Mike Burke
All right it’s a little premature to say, “Now the Orioles are cooking,” but it should be as plain as the nose on your face that the club’s trade for veteran starting pitcher Kevin Millwood is, as Radar O’Reilly said about Nurse Anderson’s feelings on Tolstoy before she could even express them, “highly significant.”
But first a little history: Kevin Millwood once was to the Atlanta Braves what Storm Davis once was to the Orioles, only much better; because Millwood is being brought to Baltimore to be to the Orioles of 2010 what Rick Sutcliffe was to the Orioles of 1992.
Those of you old enough to remember when the Orioles were the best organization in all of baseball remember the Baltimore starting rotation consisted of Jim “Cy Old” Palmer, Mike “Cy Young” Flanagan, Steve “Cy Present” Stone, Scott “Cy Future” McGregor, and Storm “Cy Clone” Davis. All at the same time.
Not only was Davis going to be the next 20-game winner for the Orioles (and from 1968 through 1980, the Orioles set a major-league record by having at least one 20-game winner for 13 straight seasons, with 22 20-game winners in all), he was going to be the next Cy Young Award winner and, most importantly, the next Jim Palmer, which in Baltimore transcended all of these things even though Cakes, the original Cy in Baltimore, was defined by his eight 20-win seasons and three Cy Youngs.
Storm Davis, of course, never came close to realizing these expectations, but he was a good big-league pitcher and had a very good career. He even won an important game or two for the O’s franchise before things became rotten.
As for Millwood, in the days when the Atlanta Braves really were the closest thing there was to being the Orioles of the 1960s, ’70s and early ’80s, he made his big-league debut in 1997, won 17 games the next season and 18 the next with a 2.68 ERA. Naturally, he was following in the footsteps and was expected to become the next Greg Maddux, John Smoltz and Tom Glavine. Just as naturally, Millwood failed to realize these expectations, and was traded to Philadelphia before the 2003 season. Nonetheless, Millwood has had an exceptional career; better, in fact, than Storm Davis’s.
Enter Rick Sutcliffe.
In 1992, the Orioles found themselves opening a brand new ballpark, known all these years later as Camden Yards. Most importantly, they had the nucleus of a young and gifted starting rotation filled with the likes of Ben McDonald, Bob Milacki, Mike Mussina and Arthur Lee Rhodes. Yet manager Johnny Oates and general manager Roland Hemond understood they needed a veteran No. 1 starting pitcher to lead this rotation, not only to the mound every fifth day, but everywhere else in between. Thus, it was the 35-year-old free-agent signee Sutcliffe who threw the first pitch in the history of Camden Yards to open the 1992 season for the Orioles.
Those young pitchers needed somebody who had been there many times before to A.) teach them how to pitch in the big leagues, B.) teach them how to win in the big leagues and C.) take every bullet he could for them while winning in the big leagues himself. Sutcliffe more than delivered, winning 16 games to 15 losses and a 4.47 ERA, starting all 36 games he pitched, throwing five complete games, two shutouts and most importantly, working 237-plus innings as the Orioles finished third in the division, seven games back with 89 wins.
If Kevin Millwood, who will be 35 when next season starts, can duplicate those numbers for the Orioles, his coming to Baltimore will be an unqualified success because of the current developmental stage of the rebuilding Orioles franchise’s future: starting pitchers Jeremy Guthrie, Brian Matusz, Brad Bergesen, Chris Tillman, David Hernandez and Jason Berken. Not to mention the many prized arms that now make up the Orioles’ suddenly-loaded farm system.
Millwood has been an innings eater his entire career, with a 155-121 record and a 4.02 ERA in 383 career appearances over parts of 13 seasons in the big leagues. Last season he went 13-10 with a 3.67 ERA in 31 starts spanning 198 2/3 innings for Texas, so duplicating Sutcliffe numbers, circa ’92, in 2010 is not out of the question.
Just as important, a proven veteran presence now heads the Orioles rotation for the first time since Mussina’s last season in Baltimore, and Millwood, just as Sutcliffe did in 1992, and just as Millwood himself did last season for a young pitching staff in Texas, is expected to teach, lead, take bullets, and somehow win more games than he loses.
This is a very good deal by Andy MacPhail, because over the past 13 seasons, there is nothing to indicate Millwood won’t do all of those things.
The pitching future of the Orioles is not yet now, but it just got closer. Significantly closer.
Mike Burke is sports editor of the Cumberland Times-News. Contact Mike Burke at mburke@times-news.com.
