O's pitching prospect Luis De Leon looks to get back on track after slow start

De Leon was a preseason top 100 prospect

BOWIE, Md. - Seeing a pitcher who was a preseason top 100 ranked player struggle with an ERA above 6.00 is surprising. It has been that this year for young O’s lefty pitching prospect Luis De Leon.

But after a slow first month he started to find himself and put up better numbers.

Then came June.

A pitcher that was ranked No. 95 in March by Baseball America and No. 63 via FanGraphs.com, had both his worst and best starts of the year back-to-back.

On June 3, pitching for the Double-A Chesapeake Baysox against Akron, a team facing De Leon for the third time this year, they got him big-time. He allowed 10 runs and four walks in 2 1/3 innings.

Challenged to prove that was a one-off, an outlier, he did just that. June 11 he threw five scoreless, no-hit innings at Altoona and fanned seven.

After an April where the 23-year-old De Leon’s ERA was 6.52, that dropped to 3.26 in May. Then came the two very different outings to begin this month.

Yesterday at Prince George’s Stadium, ahead of De Leon’s 13th start of this year, Baysox pitching coach Jeremy Hileman provided some great insights on De Leon’s season and wild two starts to begin this month.

“It came off the backend of a pretty good May (the 10-run game) where he started to put the pieces together. There was some bad luck mixed in there. It was not in his favor, how he executed that day or the luck that happened around it.

“But we challenged him after that to be really good on a couple of things we were working on. And doing so when things are going wrong. A little bit of an attack-plan goal with him and then just challenging him to be his best, most competitive self with his best body language, no matter the situation.

“When we met the next day he responded extremely well and then threw five no-hit innings. That is the version he needs to bring every day and he knows he can.”

De Leon, one of the O’s top pitching prospects, responded exactly how the organization might have hoped from one disastrous game to throw one dominant one.

“100 percent. Shows he made the adjustments. It was cool to see that after his toughest outing of the year. A credit to him to go out and do it,” said Hileman.

GETTING BETTER AFTER SLOW 2026 START

Last year, as he was rising fast up prospect ranking lists, De Leon went 5-3 with a 3.30 ERA and 11 strikeouts per nine, throwing 11 innings with Low-A Delmarva, 60 for High-A Aberdeen and 16 to end the year with Chesapeake.

He began this year back at Double-A, as was expected. What was not expected was to see him allow 14 earned runs over 19 1/3 innings in April.

This is the pitcher currently ranked as the O’s No. 3 prospect via MLBPipeline.com and No. 5 via Baseball America.

A pitcher with these scouting scale pitch grades from Baseball America: A 70 fastball, 60 slider and change, 55 splitter and 45 control.

But for this year overall, through 12 games going into Wednesday’s outing, he was 2-5 with a 6.07 ERA and in 46 innings averaged 5.9 walks per nine with 11.4 strikeouts.

“Obviously not how he wants it to go. But some of the early struggles he went through, I would say more in April than other times, will long-term be good for his growth. You learn how to adjust and fight back,” explained Hileman.

He added: “We know how talented he is and level of success he has seen last year and in the (2025) Fall League (where he had a 2.76 ERA). And obviously we know it’s in there, not a worry.

“Early on maybe we weren’t doing some of the things he does best. With falling behind in counts, too many free passes. We know he can beat guys in the zone with his best stuff. He’ll get whiffs and groundballs when he is attacking the zone to his capabilities.

“Long term, to experience those struggles now and find ways to get punched and get back up fighting, I think it will make him a better big leaguer down the road.”

This is a young man from Barahona, Dominican Republic that the Orioles signed at age 18 in December of 2021 for just $30,000. An international late bloomer who became a top 100 prospect.

Now he needs to find that success again. For most of this season, since April, one terrible outing notwithstanding, he has found it.

“I wouldn’t say there was a pitch quality concern at any point,” Hileman said in response to my question. “It was, ‘we’ve got to get you in the zone, understand your plan on how we get after hitters and then execute that plan.’ He puts guys away in 0-2, 1-2 counts as good as anybody, so let’s find a way to get there.

“The release point and those things was more the focus than anything about change of stuff or pitches. We just needed to get him back to his best rhythm and best tempo.”

But the early struggles did knock him out of the latest Baseball American top 100. O’s minor league coaches will tell you they don’t care about rankings, just helping players get better. But fans and media can sometimes get concerned if a player falls.

“The rankings don’t really dictate how we treat him or coach him. He’s the same guy,” added the Baysox coach, who also coached De Leon last year in both Aberdeen and the AFL. “People are going to view it how they want to and that is totally up to them. But if you are asking me if I think Luis De Leon is going to be really, really good for a long time, yeah, I think he’s going to be just fine.”

The mixed bag of a season De Leon is having continued last night as he faced the best-hitting team in the Eastern League, the first-half division champion Richmond Flying Squirrels. He allowed two homers, one that went off the glove of right fielder Thomas Sosa.

For his night, over 92 pitches and 4 1/3 innings, he allowed five hits and three runs with three walks and he fanned six. That left his season ERA at 6.08.

He threw a nice slider here for a strikeout to end the top of the fourth.

ARE THE WALKS CONCERNING?

Long term, De Leon will need to cut his walk rate. It was 4.23 per nine last year and is 4.85 for his career and higher this year. Can he do that or will he always be a pitcher with outstanding stuff that cannot always control it?

“I think he absolutely can get better,” Hileman said. “We see it with young pitchers often. Harnessing really good stuff also comes with some learning. Really that number is going to shrink as he continues to build off the attack plan in terms of getting into 0-2, 1-2 counts. When he gets in advantage counts, he puts guys away. That number will shrink as he does things more consistently.”

De Leon was throwing 95.5 mph last week on average with his fastball. He is showing 93 to 97 mph and he adds a slider, changeup and he added the splitter last year that he is throwing more now as it continues to develop. He uses the two-seam sinker heavily and mixes in some four-seamers too. But the mix is mostly sinker, slider, change, split.

“His stuff is in a great spot. That split has become a real high quality pitch and one he is still learning to command at a high clip,” said Hileman.

HIS CATCHER’s TAKE

Chesapeake catcher Ethan Anderson has caught De Leon in about 10 of his games this season and also last year at High-A Aberdeen and also in the Arizona Fall League.

“He was nails in the Fall League,” Anderson told me Wednesday afternoon. “It just felt like he went five scoreless a couple of times and limited the walks. He can get quick outs. He throws a sinker that can be 95 plus with a wipeout slider. That is his bread and butter and there are other pitches that make him successful.

“He has had some ups and downs but last week he really bounced back. He has major league stuff.

“He has a lot of confidence in his offspeed stuff. He can throw those pitchers in hitter’s counts. Some of his pitches are so good, he can almost throw any of them in any count.”

When he is rolling, what does it look like?

“That is my favorite (time). Because he’s throwing a bunch of pitches strike-to-ball and all of his pitches move a ton. He gets a ton of swings and a lot of groundballs. We just let our infield make plays. When he is out there he can finish some innings in five or six pitches,” stated Anderson.

By the way, Richmond won last night 5-3. The Baysox fall to 26-38.

Thanks to Baysox pitching coach Jeremy Hileman for some real insight on De Leon’s season. He touched on other Baysox pitchers too and you will see more stories on that soon here.

The top photo for this story is courtesy of the Chesapeake Baysox and Joe Noyes.

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BIG NIGHT FOR FREDERICK

In their first season back as an O’s affiliate since 2020, the High-A Frederick Keys can clinch a South Atlantic League playoff berth tonight.

Frederick leads the SAL North division by percentage points with one game left:

.635 - Frederick (40-23)
.631 - Greensboro (41-24)

Going into last night, Frederick was 1.5 games back, but swept a doubleheader over Hub City 9-3 and 9-1 while Greensboro lost 5-4 to Winston-Salem.

The final day of the first-half is tonight. Frederick gets in with either a win or a Greensboro loss.

It would be a nice return to the O’s organization to clinch a playoff berth. Four teams will make the SAL playoffs in September. The regular-season ends Sept. 6. With win tonight or Greensboro loss, the Keys will be in the postseason and playing past that date.

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ALSO BIG NIGHT FOR BRADISH, O’s

The Orioles evened their series with the Mariners winning 5-3 as Gunnar Henderson and Jackson Holliday homered and Kyle Bradish pitched a gem.

Bradish gave up one run and five hits over 7 2/3 innings and he fanned a career-high 12. He threw 100 pitches and got 18 whiffs. This was the longest outing this year by an O’s starter and was also Baltimore’s third straight quality start.

His 12 strikeouts were the most by an O’s pitcher since John Means had 12 while throwing a no-hitter on May 5, 2021. That game was also at Seattle.

The O’s can win the series at 4:10 p.m. ET today when Shane Baz (4-6, 4.06 ERA) faces Bryan Woo (5-5, 4.28 ERA).