The four red flags from 2022 that can stunt the Orioles' progress

If the Orioles end up contending for championships for the rest of this decade, 2022 will be remembered as one of baseball’s most drastic and distinct turning points. Considering the depths of 100-loss seasons that the Orioles came from, to win 31 more games from 2021 to 2022 was a testament to a lot of hard work by a lot of people, and there are aspects of what happened over the last 12 months that can really drive the organization forward. (We covered those yesterday.)

There were also parts of it that have rightfully been flagged by skeptics of the entire operation as bad signs at the expense of everything else. A newsletter that has devoted much of the first year of its existence to chronicling the everything else has no such myopia, and can see the issues boiling in Birdland as clearly as it can see the ways this can actually work.

After highlighting four things that can push the Orioles higher that occurred in 2022, it’s only right to present four that could undermine whatever progress they’re making on the field.