It's go time

A roster projection, a lineup prediction and a breakdown of the Baltimore Orioles.

We’re just hours from the return of the Royals to the postseason. Days like this are about anticipation and nerves and rituals and whatever else helps you kill the time that drags until the first pitch is unleashed.

The cliché says anything can happen in a short series, but as we are far too aware, anything can happen in a single game. Will it be a grounder down the third base line? A mad dash from first to home? A dive into the photo bay to make a catch? A clutch late inning home run? Or 99 MPH gas to close out a win?

It’s October. Time to be a legend.

First pitch is scheduled for 3:08 on ESPN2.

Let’s go.

What’s interesting to me (because I can get lost in the details of something like this) is that the three-game series represents another unique roster-building opportunity. It’s not as extreme as the one-game, winner-take-all Wild Card game like the Royals played 10 years ago. But it’s not like a normal postseason series.

Take the pitching staff. The Royals need three starters and, as we know, have set their rotation. It’s Cole Ragans, Seth Lugo and Michael Wacha. You may think that means the Royals wouldn’t need to carry any other starters and just stock the bullpen with as many relief arms as possible. I see two issues with that approach. One, you need to protect against the need for a bulk guy. If something goes sideways in the first two games, you can’t blow through your bullpen just to try to finish out nine innings. There may be a need to just eat some innings.

Two, you have to be ready to navigate an extended game that goes well beyond the scheduled nine. In a masterstroke, the Manfred Man does not exist in the postseason. I have no idea why, if a rule is acceptable for the regular season, it’s not in the postseason. Whatever. So there’s a danger that a game could go into the tenth, eleventh, twelfth…A starter would be an ideal candidate to come in should a game go past 10.

That’s why Brady Singer and Michael Lorenzen will be on the roster. The bonus is that both have pitched out of the bullpen at various times. Lorenzen was a reliever for the most part up until 2022.

As for the bullpen, you have Lucas Erceg who will be the closer. That means he’ll pitch in the highest-leverage situation. I would not be surprised to see him in a game in the eighth if the lineup if the dangerous part of the Baltimore lineup is due. Erceg will be supported with a ton of left-handed relief. Kris Bubic and Daniel Lynch IV have both thrived since their move to the bullpen. Angel Zerpa has been nails since his return from Triple-A exile. Sam Long has scuffled a bit in September but has been a steady presence for the most part since joining the bullpen back in May.

That’s four lefties, plus Erceg (and the starters). Can’t forget John Schreiber. He gets a spot. There’s room for one more. Here’s where I’m a bit undecided. It could be Carlos Hernández, who has been fine since his return from Omaha. It could be Alec Marsh who started the season finale. Or it could even be Steven Cruz, who made a handful of appearances for the big league club. Marsh hasn’t worked a lot out of the bullpen and threw 77 pitches in the season finale on Sunday. I realize we’re basically talking about the last man in the bullpen, but I would think the Royals would want everyone available from the first pitch of game one. Cruz has done well in his limited time in the majors this year, but it seems he hasn’t yet earned the trust of the club to be successful at this level. Plus, it’s the playoffs. The default selection here leans to Hernández.

By carrying 12 pitchers, the Royals will have the opportunity to have 14 bats on the roster. I’ve gone through all the scenarios and permutations in my brain and on my spreadsheet. There are almost a million ways this roster can shake out.

The first question that needs to be answered is the most important: Can Vinnie Pasquantino play? We’ve seen video of him taking hacks off the machine. We’ve seen him hitting live pitching and crushing home runs. He looks ready. And if we can read anything into his interview in the locker room after the Royals clinched on Friday, he believes he’s ready. At this point, it’s about the comfort that Pasquantino has swinging the bat. If he’s ready to go, I imagine he’s only a designated hitter.

I wrote this the other day, but I just don’t see any way the Royals keep him off the roster. He hit off the machine on Monday as the Royals didn’t hold an on-field workout, so his recovery into Tuesday morning is extremely important. The bet here is that Vinnie Pasquantino is in the lineup.

With that in mind, let’s construct the rest of the roster, starting with the infield. Salvador Perez and Freddie Fermin will share catching duties with Perez getting some time at first base. The Royals will need another first baseman if they want Perez behind the dish, so I think Yuli Gurriel is on the team. Up the middle, it will be Michael Massey and Bobby Witt Jr.. I believe Maikel Garcia will be the guy at third.

In the outfield, you’ll have MJ Melendez, Tommy Pham, Kyle Isbel and Hunter Renfroe. The Orioles could have as many as four lefties in the bullpen, so Garrett Hampson makes the squad as a backup/late inning replacement for Isbel.

The Royals and Matt Quatraro love Dairon Blanco and what he brings on the bases. We all know what speed can do in the postseason. You may not want to hear this, but the Royals likewise value Adam Frazier and his versatility. He’s on this roster as a lefty bat off the bench and all-around defensive Swiss Army Knife. He could even get a start at second if the Royals value the matchups.

That leaves Paul DeJong and Robbie Grossman off the Wild Card roster. DeJong has been mired in a terrible slump of late, hitting just .135/.154/.135 in September, good for a -29 wRC+. Yikes. He’s also struck out in 37 percent of his plate appearances since joining the Royals.

If you want to talk yourself into DeJong on the roster, how about this? He’s faced Corbin Burnes 23 times in his career and has hit .318/.348/.636 with two home runs. DeJong also has five hits, including a home run, in 12 career plate appearances against probable Game Two starter Zack Eflin. Batter versus pitcher numbers are the ultimate in small sample, but sometimes there’s something there.

There’s a reason I’m not the manager.

Let’s take this exercise one step further. Here’s my guess as to how the Royals lineup card will look:

Tommy Pham — RF
Bobby Witt Jr. — SS
Vinnie Pasquantino — DH
Salvador Perez — C
Michael Massey — 2B
Yuli Gurriel — 1B
MJ Melendez — LF
Maikel Garcia — 3B
Kyle Isbel — CF

I’m not happy with Pham at leadoff, but I could switch out him with anyone else and make the same statement. Pham hit .167/.167/.217 over the last two weeks of the regular season. That’s with 18 strikeouts and no walks.

The Witt/Pasquatch/Perez/Massey block puts the team’s four best hitters in a row. I wish I could say with certainty that Pasquantino is 100 percent and ready to go. Those swings we saw over the weekend give me a little bit of faith.

Gurriel getting at bats on a contending team in September is something I never saw coming. (And if you say you saw it coming, I will fight you.) So him hitting sixth in a Wild Card series…yeah.

Melendez has cooled off after a strong August, but I feel like Quatraro would want to get his left-handed bat in the lineup where he can take aim at that short porch in right. Garcia gets the nod at third, although he certainly didn’t seem to finish the season in strong fashion. Isbel is the guy in center.

How about the Baltimore Orioles?

A year removed from winning 101 games, Baltimore raced out to a 57-33 record and were three games in front of the Yankees in the AL East at the end of play on July 7. From there, they went into something of a tailspin, losing their next eight of 11. But their run of subpar play countered a poor stretch for the Yankees and the Orioles finished July with a slim half game lead in the division.

However, Baltimore could never really find their groove in the second half and ultimately went 38-40 over the final three months of the season.

The Offense

Jordan Westburg, their number two hitter, missed most of the last two months with a fractured hand. He returned last week and collected five hits in 29 plate appearances with one double. He had hit 18 homers and 25 doubles in 420 PAs prior to his injury. That was a blow to the Baltimore offense, but make no mistake, this team is built on power. More on that in a moment.

Like the Royals, the Orioles are anchored by their All-Star shortstop. Gunnar Henderson finished the year hitting .281/.364/.529, good for an 8.0 fWAR, sixth-best in the majors. He’s their leadoff hitter.

Beyond Henderson and (a presumably healthy) Westburg, the Orioles have a formidable heart of the order, featuring Anthony Santander, Colton Cowser and Adley Rutschman. As a team, they clubbed 235 home runs, second most in the majors. On a given night, they can feature a lineup where all nine players have clubbed double-digits in home runs.

As a refresher for new subscribers (welcome!), wRC+ is Weighted Runs Created, a FanGraphs metric used to determine overall productivity of an offense (or player). It’s league and park adjusted. The plus means it’s an index stat where 100 is the baseline. Anything above, is considered above average. The inverse is true for numbers below 100. So the Orioles offense was 15 percent better than the major league average offense in 2024. The Royals offense was four percent worse.

The Starting Pitching

Game One starter for Baltimore will be 2021 NL Cy Young award winner Corbin Burnes. Burnes was acquired from the Milwaukee Brewers ahead of this season and has been one of the best starters in the game since his award-winning 2021.

Here’s how he stacks up against Cole Ragans:

The Orioles have yet to announce their game two starter, but the smart money is on Zach Eflin. I’ll wait to post the starting pitcher comparisons until it’s official ahead of the game. Suffice to say, the numbers favor the Royals’ starter, Seth Lugo.

If the series goes three games, the starter for Baltimore presumably would’ve been Grayson Rodriguez. Rodriguez hit the IL in early August with a lat strain and had been on target for a late season return before the Orioles announced he was being shut down for the year. Beyond Burnes and Eflin, there aren’t many good options, one large reason for the Orioles second half fade. They could turn to journeyman right-hander Albert Suárez who pitched six innings on Sunday against the Twins. Should he start on Thursday, that would be on short rest. Other options are lefty Cade Povich and right-hander Dean Kremer.

The Bullpen

Here’s a fun experiment. Let’s start with the bullpen numbers of both teams from the start of the season through July 31.

The Orioles had one of the top relief corps in the majors up until the trade deadline. The Royals…did not. However, since August 1…

The Royals have improved across the board with the deadline acquisition of Lucas Erceg and the callups of guys like Kris Bubic and Daniel Lynch IV. The Orioles jettisoned closer Craig Kimbrel, who just couldn’t get guys out after the All-Star Break and replaced him with Seranthony Domínguez, whom they acquired from the Phillies earlier this year. He’s posted a 3.97 ERA and a 5.33 FIP since joining the team with a -0.3 fWAR. Oops.

The Orioles best reliever is lefty Keegan Akin who has an 11.1 SO/9 and a 2.2 BB/9 to go along with a 3.32 ERA and 2.99 FIP. He’s been worth 1.4 fWAR this season in 78.2 innings. Right-hander Yennier Cano has been on a roll in the season’s second half and has emerged as a strong option as well with a 3.15 ERA and 3.55 FIP.

Defense

According to the Outs Above Average metric at Baseball Savant, the Royals were the best defensive team in the majors this year, with a final tally of 36 OAA. They credit Royals defenders with saving 28 runs. You know the strengths of the Kansas City defense. The left side of the infield is a fortress. Center field isn’t too shabby and the pitchers field their position as well as any group in the majors.

The Orioles…weren’t as good. They finished with a -9 OAA and their defense cost their team five runs. They’re a very poor defensively around the horn with shortstop, third and second base all posting negative OAA. In the outfield, only Cedric Mullins and Cowser grade positively.

If Defensive Runs Saved is your thing, the individual positions may vary, but the overall results are the same. The Royals defenders were worth 47 DRS. The Orioles defense finished with a DRS of…one.

What it all means

I try to keep objectivity here, but it’s fairly clear the Royals hold the edge on the pitching and defense side of the game. The Orioles are clearly a better team offensively and their power is among the best in the league. Yet the gap over the last two months wasn’t all that large as the Orioles hitters lost some of that power production. In a short series like this, I would tend to lean toward that pitching and defense to confound the hitters. The Royals have a moderate advantage with the starting pitching in Game One and will follow that up with clear edge in the remaining two contests. Plus, given the recent fortunes of the bullpens, once the game moves to the relievers, the Royals again come out on top.

My bold prediction: The Royals in three.