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The Orioles are finally spending money, but in an unconventional way

January 14, 2025 by Camden Chat

Los Angeles Angels v Baltimore Orioles
Photo by Greg Fiume/Getty Images

Any claims of penny-pinching are off base. In fact, this has been the Orioles most active (and expensive) offseason in years. But it has certainly defied conventional wisdom.

Early on in the Mike Elias era, the Orioles were widely criticized for not spending money on the major league payroll. The organization and its new GM were brazen about their goals. Winning didn’t matter in the short term, and instead they preferred to focus on developing a “pipeline” of talent that would never run dry. As a result, payroll lagged and the product on the field was rather putrid. But times have changed.

Several moments are converging at once for the Orioles. Most crucially, the team is good. They have posted three straight winning seasons and been to the postseason in back-to-back campaigns. Their best players are big talents with tiny salaries, presenting a perfect opportunity to supplement with more expensive veterans. And the team was sold a year ago to a wealthier (and maybe hungrier) ownership group that is looking to make a splash.

Last year showed the first signs of a shift happening in Baltimore. Before the season even started, the team added Corbin Burnes, who was due over $15 million in 2024. Months later, at the trade deadline, the team took on oodles of salary in the form of Zach Eflin, Eloy Jiménez, Seranthony Domínguez, and Gregory Soto, among others. From the end of 2023 to the end of 2024, the Orioles added more than $25 million to their MLB payroll, rising from ~$79 million to ~$105 million.

While that was a significant one-season jump, it still kept the Orioles in the bottom third of all organizations. For a team that supposedly had World Series ambitions in 2025 it was clear that they would need to ratchet up their spending even more if they hoped to compete with the bottomless pockets in New York and Los Angeles.

That brings us to the current offseason. The Orioles entered it with a few stated goals. They needed an ace, a right-handed hitting outfielder, a backup catcher, and some bullpen depth. With spring training just a month away, the team has not quite completed that checklist, but they sure have spent some money and indicated that they are willing to spend even more.

The Orioles have brought on a handful of veteran free agents: Tyler O’Neill, Gary Sánchez, Tomoyuki Sogano, Charlie Morton, and Andrew Kittredge. Those five alone had added ~$62 million to the team’s payroll.

There’s also the raises that have come via arbitration. A group that included Adley Rutschman, Kyle Bradish, and Cedric Mullins saw their incomes increase by a collective $15 million for 2025, and that number will go up slightly once Jorge Mateo’s case is finalized.

And then consider that the players added at last year’s deadline that are still around (Eflin, Domínguez, and Soto) will now earn a full season of income from the Orioles rather than the prorated portion they were responsible for a year ago. That’s no small number, totaling more than $30 million in 2025.

Of course, the team has gotten some bigger salaries off of their books from last year, most notably Burnes, Anthony Santander, and James McCann. But the fact remains that they have spent far more than they have lost.

According to reports, the club has attempted to spend even more. They were in on a reunion with Burnes, potentially at the cost of a franchise-record deal. And they were a bad physical away from signing reliever Jeff Hoffman to a three-year, $40-million contract. Swap Morton for Burnes and Kittredge for Hoffman, and the O’s payroll would be jumping up even more than it has.

As it stands, FanGraphs estimates the Orioles’ 2025 payroll at $156 million. That represents a 50% increase from their end-of-year 2024 estimate, and while these various sites that report on contracts don’t always agree on the specifics, it is pretty clear that the Orioles have ramped up their spending in a way that few other teams have across MLB this offseason.

Despite this fact, there is still a feeling of dissatisfaction across the Orioles fan base. Why? It’s pretty simple. The team is still missing the most important part of their offseason shopping list, and they seemingly refuse to commit to players long term.

Acquiring an ace is no easy feat. The Orioles didn’t really have one from the day Mike Mussina signed with the Yankees in 2000 until the moment they traded for Burnes last year. Regardless of how tough it can be to add one, the presence of a dominant arm atop your rotation does feel like a requirement to be a contender. The Orioles current staff is solid and undoubtedly deep, but unless things really click for Grayson Rodriguez this year, it does not have a bonafide ace.

Signing superstar young players has been a hallmark of franchises around baseball for the last few years. The Royals handed Bobby Witt Jr. the keys to the franchise last year. The Mariners did the same with Julio Rodríguez the year before. And the Braves seem to sign a new pre-arbitration player to a long-term deal on a quarterly basis at this point. Meanwhile, the Orioles have no commitments to speak of.

The only player that is guaranteed a spot on the 2026 Orioles if he wants it (barring a trade) is the recently-signed O’Neill, but even he can opt out after 2025. While the Orioles have loaded up in 2025, they have virtually nothing tied up beyond October.

That is where Elias’ style of roster construction comes in. As Orioles GM he has rarely shown an appetite for risk, or a willingness to give up any amount of team control. Free agents under his watch have almost exclusively signed one-year deals, he is yet to hand out a significant extension, and prospects are treated as an invaluable commodity that will need to be pried away from his clutching hands. This has allowed him to build up a really good team in Baltimore, but can it lead to a World Series? That remains unclear.

What is obvious is Elias’ ability to lay in wait, keep his cards close to the vest, and strike where he sees value. Deals the Orioles make are rarely, if ever, reported on until the moment they happen. The organization has been water tight under his watch. So while there are almost no rumblings right now that the O’s are eyeing an ace or working on an extension, it does not mean that the conversations aren’t happening.

At his essence, Elias appears to be pragmatic. Yes, he wants the Orioles to be good, but he doesn’t want overplay his hand. He doesn’t want to jeopardize the future. He likes to hedge his bets and give himself multiple avenues of success. It’s logical, and it will probably lead the Orioles to be quite good again in 2025 and beyond.

But is also possible that that the Orioles need to take bigger swings if they are going to vault from good to great in any one season. While spending and winning do not always have a 1:1 relationship, it’s also tough to look at the payrolls and tactics of teams like the Dodgers, Yankees, and others, then look at their historic postseason success and connect some dots. Elias and the Orioles—it appears—are hoping to operate slightly outside of that system.

Filed Under: Orioles

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