The A’s slugger would fill Baltimore’s massive need for a right-handed power bat, but could prove expensive to acquire via trade.
Most of the talk surrounding the Orioles in the first several weeks of the offseason has centered on their attempts to add a starting pitcher. However, don’t let the buzz around the likes of Corbin Burnes, Max Fried and others distract from the fact that Baltimore’s is far from a complete offense. After all, it was not the pitching staff that bore the brunt of the blame for the Orioles’ latest postseason crash, with the lineup only managing one run and 11 hits across two playoff losses.
The Orioles will undoubtedly count on some internal development to bolster their lineup in 2025, but there’s still the matter of filling the Anthony Santander-sized hole in the middle of the order. After making a big splash in the pitching trade market last year, the O’s have the opportunity to swing big on a trade for a bat by acquiring the Athletics’ former All-Star, Brent Rooker.
Rooker is the latest player to go from relative anonymity to the cusp of stardom while playing for the green and gold. A relatively late bloomer, Rooker made his debut for the Twins during the shortened 2020 season, just a couple months shy of his 26th birthday. After failing to find a role in Minnesota, the former first round pick was traded to the Padres, who in turn traded him to the Royals.
The Athletics scooped up Rooker off waivers from Kansas City at the end of the 2022 season and handed him his first opportunity to be a full-time starter in 2023. The then 28-year-old blossomed into one of the lone bright-spots in the lowly A’s lineup, blasting 16 first-half HRs to earn his first All-Star appearance. Rooker would finish the year with a team high 30 HRs, 69 RBIs and 50 XBHs.
He then backed up his breakout 2023 season with an even better 2024. In a new role as the A’s full-time DH, Rooker quietly put together one of the best seasons in all of the American League. He finished 2024 third in the AL with 112 RBIs, tied for 4th with 39 HRs, fifth in slugging with a .562 slugging percentage and seventh in average at .293. Had he been on the Orioles last season, he would’ve led the club in average, RBIs, slugging percentage and finished second to Santander in slugging percentage.
Rooker’s potential fit on this current Orioles team would be rather seamless. Since Austin Hays’ downturn at the end of the 2023 season, the O’s have been looking for a right-handed outfielder that can provide power against left-handed pitching.
The front office tried to cobble together an OF/DH platoon of right handers at last year’s trade deadline, bringing in Austin Slater and Eloy Jiménez from the Reds’ and White Sox’ bargain bins. Neither ever hit well enough to earn a role or stay on the roster and the O’s currently would have a starting outfield of only left-handed bats (Cowser, Mullins and Kjerstad).
Rooker offers the same profile as Santander: an upper echelon power hitter with just enough athleticism to be serviceable in RF at Camden Yards. And if 2024 Rooker is the player you’re going to get going forward, he’s an upgrade on what Tony Taters delivered the last couple of years while giving the O’s the right-handed bat they need.
Santander offers above-average to well above-average xSLG, barrel rate and hard-hit rate, but Rooker put up truly elite numbers in those metrics last year while hitting for a much higher average. The only area Santander had a distinct advantage was in avoiding swings and misses, as Rooker has one of the worst whiff and strikeout rates in all of baseball.
Where the A’s big bopper really has an edge on Santander is on the payroll sheet. While Tony Taters is expected to receive offers of $20M+/year on the free agent market, Rooker still has three more years of team control. Spotrac currently projects Rooker’s 2025 salary at $3.5M and it’s likely that Rooker will make less over the next three seasons than what Santander will make in 2025 alone.
The only potentially prohibitive cost associated with acquiring Rooker is what the A’s would demand in return for him. During the 2017 offseason, the Cardinals gave up their sixth, seventh and 24th best prospects (along with another minor leaguer) to acquire Marcell Ozuna from the Marlins after Ozuna put up a season similar to Rooker’s 2024. Rooker might be slightly cheaper to acquire in trade given that he’s three years older than Ozuna when he was traded, but the value of having three years of team control could also lead Oakland to drive up the price. If the O’s were to mimic the Ozuna trade, they’d be sending Dylan Beavers, Griff O’Ferrall and one or two lower level prospects to the A’s.
The other complicating factor is whether the A’s consider themselves sellers after showing signs of improvement in 2024. The Athletics just handed out a 3 year, $67 million contract to former Yankee and Met Luis Severino, which is the largest free agent contract in the franchise’s history. The singing of Severino may signal that the A’s view themselves as buyers in this market after playing .500 ball in the second half of last season.
If the Orioles can convince their AL West counterparts to part with the centerpiece of their lineup, it would go a long way toward boosting the Baltimore lineup to one that can not only get them to October, but propel them to some playoff wins. Rooker has already posted outstanding numbers in his past trips to Camden Yards, with a .435/.462/.913 triple slash and 12 RBIs over six career games in Baltimore. Given his history, and with the Great Wall of Baltimore moving up in 2025, it’s easy to imagine the damage Rooker could do playing all of his home games in front of the Birdland faithful.