Will the next team for Grayson Rodriguez be Norfolk or Baltimore?

It usually comes down to more than this, oftentimes much more, but if the Orioles simply headed north for opening day 2022 with their five most talented pitchers in their rotation, no doubt right-hander Grayson Rodriguez would have a great chance to be one of those five.

Could he be in the opening day rotation? He certainly could. Will he? That is a much more complicated question.

There is lot to consider beyond whether he one of the best five. There is what the new collective bargaining agreement will produce in how clubs can handle service time for young players. Under the old rules, the Orioles would certainly want to maximize that and make sure they have Rodriguez for seven big league seasons. That would work against him making the opening day roster.

They could decide they feel he needs some Triple-A seasoning under his belt. While Rodriguez, now 22, made 18 starts last season at Double-A Bowie and was dominant in many of them, he's yet to pitch for the Norfolk Tides.

At the end of last season, O's executive vice president and general manager Mike Elias was asked if one or both of Adley Rutschman and Rodriguez could make the opening day roster for 2022.

"I think on TV the other day, I mentioned they will be at spring training (and) unless something happens, that is almost certain to be the case," Elias said. "And once you are in major league spring training, you've got a chance to show your stuff and make the team. And I think, first and foremost, we're going to have to see how that goes. But both players had spectacular years. They're two of the better minor league talents in the entire sport. We're very excited about them. They are on schedule despite losing a full season with the pandemic.

"Grayson has not pitched in Triple-A yet. I don't think it's 100 percent necessary to pitch in Triple-A. So that doesn't preclude anything. But you know that's going to be a consideration. And Adley has spent a short amount of time as well and played very well there. So we're just going to consider all factors. We're not there yet, we're a long way from the end of spring training. But I just kind of hope they pick up where they left off."

Another consideration for the Orioles is where is their team at right now? They are unlikely to contend for a playoff spot in 2022, and while they may show improvement, if they are still fifth out of five teams in the division, should the O's consider that and wait a bit longer on Rodriguez? It would give him Triple-A time now and maybe more time later to pitch for an Orioles team that could be good.

I have always considered J.J. Cooper of Baseball America a great resource to get opinions on matters such as this. Is Rodriguez ready now and should the Orioles bring him right from Double-A to the majors? I asked his opinion on this during our recent conversation on the Baseball America top 100 prospects list. Is Rodriguez ready or is the better play to let him get in those 10, 15 or 20 Norfolk starts?

"That kind of comes down to a lot of times organizational philosophy, but we can look at that two ways," Cooper said. "That's he could get a number of starts at Triple-A and partly I say that because you can look in the same division, that is kind of generally the approach that the Rays have had. Which is they will bring their pitchers up after they've kind of dominated Triple-A and worked at Triple-A. They want to bring their pitchers up at a point they are ready to immediately step into the big league level. And it's generally worked quite well for them.

"But the other part of this is, as we sit here right now and we don't know what other moves will be made post-lockout, but the Orioles do not appear to be in contention in 2022, in an extremely, brutally tough AL East. So if that's the case, right now you look at the pitching staff and it's hard to argue that Rodriguez will not be one of the five best starting pitchers in Orioles camp. But that doesn't necessarily mean you are kind of looking a little bit more long-term. And by looking long-term, Grayson Rodriguez could derive long-term development value by having some Triple-A time in 2022. Time that allows him to work through some of the last, and I do mean last, things on his to do list before the majors.

"It's tricky, because if the Orioles were in a position where you say they are one starting pitcher away from contending in the AL East, I might have a different answer."

Rodriguez, ranked No. 6 on the new Baseball America top 100, went 9-1 with a 2.36 ERA and 0.83 WHIP in 23 regular-season starts, making five with high Single-A Aberdeen early this past year before his move to Double-A. With Bowie, he went 6-1 with a 2.60 ERA over 79 2/3 innings with 22 walks, 121 strikeouts and a 0.87 WHIP. He gave up one earned run or zero in 17 of his 23 starts. By almost any standard, he had a great season.

He was named the winner of the Jim Palmer Award as the O's Minor League Pitcher of the Year. In the last minor league season before last summer, he shared this same award with right-hander Mike Baumann in 2019.

Among all pitchers in the minors with 80 or more innings in 2021, Rodriguez ranked tied for first in strikeout percentage (40.5), fourth in FIP (2.67), fifth in strikeout rate (14.1) and ninth in ERA for the year.

In this article (subscription may be required) where Baseball America did a deep dive into individual pitches for pitchers in their top 100, they placed Rodriguez and DL Hall in a category of five pitchers with the best overall pitch mix. They listed them as such since each of those pitchers had at least three plus pitches that could rank among the best individual pitches in a category.

Baseball America reported that Rodriguez had a whiff rate of 37 percent on his fastball that touched 100 mph and averaged 97 mph. The whiff rate noted was 40 percent on his slider, above 50 percent on his curveball and above 45 percent on his changeup. Yep, a very, very strong pitch mix. And Baseball America noted that it's the command Rodriguez has on those pitches that sets him apart from some other top pitching prospects.

There is no such thing as can't-miss in baseball. We know that, but Rodriguez has had a tremendous career on the farm for the Orioles since they picked him No. 11 overall in 2018. He was great last year at Double-A, meeting all challenges. Now we wait to find out his next team. Will it be Norfolk or Baltimore?