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The Orioles are ending the first half of the season today with Coby Mayo staying on the bench and the club sticking to its reasoning that winning games is the priority.
Mayo has started twice in the last 11 games and is 0-for-6 this month.
“I’ve talked to him a few times about it, just trying to communicate with him as good as I can, but a lot of it was the roster, and the addition of (Jordan) Westburg and T.O. (Tyler O’Neill) kind of take away spots,” said interim manager Tony Mansolino.
“Every day you have a scenario with four outfielders that you want to play – (Cedric) Mullins, (Colton) Cowser, T.O. and Ramón (Laureano) who, when Ramón got here earlier in the year, I don’t think he was expected to become what he’s become. He’s been a really good player. And then, you have three corner infield guys, essentially, and the fourth would be Mayo. You have (Ramón) Urías, who’s in the lineup, who I think everybody in the room would agree needs to play more. But who do you play Urías over? Do you play him over Westburg? Do you play him over (Ryan) O’Hearn on the corners? When you’ve got the four outfielders, one of them is going to run through to the DH, and you have Coby, too.”
Mayo went through an 11-for-36 stretch over 11 games to finish June but isn’t benefiting from Ryan Mountcastle’s extended stay on the injured list with a Grade 2 hamstring strain. The sudden roster crunch hurts him. And the Orioles aren’t ready to use the majors as an extension of player development while fighting to make up ground in the Wild Card chase.
“I think right now, we’re in a situation where we are trying to win games,” Mansolino said. “There are times when, Coby has played against every left-handed pitcher so far. And I don’t think that working your way into the big leagues and learning how to hit lefties is a bad way to do it. I think it’s probably dosed pretty well for a guy, for any player.
“He’s had opportunities there. We’ve mixed him in against some righties, and just recently with T.O. showing up and Westburg, it’s kind of dried up. It’s tough. But you’ve got four outfielders for three spots and a DH, and you’ve got four corner guys for two spots and a DH. So it’s tough situation right now, but Coby is handling it great.”
Mayo has played in 26 games and is batting .205 with five doubles, a home run, nine RBIs, six walks, 22 strikeouts and a .570 OPS. The counter to having Mayo gain major league exposure in small samples is how sitting for extended periods could slow his development.
“I think with Coby’s case, he’s spent enough time in Triple-A, so you’ve got to kind of think through what’s the benefit of having him in Triple-A and put up numbers versus playing against lefties here, which he has, every left-handed game, and occasional righties, and being in the big leagues and getting the opportunity to learn the big league game, to mature in the big leagues,” Mansolino said.
“So he can go down and play every day. You can make that choice right now. And we’ve talked about it a lot. We go back and forth on it every week, what’s kind of best. But I think where we’ve landed right now is, he’s playing against lefties, he’s getting occasional righties, and he’s getting the opportunity to slow down in the big leagues, and getting to understand what the game is and mature here. So we like how this has been dosed to Coby. It’s tough not getting him in the lineup, being a career development guy and understanding kind of what’s happening right now, but again, we have to make the choice right now to win games. The Baltimore Orioles need to win games. We’re still not out of this thing. We were so close yesterday, getting six games under.
“There’s still a path forward for us, and until that path disappears, our No. 1 priority has to be to win, and then secondary is development.”
* The Orioles recalled left-hander Grant Wolfram this morning and designated Corbin Martin for assignment. Wolfram made his third major league appearance in Game 1 of Thursday’s doubleheader and earned his first win with two scoreless innings and four strikeouts.
“That’s something that you dream of, right?” he said. “You get to go up against a guy like Juan Soto, (Francisco) Lindor and all those faces of baseball. I grew up a baseball fan, so to get an opportunity to be on a big league mound and face those guys is a dream come true, for sure.”
Wolfram has a 3.62 ERA in 24 appearances with Triple-A Norfolk. He hasn’t allowed an earned run in his last 12 games.
“Just talked with some of the pitching staff and just throwing my two-seam more up in the zone and then throwing my curveball more off that, and that’s honestly been pretty much the only adjustment,” he said. “Just sticking to that plan and going with it.”
It carried to the Orioles.
“He looked so good the other day against the Mets,” Mansolino said. “Those two innings, it’s 98, there’s a curveball, there’s a slider. He was the 27th man. It wasn’t a roster spot necessarily, and then after throwing two innings he was probably going to be down two days, so just kind of worked out to where we kept Martin coming into this.”
Mansolino called Martin to explain the club’s decision, with the games dictating that he use the higher-leverage relievers.
* The Orioles are expected to come out of the break with Charlie Morton, Dean Kremer and Trevor Rogers starting against the Rays in Tampa.
* The Orioles placed reliever Scott Blewett on the 15-day injured list with right elbow discomfort and recalled catcher David Bañuelos, who was on the taxi squad.
Blewett surrendered four runs yesterday in the ninth inning.
Fifteen players are on the IL.
