Throughout the season, the CBS Sports MLB experts will bring you a weekly Batting Around roundtable breaking down pretty much anything. The latest news, a historical question, thoughts about the future of baseball, all sorts of stuff. Last week we debated Aaron Judge’s Hall of Fame case. This week we’re going to tackle two contenders off to low starts.
Which team is more likely to rebound from its slow start and make the postseason: Braves or Orioles?
Dayn Perry: At this very early juncture, I have to go with the Orioles. In large measure, this reflects how much easier it’s probably going to be to make the playoffs in the American League versus the National League. They’re much closer to playoff position than the Braves are, and both the AL East race and the race for AL wild-card berths figure to be much less imposing than what the Braves face in the NL East and the NL wild-card fray. The NL is just the superior league right now, and that accrues to the Orioles’ advance in this particular discussion.
R.J. Anderson: At the risk of submitting a cop-out answer, I think both teams will recover. There’s too much talent on their rosters, too much time remaining in the season. We’re talking about fewer than 20 games apiece here; if these stretches had occurred in June or August, we would’ve noticed them but we wouldn’t pretend they were season-enders. I’ll grant that injuries and underperformance can rip a season away like the tide. Until we get into the deeper waters, I’m not ready to give up on either of these clubs.
Matt Snyder: I’m gonna go with the Braves, actually. I know the NL is much tougher, but they are so much better than they’ve been playing and a large portion of their dreadful record to start the season is the 0-7 trip to visit the Padres and Dodgers. It’s reasonable to believe the other two NL East contenders would go something like 2-5 or 3-4 on such a trip, so they don’t have a ton of mileage to make up from that point of view. The return of Spencer Strider and the coming return of Ronald Acuña Jr. will help, not to mention players like Matt Olson, Austin Riley, Michael Harris II and Ozzie Albies getting hot after cold starts. As for the Orioles, I just don’t think they have the pitching.
Mike Axisa: Since we have to pick one of the two teams, I’m with Snyder. I think it’s the Braves, in part because I just do not trust the O’s pitching. The Braves are 5-6 since their 0-7 start, which obviously isn’t great, but at least they’re moving in the right direction. Spencer Strider looked good in his return Wednesday and they’ll get Ronald Acuña Jr. back in a few weeks too. Even if those two are 75% of their usual selves this season, they’re still impact players. Also, since we’re picking specifically between the Braves and Orioles, I have way more faith in Alex Anthopoulos finding a way to move the needle at the trade deadline than I do Mike Elias. We’ve seen the Braves start a season slowly only to rally and make the postseason (they did it the year they won the World Series!), so they’ve earned some benefit of the doubt. There is still so much season remaining. Ultimately, I think both teams will be fine, but I have more faith in the Braves figuring it out than I do Baltimore.
