The big Orioles signing generated excitement and questions about what comes next.
Hello, friends.
There are now 105 days remaining until Orioles Opening Day 2026. Today will probably not be as exciting as yesterday was, unless Mike Elias is really, truly determined to knock off another major piece of business before this week comes to a close.
As I’m writing this, it’s been several hours now since the news broke that the Orioles have agreed to a contract (pending physical) with Pete Alonso. It goes against everything that we have seen from Elias over the past few years, including just this season, when he avoided any expenditure bigger than Tyler O’Neill – which, in year one, looked like a huge mistake. The rest of the roster faltered without high-end reinforcements and we got what we got in Birdland.
Now, the Polar Bear is coming. He is not coming cheap. His five-year, $155 million deal is a record average annual value for a free agent first baseman. There are no deferrals in the $31 million per season. It’s big money going to a guy who will be 31 and will hopefully be hitting a lot of dingers. They are his specialty. While he’s never equaled the 53 homers that he smashed in his 2019 rookie season, Alonso has hit at least 34 homers in every full season of his career.
Although Alonso does strike out a bit, as one can expect from a power hitter, the 22.8% rate from this past season is within the acceptable range. Over his whole career, the guy has batted .253/.341/.524, so his track record doesn’t suggest he’s one of these guys where you pay the price of a low batting average along with everything else he does. (Though, the Orioles did try really hard to sign that other guy only one day earlier.) Alonso also hits a lot of doubles that drive in runs. The Orioles will just need to figure out getting guys on base ahead of him.
They also still need to figure out their rotation. Elias has time to work with that. I’m very curious whether his earlier claims that the team could both sign a top bat and a top pitcher will bear out. MLB free agents Ranger Suárez and Framber Valdez remain, as does Tatsuya Imai, posted from Japanese baseball.
Trades are a possibility. The Orioles have been linked to players like Miami’s Edward Cabrera and Milwaukee’s Freddy Peralta. Neither of them strike me as the top-end guy who the Orioles need, but they also shouldn’t cost as much as a top-end guy would cost. With the big signing of Alonso, everybody is wondering if that means the end of Coby Mayo’s time as an Oriole.
Mayo, though he had some downs in his rookie season, ended it on a positive enough trajectory that he’s probably still got value as a headliner. Moving him seems like the cleanest way to resolve an apparent roster logjam while also getting something that might actually be worth getting. Imagined deals essentially dumping either Ryan Mountcastle or even O’Neill are not going to fetch anything worthwhile.
The contract is not yet official. Alonso does still have to pass the physical. That means we’ll get another exciting boost today when, presumably, the deal is announced. The Orioles will have to dump someone from the 40-man in the process. There are still some guys I don’t expect to miss.
All of this happened on the day where many people had their Opening Day ticket presale open up. The tickets were already expensive even before there was any inkling that Alonso would sign, but hopefully those who paid up – which includes my wife and I – will be happier about having done so than we might have been without the signing.
In non-Alonso news yesterday, the Rule 5 draft happened yesterday. The Orioles did not make a selection on account of having a full 40-man roster already. They lost one player in the major league portion of the draft, pitcher Carter Baumler, plucked away by the Pirates. The oft-injured pitcher from the 2020 draft finally was healthy enough to pitch at least half a season this year and made his way up to Double-A as a reliever. The O’s either took the risk he wouldn’t be selected or just weren’t that worried about whether he was. We’ll see if they were right about what they decided.
Orioles stuff you might have missed
The Orioles deal for Pete Alonso shook the winter meetings. That’s the whole point. (The Baltimore Baseball)
It’s not a very good headline because the whole point is to have a better team next year, not get Jim Duquette shouting at the winter meetings, but don’t worry, because the article is much better than the headline and brings solid analysis about what this deal might mean for the team.
Five numbers that explain who the Orioles are getting in Pete Alonso (The Baltimore Sun)
For me, I keep coming back to the number 17, which was the three-way tie for team leader in home runs in 2025. That’s sad stuff. Alonso has hit at least double that in every non-pandemic season of his playing career, and the Walltimore 2.0 dimensions could be even friendlier to him than his previous park was.
With addition of Polar Bear, how will the Orioles address first base logjam? (Orioles.com)
I think it’s one of the two big remaining questions of the offseason, along with “What are they going to do about the rotation?” Jake Rill also sees Mayo as the most likely trade chip with some value.
Peter, out: Orioles swipe Alonso from Mets (FanGraphs)
FG sizes up the deal’s impact on both Alonso’s old team and his new one. Don’t spend too much time thinking about the 2030 projections if you want to maintain an uninterrupted good vibe over this signing.
Birthdays and Orioles anniversaries
There is one former Oriole who was born on this day: 1955-62 pitcher Hal Brown, no known relation to this writer. Brown passed away in 2015 at age 91.
Is today your birthday? Happy birthday to you! Your birthday buddies for today include: composer Hector Berlioz (1803), baseball Hall of Famer Old Hoss Radbourn (1880), author Aleksander Solzhenitsyn (1918), actress Rita Moreno (1931), Mötley Crüe bassist Nikki Sixx (1958), rapper Mos Def (1973), and actress Hailee Steinfeld (1996).
On this day in history…
In 1282, English and Welsh forces waged the Battle of Orewin Bridge, in which Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, the Prince of Wales, was killed. Llywelyn was the last native Prince of Wales; in the present day, the title goes to the oldest child of the reigning British monarch.
In 1792, the deposed King of France (Louis XVI, then being referred to as Citizen Louis Capet) was put on trial for treason by the National Convention. The trial ended about a month later with execution by guillotine.
In 1913, the Mona Lisa was located in Florence, Italy. It had been stolen about two years earlier by an Italian working in the Louvre who may or may not have had patriotic motivations for wanting the painting to be returned to Italy.
In 2009, Angry Birds was released onto iOS.
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And that’s the way it is in Birdland on December 11. Have a safe Thursday.
Category: General Sports
