The Orioles lost Game 2 of last Wednesday’s doubleheader against the Twins after former manager Brandon Hyde handed Yennier Cano the ball in the eighth inning and watched him allow three runs. This was an automatic and understandable move, using the primary and rested set-up man to protect a 6-5 lead before passing it on to closer Félix Bautista.
The critics came after Hyde again for no good reason. It was the right decision, it blew up like so many others in 2025, and Cano’s ERA was inflated from 2.70 to 4.40.
Interim manager Tony Mansolino summoned Cano in the eighth inning Monday night with the score tied in Milwaukee. Cano got the first two outs, but a full-count walk and stolen base preceded William Contreras’ ground ball single to give the Brewers a 5-4 win.
First base was open but the Orioles pitched to Contreras, who finished with four hits.
“We have a ton of faith in Yenni,” Mansolino said. “Yenni’s one of our guys. We really like Yenni, really in any situation. So we bet on our guy, it didn’t work out. We’ll do it again next time.”
That faith is being tested.
Cano was an All-Star in 2023 and had a 3.15 ERA last season in a team-leading 70 appearances. He didn’t allow a run in 11 games in March/April, but is 0-4 this month with a 12.79 ERA and 2.211 WHIP over 6 1/3 innings. Opponents have scored in five of his last seven games, totaling nine runs in 5 1/3.
The Orioles are coping with enough issues. They can’t have late-inning relief ruining what are rare opportunities to win.
Seranthony Domínguez has a 4.80 ERA and 1.600 in 17 appearances before last night. Bryan Baker earned more high-leverage opportunities with an impressive camp and a 2.21 ERA and 0.93 WHIP in 21 games. But the nightly recipe can’t be Baker to Bautista - and not because Bautista replaced Baker in the eighth last night and surrendered a leadoff home run and later an unearned run. Cano is needed and must back up the trust that his managers have shown.
* Mansolino knows where to go if he needs counseling on his new role, his first at this level. Mansolino’s father, Doug, is only a phone call away while serving as a special advisor in player development with the Braves.
Tony also knows who’s more likely to do the dialing.
“He’s got the special advisor title, so he’s really good at giving advice,” Mansolino said. “And it’s really good advice, and it’s been that since my first day playing, my first day coaching, and it’s absolutely a guy I’ll lean on nightly. And I probably won’t have to call him. I’m sure he’ll be calling me.”
* The Orioles have a 1:10 p.m. game today to close out the Brewers series before they head to Boston.
It’s a battle of rookies who are nine years apart in age.
Tomoyuki Sugano didn’t allow more than three runs in his first eight starts but surrendered four to the Twins in 6 1/3. Milwaukee right-hander Chad Patrick is making his 11th appearance and 10th start. He hasn’t allowed more than three runs in any appearance.
Patrick has registered a 3.35 ERA and 1.283 WHIP in 48 1/3 innings, and he’s allowed only four home runs. His ERA is 2.83 and his WHIP is 1.116 in five home games. His ERA is 4.12 and his WHIP is 1.525 on the road.
* Executive vice president/general manager Mike Elias met with a small media contingent yesterday in Milwaukee to discuss Hyde’s firing. Here are 10 items worth mentioning.
1. Elias explained the reasoning behind the May move by saying, “Sometimes organizations try something different and that’s what this was.”
“There come times when the go-forward look at things involve a different voice and a head coaching change to receive that voice,” Elias said. “Ultimately, stretching back into early last summer, this is a team that we feel has been collectively and individually to varying degrees underperforming its talent level, and we want something new in order to hopefully restore them to the level of play that we expect of ourselves and we think this team is capable of.”
2. The firing wasn’t deemed necessary solely due to this year’s nosedive. Elias pointed out the decline in the second half of last season.
“You go back to last June, we were on top of the sport in almost every facet of the sport, including majors and minors, and now we find ourselves where we find ourselves,” Elias said. “This has been hitting us all very hard. But it’s unusual for that to be so sudden and I’m in the process of heavily evaluating everything that we do across the organization. That pertains to the front office, analytics department, player development, you name it. We’re looking at it very hard.
“To our credit, this is something that’s not been lingering for years and years. It’s something that has mounted in months. It’s been very tough on those of us in leadership positions in the organization, but we’re focused on fixing it right now. The main focus is trying to stabilize this team, improve the play on the field and get this core of players back on track.”
3. Elias said he consulted heavily with the ownership group, headed by David Rubenstein, before reaching a decision on Hyde. He declined to say who initiated the discussion.
4. Elias was asked why he chose to wait until the team was in Milwaukee to have his media scrum, rather than do it over the weekend in Baltimore.
“It was a pretty hectic few days,” he said. “Got Tony in place and traveled up here with the team. And I just needed a couple days.”
5. We’re under the assumption that Mansolino will stay interim manager for the remainder of the season. It doesn’t appear that the Orioles are checking on outside candidates.
“Looking at our internal options, because this is not a time of year when you make external options easily, Tony had the combination of a lot of major league coaching experience but also minor league managerial experience, and so that made him the best candidate in my mind,” Elias said.
6. More changes could be coming.
“Some of it is just individualistic and, ‘Hey, let’s do something different with this player.’ Other things I think will involve perhaps sweeping changes to the way we do business in the warehouse,” Elias said.
“I’m just not ready to go into it all right now.”
7. Elias joins the chorus of people in the organization who say the season can be salvaged.
“Yes,” he said. “I think we need to play much better baseball. This team hasn’t been fully healthy for almost a year. I don’t know that it ever will be or any team can expect to be. But we have perhaps a league-leading amount of injuries right now. We need to get some of that back. We don’t have our head in the sand about our offensive struggles, but some of these guys are hitting the ball really hard in other spot and hopefully that evens out.
“At this point we’ve dug quite a hole but there’s plenty of time to play better baseball. We’ll see where the standings end up. To me, my focus is getting the quality of play, in particular our main guys that we cherish so much, getting them gelling in a way that we all became accustomed to.”
8. Elias accepts blame but also defends himself.
“I have had a lot of success, I believe, in my career, and I think that we did a really strong job in building up the franchise to the position that it was in at least through the end of 2024,” he said.
“A big point of pride for me in my career has been to adapt in a sport where you’ve got to do that, and where it’s almost impossible to have consistent success. What we’re going through right now and the degree to which we’re going through it is well below anyone’s standards, including mine and this is deeply disappointing to me, and I’m doing everything in my power to correct it and improve it going forward.”
9. Elias said “it just didn’t work out” with Kyle Gibson, who was released yesterday after four starts.
“I know the hazards that occupy a guy who skips spring training, I was aware of that, but we decided to take a chance on him,” Elias said. “I do think a lack of spring training hurt him.”
10. Grayson Rodriguez is "very close to throwing," Elias said, but elbow and lat injuries in the same calendar year force a very cautious approach and the team isn't ready to script out what's next. Also, Jordan Westburg (hamstring) won't be back before early June.