After landing on the injured list for the first time in his career, it appears as though Adley Rutschman’s stay there will be a prolonged one as well. Interim manager Tony Mansolino told reporters Sunday that the star catcher would be out through the All-Star Break with a left oblique strain.
According to reports, Rutschman felt discomfort on Friday during batting practice before he was scratched from the line up and scheduled for an MRI. The 27 year old has appeared in 483 games since debuting in 2022, becoming one of the league’s more durable backstops over that span.
It’s been a season to forget for the Orioles through the first half of 2025. Rutschman is hitting just .227 with eight homers and 20 RBIs across 68 games to date. He now becomes the 10th Oriole currently on the injured list, joining a group that includes Ryan Mountcastle, Tyler O’Neill and Grayson Rodriguez amongst others.
The unfortunate part however is that the former top pick had begun to turn his fortunes around of late, hitting .309 over his last 15 games before going down with the oblique injury.
Former Yankee Gary Sanchez figures to see the bulk of the reps behind home plate in Rutschman’s absence. In a corresponding move, the club also recalled Maverick Handley, who is hitting .322 across 17 games with Triple-A Norfolk this year.
Given the team’s lack of offence, and now the injury to their franchise catcher, fans began to speculate whether the club would promote top prospect (no. 15 overall per MLB Pipeline) Samuel Basallo who has experience at catcher and first base.
The 6’4″ left handed bat has racked up 15 home runs, 34 RBIs, and 33 runs scored, while hitting .272 across 47 games for Norfolk in 2025. Despite the hole in the roster and the team’s need to generate more runs, the club doesn’t appear to be in any hurry to bring Basallo up.
“We haven’t talked about him, just to make it perfectly clear,” Mansolino said. “But from my point of view, just as a development guy — I’m a long-term development guy — what I would love to see is him absolutely knock the door down.
“I don’t think you take a guy like Sammy Basallo and you bring him to the big leagues just because there’s a need. I think you bring a Sammy Basallo to the big leagues when he’s destroyed Triple-A in all facets of the game — his at-bats, his defense, everything. So when he destroys Triple-A and he knocks the door down, to me, then he becomes part of the conversation. I don’t personally think you bring a guy to the big leagues with that type of profile until that happens.”
Baltimore is next scheduled to take on the Yankees on Sunday in an afternoon affair in the Bronx.
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