis of everything Elias executes and seemingly believes in.

The Skipper Matters

Oct 22, 2026; Milwaukee, WI, USA; Tampa Bay Rays manager Kevin Cash (16) speaks during a press conference during a workout session before the 2026 World Series. Mandatory Credit: Michael McLoone-Imagn Images | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

They have empowered strong-willed managers – not puppets – who hold all players to account. They don’t play favorites and try to pick on the last guys on the roster. If you think Pat Murphy or Kevin Cash wouldn’t bench Gunnar Henderson after getting picked off twice in the same game amid a full-scale meltdown by the player in all aspects of play, then that tells me you don’t watch them.

It never would have got to that because he’d be in the dugout the first time he fell asleep at first base. Especially with it happening so early in wannabe manager Craig Albernaz’s tenure, a signal would have been sent right then and there. Cash is as respected as any manager in the game and has set a standard in regards to quality-of-play and attention-to-detail that is the envy of baseball.

Elias has found three dugout jockeys, each one deeper under his thumb than the last; the quality of player has deteriorated under all three and his most recent hire would have been fired after one abysmal season if anyone in The Warehouse thought the skipper mattered at all.

Alas, we already know a lot of this isn’t changing with Albernaz back and Elias finding a new underling to replace Matt Blood in player development, but not bringing in anyone who ever made decisions before to actually check his worst practices. Maybe they’ll stumble into a roster that actually field the ball, throw the ball and run the bases next season, anyway.

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