The severity of Grayson Rodriguez’s lat/teres situation that knocked him out from starting on Tuesday is still unclear. What is clear is it’s bad enough that he’s been placed on the injured list the next day, so it’s enough of a long-term absence that the Orioles can and will replace him on the roster. Rodriguez was placed on the 15-day IL on Wednesday afternoon, with the team recalling lefty reliever Keegan Akin in his place.
Along with Rodriguez, the Orioles also placed Heston Kjerstad back on the injured list due to continuing impact from his concussion. Kjerstad was originally placed on the concussion list after being hit in the head on July 12 and stayed on that list for the minimum time before being activated again. There was enough struggle since that return, with Kjerstad batting just .111 with no extra-base hits in seven games, that I wondered if he was still impacted.
In a separate move announced about 30 minutes after these first two, the Orioles also placed Jacob Webb on the injured list. Webb’s injury was described as right elbow inflammation. Replacing Webb on the roster is reliever Bryan Baker. Webb has pitched in 53 games this season, leading the team. He hasn’t always been good, taking the loss in five games, but someone will have to cover key innings that Webb had been covering.
The Orioles sent Kjerstad to Triple-A Norfolk about a week ago but Kjerstad had not yet played in a game there. MASN’s Steve Melewski said yesterday that Kjerstad was supposed to be back in the lineup today. The situation has not played out that way. The team must have suspected the continuing concussion impact in not playing Kjerstad for the past several days, and now that’s confirmed with Kjerstad’s return to the injured list.
The move for Kjerstad doesn’t impact the big league roster since he’d been optioned previously. Kjerstad is just put on the major league injured list because he suffered the injury while with the major league team. That means he’ll be accumulating MLB service time while on the IL, which isn’t the case for players on the minor league IL.
How will the Orioles replace Rodriguez in the rotation while he’s gone? They might have already done it after Albert Suárez filled in with a solid emergency start last night. This would require the fewest roster machinations to accomplish and would keep the O’s from having to toss a possibly still-in-progress rookie into the fire, like Cade Povich or less-known Brandon Young.
Akin is one of those guys where the idea that he sucks is lodged into my brain forever, mostly because he did suck a year ago, with a 6.85 ERA and 1.775 WHIP in 24 games. He’s been a lot better this year and has a sub-1 WHIP along with a 3.34 ERA in 47 games. The Orioles could certainly use a reliable bullpen lefty given that recent acquisition Gregory Soto has flopped in his first two outings and Cionel Pérez has not been that guy in 2024.
Baker’s return elicits a response in line with a certain meme from the Disney-produced Star Wars sequels. He has pitched to a 4.58 ERA and 1.075 WHIP in 14 games for the squad this season.
