O's have had a lot of pitching injuries on the farm, what does it all mean?

Eight top 30 prospect pitchers have spent IL time this season

It was a podcast question that I asked that led to a somewhat surprising answer. With all the pitching injuries the Orioles have had on their farm this year, I assumed they must be worse off than many clubs in the farm system pitcher injury department.

Not necessarily so, indicated JJ Cooper the editor-in-chief of Baseball America and my podcast guest this week.

There are a ton of injuries to pitchers around baseball – the minors and the majors – and the Orioles have had their share. But Cooper said his sense was that the Orioles are not an outlier here. Or any leader in injured list stints.

The question I asked JJ for this podcast that dropped on Thursday, was are the O’s just going through bad luck or is there something else at work they need to do a deep dive on?

“Some people may really be annoyed by my answer on this one, but it is part of baseball in 2025,” he said. “Where, if you are chasing success and stuff (a high-quality pitch), this is the question that no one yet has an answer for.

“People yell at me and say these pitchers are throwing too hard and if they just threw softer they would not get hurt as much. And I am not telling you that’s wrong. I am also telling you that you could have the healthiest group of soft-tossers you want, (but) you’d rather win. You are not winning with guys that sit 88 to 92 (mph).”

Here is just a partial list of some O’s farm pitching injuries this year.

Low-A righty Keeler Morfe made three starts and has been out since with a right ring finger sprain.

Double-A righty Zach Fruit made three starts and has been out with a lat strain.

High-A righty Michael Forret made five starts to a 1.66 ERA and has been out with a lower back issue.

Double-A righty Alex Pham pitched in five games and has been out with right forearm inflammation.

In mid to late May, the O’s announced that pitchers Patrick Reilly (1.86 ERA at Chesapeake) and Teddy Sharkey (who made five starts at High-A) had UCL reconstruction surgery, the procedure known as Tommy John surgery.

Forret, the club’s No. 8 prospect, has a WHIP of 0.69 at Aberdeen this year

Again, this is a partial list, not including every pitcher that went on an IL this season for the O’s on the farm.

Of the 12 pitchers currently ranked as top 30 prospects on the O’s list via MLBPipeline.com, eight of the 12 have been on the IL at some point or are injured now.

“I don’t think the Orioles are in any way alone on this,” said Cooper. “The Dodgers are the prime example that – they won the World Series and they have more money than anyone else. They had a Tulsa rotation a couple of years that was getting raves from scouts as better then some teams’ big league rotations. And it was. Almost all of those guys have spent significant time on the IL.

“Some of the pitchers we are talking about on the Orioles are some of their better pitching prospects. And I do think that in the 2020s teams ask their pitchers to run a little bit closer to that rev limit than they used to. We are in an era now that missing bats is important and injuries are a part of that.

“The Braves had a draft a couple of years ago where in their top 10 rounds they took almost all pitchers. And only one of them has not had Tommy John surgery now.”

The pitchers, all over the game, are going down and in big numbers.

The organization that can finally solve this issue and/or make major headway toward keeping pitchers healthy, may be one that thrives over all others moving forward.

If that is even possible.

Cooper added that the Yankees, Dodgers and Rangers, to name just a few other teams, have had a lot of minor league pitching injuries during this season.

“I know it is frustrating as an Oriole fan to see Grayson Rodriguez hurt again. To see Kyle Bradish coming back from the significant injury. However, those guys when they are on have been really good. And that’s the challenge of this,” he said.