Orioles’ Elias on Hyde: ‘One of the best managers in the game’

If you’re a consumer of social media, it wouldn’t surprise you that some fans think that manager Brandon Hyde is to blame for the Orioles’ two-game sweep by the Kansas City Royals.in the Wild Card round.

On October 3^rd, the day after the elimination and Hyde’s 51^st birthday, executive vice president Mike Elias defended the Orioles’ manager and said he would return in 2025.

In a New York Post podcast on Wednesday, Elias went further in defending Hyde, who recently completed his sixth season as Orioles manager.

“Brandon is one of the best managers in the game,” Elias said. “He’s guided us, not only through the rebuild, but kind of going back to midway through 2022, I don’t know where we are exactly — top three or so in wins.

“He’s the skipper that has guided through that, and that’s despite our team not having the payroll levels a lot of teams around the league have had. So, this has been an impressive accomplishment, to win the AL East, to win the first Wild Card seed despite the injuries that we sustained, and there’s a lot that goes into that.

“And he and I have been working really closely since we started the rebuild but also through this competitive period. His talent is really high, and both he and I feel this sting of not being able to advance through the playoff round the last two years now. We’re focused on that. We’re doing everything we can to prevent ourselves from having that happen next year. But guess what? We’ve gotta get back in the playoffs, too. A lot of work ahead of us. But he’s a big asset for us.”

When Hyde came to the Orioles in December 2018, he was regarded as a placeholder. There was speculation that Hyde would manage the club during the rebuilding years and then be replaced by a more experienced manager when the team’s competitive window opened.

That conventional wisdom was wrong, and Hyde is now the fourth-longest tenured manager in the American League.

Hyde is one of just four managers whose teams qualified for the postseason in 2023 and 2024. Brian Snitker (Braves), (Dave Roberts (Dodgers) and Rob Thomson (Phillies) are the others.

With his first win in 2025, Hyde will tie Hank Bauer for fourth-most victories by an Orioles manager with 408. Earl Weaver, Buck Showalter and Paul Richards are the top three.

The Orioles don’t announce contract lengths for managers or coaches, so we don’t know how long Hyde’s deal is for, but it’s obvious that he’s been extended, probably multiple times.

Elias has much more confidence in him than fans, some of whom call for Triple-A Norfolk manager Buck Britton to replace him.

Fans take out their frustrations on Hyde because the team failed to hit well with runners in scoring position for most of the season’s second half and in the two losses to the Royals. They also question his bullpen moves.

Watching the two games last week, it seemed that Kansas City manager Matt Quatraro managed the games similarly.

The difference in the second game was relief pitcher Cionel Pérez allowing two hits on soft contact by Kyle Isbel and Michael Massey in the sixth inning and a difficult play on a ground ball by Bobby Witt Jr. that scored the eventual winning run. However, it was tough to see Kansas City advance after scoring just three runs in the two games.

Managing has changed dramatically in recent years. The big personality managers, Showalter and Dusty Baker, are no longer in the dugouts and while Cincinnati hired Terry Francona after a year of retirement, I’m not sure he qualifies as a large personality.

The data managers are given by analytics departments is immense and intense, but they’re still free to use both the data and their judgment.

Just like your workplace, clubhouses have changed in recent years, and a large part of a manager’s job is keeping a clubhouse tranquil, and that’s something that Hyde does well.

Two years of 218 losses with a difficult 60-game Covid-shortened schedule in between might have traumatized many first-time managers, but Hyde came through it well, and the team was a surprise late-season contender in 2022.

Last season was a great year, 101 wins, an American League East title, but an abrupt ending when they were swept in three games by the Texas Rangers. This year was fine for 2 ½ months, but season-ending elbow injuries to starting pitchers Kyle Bradish, John Means and Tyler Wells and lengthy absences because of injuries to reliever Danny Coulombe and infielder Jordan Westburg hurt the club.

A poor second half by catcher Adley Rutschman and the need to use 60 players, two shy of the club record, also made it a challenging year for Hyde.

Some fans yearn for the days of Showalter and his entertaining news conferences, but those were a lot more entertaining when he had steady veterans Brad Brach, Zack Britton and Darren O’Day in the bullpen and experienced infields of Chris Davis, Jonathan Schoop, J.J. Hardy and Manny Machado.

It’s great that Elias has drafted position players well, but even Rutschman, the most experienced, has fewer than three years of big-league service time.

Next year with veterans with postseason experience presumably added should make for another competitive club, and the hope that Hyde gets the club to win at least one postseason series to secure an even longer tenure in Baltimore.

Note: The Orioles named longtime club executive Greg Bader as the new executive vice president and general manager for the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network (MASN). Bader, who has been with the club since 1994 has most recently been team’s executive vice president and chief operating officer. He’ll begin transitioning immediately and will run MASN fulltime beginning January 1^st. He’ll report to Catie Griggs, the team’s president of business operations.

Call for questions: Most weekdays, I’ll be answering Orioles questions. Please email them to: Rich@BaltimoreBaseball.com.