O’s game blog: Season opener against Rays

The Orioles open their 69th season this afternoon in St. Petersburg, Fla., against the Tampa Bay Rays. As the year begins, the Orioles are looking for their first winning season and playoff berth since 2016. Their last three full seasons have resulted in at least 100 losses.
 
Birdland is wondering how much improvement the Orioles can make from a team that finished 52-110 last year. Also, how will the roster turn over throughout the year and when will some of the top prospects arrive?
 
Good questions and three of many reasons to watch the 2022 Orioles.
 
They open with a three-game series against their 2021 tormentors in the Rays, who beat the Orioles in 18 of 19 games last year. They outscored Baltimore 150-7. Just three times in the divisional era since 1969 has one team gone 18-1 versus another. Both previously were in 2019 when Cleveland was 18-1 against Detroit and Houston went 18-1 versus Seattle.
 
The Orioles began last season with a three-game sweep of the Boston Red Sox, winning by scores of 3-0, 4-2 and 11-3 at Fenway Park. The Orioles were 8-9 after 17 games, 12-14 at the end of April and 15-16 on May 5 before they lost a bunch of games through the rest of that month as the season turned south.
 
This is the O’s fourth straight season opening game against a divisional opponent. They lost to the Yankees 7-2 in 2019, to Boston 13-2 in 2020 and then beat the Red Sox last year.
 
The Orioles are 9-2 in their last 11 opening day games and 16-5 in openers since 2001. They're 44-24 all-time in the first game. And they are 12-11 when the opener is on the road.
 
The Rays are the two-time defending American League East champions and went 100-62 last year. Tampa Bay lost in the World Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2020 and the Rays season ended last year with an AL Division Series loss to Boston.
 
Lefty John Means (6-9 with a 3.62 ERA in 2021) will start an opener for the second year in a row. The last O’s pitcher to do that was Chris Tillman, with three straight opening day starts from 2014-2016. Since then, Kevin Gausman was the 2017 Game 1 starter followed by Dylan Bundy in 2018, Andrew Cashner in 2019, Tommy Milone in 2020 and Means.
 
Means threw a gem last season in the opener with seven scoreless innings on just one hit against the Red Sox. It was the O’s first opening day shutout since 2005.
 
Means posted an ERA+ of 131 in 2019 and 126 last year. He fell short of qualifying for league leaders by 15 1/3 innings last season. But if he had qualified, Means would have finished seventh in the AL and 23rd in the majors in ERA. He would have been first in the AL in WHIP (1.030) and seventh in the majors.
 
Lefty Shane McClanahan (10-6, 3.43 ERA in 2021) gets the start for the Rays. The 24-year-old McClanahan is a Baltimore native who lived in the area until he was 6. As a kid, he had a Cal Ripken Jr. poster in his bedroom.
 
In four starts versus the Orioles last year, he went 4-0 with an ERA of 2.74 and a WHIP of 1.087. Over 23 innings, he walked three and fanned 27.
 
His fastball, which he threw 41 percent last season, averaged 96.5 mph. He used his slider 35 percent, his curveball 16 percent and split-finger fastball 8 percent. He ranked in the 89th percentile (the top 11 percent) in the majors in fastball velocity and the 85th percentile in whiff rate. But when opponents did put bat to ball against him, his average exit velocity against was poor at 91.7 mph.
 
Some O’s batters against McClanahan:
 
* Cedric Mullins is 8-for-24 with two homers.
* Trey Mancini is 6-for-24 with six singles.
* Austin Hays is 6-for-22 with two homers and 10 strikeouts.
* Anthony Santander is 6-for-20 with two doubles.
* Ryan Mountcastle is 0-for-14 with eight strikeouts.
* Rougned Odor is 4-for-10.
* Jorge Mateo is 4-for-10 with two doubles.
 
 
O’s all-time opening day homer leaders:
 
6 – Brooks Robinson
4 – Cal Ripken Jr.
3 – Eddie Murray, Frank Robinson, Gus Triandos