Inside the Orioles’ second-half struggles with chance for AL East title all but gone

The Baltimore Orioles have endured a lot of 40-degree days in the second half.

The young and talented Orioles have fallen from neck-and-neck AL East contenders alongside the Yankees to also-rans with a second-half mini-collapse that has the Yankees’ divisonal magic number at one entering Tuesday’s series opener in The Bronx.

Baltimore (86-70) is 29-37 since matching its season-high by improving to 24 games above .500 on July 7, although it still remains four games ahead to claim the first wild-card spot.

“We’ve been going through a patch here for a few months,” Orioles general manager Mike Elias said last week. “It’s been trying for all of us. This is the first time, I think, this group has kind of experienced this collective struggle since we’ve been a winning team.”

There is a “Dickensian Aspect” — yes, that’s our second “The Wire” reference — about the Orioles’ season with their season being defined by two halves.

The Orioles went 58-38 in the first half to grab a one-game division lead, but are 28-32 in the second half.

Both the offense and pitching are at fault, along with plenty of injuries.

Let’s start with the offense:

Baltimore scored the fifth-most runs in the sport in the first half while averaging 4.93 runs per game. The Orioles slashed .253/.313/.452/.675 and mashed a league-best 149 homers.

The Orioles have experienced second-half drops in their runs per game to 4.58, along with dips in their average, slugging percentage and OPS, with their only bump coming in on-base percentage.

Orioles team offensive statistics (entering Sept. 24)

The most notable dip from first half to second half among Baltimore’s position players comes via catcher Adley Rutschman.

Rutschman posted a .780 OPS before the All-Star break but has tallied a .594 OPS since, hitting just .205 with three homers.

“It’s been a tough couple months — tough since the All-Star break,” Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said earlier this month of Rutschman’s struggles, per the Baltimore Sun. “He’s grinding. He’s trying every single day to get the feeling back. .. He’s probably putting way too much pressure on himself, also.”

Superstar Gunnar Henderson’s OPS has gone from .957 to .817, a large drop, but that’s still top-notch production from a shortstop.

Ryan Mountcastle (.758 to .643) and Ryan O’Hearn (.791 to .664) also have not maintained their first-half paces, with an injury also sidelining Mountcastle last month.

Henderson recently seemingly indicated how the team’s struggles have weighed on him amid this skid.

“Just try not to do too much,” Henderson said after a game-tying hit in a Sept. 21 loss. “I feel like I’ve got caught up kind of doing that recently and was able to just take a deep breath, go up there and just take what he gives me.”

The Orioles have clearly felt the loss of third baseman Jordan Westburg, who just returned after fracturing his right hand in late July.

Westburg had a .814 OPS in the first half, mashing 15 homers and driving in 50 runs.

Sparkplug Jose Mateo has also been sidelined since late July.

Baltimore also has received underwhelming production from top prospect Jackson Holliday, who is hitting .169 with a .517 OPS through his first 56 games.

Holliday’s lack of results has made Westburg’s injury loom larger.

“We’ve had pitching injuries, but they’ve come more way on the position-player side and in unexpected ways,” Elias said. “That’s been unfortunate.

“The testing of our depth and a lot of the depth we’ve lost is not something I anticipated to this degree in the second half on the position-player side.”

Orioles players offensive stats (through Sept. 23)

On the pitching side, the Orioles tied for sixth in MLB with their 3.71 first-half ERA.

They are 18th in the second half with a 4.31 ERA.

One big reason for that dip is the slide of ace Corbin Burnes.

Burnes, acquired from the Brewers in the offseason, went 9-4 with a 2.43 ERA in 19 starts to open the season.

The righty is just 6-4 with a 3.82 ERA in 12 second-half starts.

The Orioles have also dealt with injuries to Grayson Rodriguez and Kyle Bradish, among others, with Rodriguez making only three second-half starts and Bradish making zero after undergoing Tommy John surgery.

Baltimore’s bullpen, a strength of the 2023 division-winning team with the fifth-best ERA in the sport, never recovered from losing closer Felix Bautista before the season.

Craig Kimbrel lost his closing job due to his struggles and has a 10.59 ERA in the second half, forcing the team to trade for Seranthony Dominguez.

Baltimore ranks 19th in reliever ERA without that lockdown option in the ninth.

Add all these issues together and you have a team that is heading in the wrong direction entering the postseason, an operation collapsing like the Barksdale-Bell empire.

The Orioles are 5-10 in their last five series, losing two of three in each set.

They’ve lost two sets to the Tigers and one each to the Red Sox, Giants and Rays, who all likely will miss the playoffs.

Their series loss to the Giants included an embarrassing play by catcher James McCann when he did not step on the plate for what should have been a routine force out.

It’s seemingly all gone wrong for the Orioles since mid-July, but they should have the postseason to prove why they were a top title contender entering the season.

Elias still believes in his roster.

“This is a group that has had a really long track record– player and staff — of success here,” Elias said. “Now, within the span of a few months, it’s gotten away from us.

“I think we’re going to get right here before the season’s over. I think we’re going to make the playoffs and I think we’re going to do really well in the playoffs.”