May 21, 2022. Oriole Park at Camden Yards. The crowd is electric knowing there will be a new catcher debuting his skills today. “Now at catcher, number 35,” Adrienne Roberson screamed over the microphone as the crowd continued to roar. “Adley Rutschman!” The wave of orange leaps to their feet and applauds for their new captain and the 23 year old joins the line of men standing on the second base line. Little do they know the best is yet to come. As the Orioles take the field for the beginning of the first inning, Rutschman takes his helmet off and seems to breathe in the Camden Yards air. He does a spin and looks at the crowd in the stands as they give him a standing ovation. He gave the crowd a silent nod as he spun around, as if to say, “I made it.”
Portland, Oregon, 1998, Carol and Randy Rutschman welcomed into the world a baby boy. They named him Adley. Some say Adley was destined for greatness as his father, Randy, is regarded as one of the best catching coaches in the United States. Raised three hours south of Seattle, Adley became enveloped in the world of baseball. Being influenced by the strength of his dad or the spryness of his 91 year old grandfather, Ad Rutschman, Adley always pushed to get better no matter how good he currently was. At a young age he would send foam baseballs flying over neighbor’s houses and land them perfectly in backyards. None of these neighbors cared, as they knew this child would one day be hitting baseballs onto Eutaw street. From a young age, Adley would go on road-trips with his father and grandpa to George Fox University and shag balls during collegiate batting practice. This little leaguer was showing promise. Later in his adolescence, Adley attended Sherwood High School in Portland, Oregon. There, he was topping 90 on the mound as an underclassman. Yet Adley kept growing and growing and growing! He ended up at 6’2’’, no longer the prime pitching recruit. Later in high school, switching his skills to catching and focusing on his switch hitting ability, which made him a valuable prospect to colleges. He was a well rounded kid who figured himself out and how to control his movements. This is how Oregon State University found Rutschman and brought him into their program, but not just for baseball.
What many fans don’t know about Adley is he signed a letter of intent to play baseball and football at OSU. During his time at Sherwood, he set the state record for the longest field goal at 63 yards, so OSU brought him in as a place kicker for football and starting catcher for baseball. His time at Oregon will be remembered very well through both sports. Although he only played his freshman year, Adley made some big plays on the football field. The one that stands out the most is during the Stanford-Oregon game, after the kickoff, Christian McCaffrey recovered the ball and ran about 37 yards before Adley got ahold of him and ripped him to the ground, effectively cementing his name as one of the few kickers to ever tackle McCaffrey. In his four years of Beaver baseball, Adley set some impressive records. He never batted below .400 and his senior year fielding percentage was .989! Coaches and teammates from Oregon have credited Adley with some of the best frame-work in the nation. His ability to stay silent behind the plate yet make big things happen when he’s in the box was astounding to everyone. His sophomore year is when he got the nickname “Aldey Clutchman” for his clutch pinch hitting ability and power. He had a breakout year with 83 RBI’s in 67 games. In his senior year in college he hit 17 home runs with 58 RBI’s, also breaking a school single season record for most walks with 76. But that’s not even all, he had an astounding 24 intentional walks from being such a weapon at the plate. In one game against the University of Cincinnati they walked him with zero outs and the bases loaded. Cincinnati was only up 5-3 at the time and ended up losing that game. Walking a batter with bases loaded is an extremely big deal, and it just goes to show how much of a weapon Adley was in college. His college career caused a lot of talk in the baseball community about how he would become the eventual number one overall draft prospect. The only question was, to what team?
The Baltimore Orioles used to be a powerhouse of an organization producing players such as Cal Ripken, Brooks Robinson, Jim Palmer, and Eddie Murray. But after 2017, their fans were getting worried about the future. Adam Jones had reached retirement, Manny Machado’s contract was up, and many more beloved Orioles were leaving the team. The Orioles got last place in their division, cementing them in zero playoff berths since the previous season. Fans didn’t know how it could get any worse until the 2018 season rolled around. The season ended and the Orioles had a losing record of 47-115. This gave them certainty of the first draft pick in the upcoming MLB draft. But manager of 8 years, Buck Showwalter, announced he was moving his talents elsewhere. With many fans left confused and lost, they all agree on at least one thing: “draft Adley Rutschman!” Sure enough, as the 2019 MLB Draft comes along, the Baltimore Orioles drafted Adley Rutschman number one pick overall. Some might think this pick was a no-brainer, but Rutschman’s draft class was stacked with skill. Bryson Stott to the Phillies, Bobby Witt Jr. to the Kansas City Royals, Corbin Caroll to the D-Backs, and many more extremely athletic first round picks. Adley’s Minor League career didn’t start off as well as everyone expected. Perhaps it was the shock of the big leagues being real. His first major league experience was in Aberdeen with the Orioles A level affiliate, the IronBirds, then was quickly promoted a few games later to the class A Delmarva Shorebirds and that’s where he finished off his 2019 season. From there he spent the off-season on an invite to join the official Orioles spring training down in Sarasota, Florida. He had 9 plate appearances with 1 recorded hit. He played in seven spring training games with the Orioles until going back to Bowie to play double A on the Baysox. Adley was with the Baysox from summer of 2020 to the next spring training season where he was called up to play with the Orioles triple A affiliate, the Norfolk Tides. He finished his minor league career (up until May 21st) with Norfolk and won many awards such as the Gold Glove Catchers Award. Rutschman had a short minor league career, spanning less than 3 years total. But in those three years he proved to the organization he was ready for the next step.
On May 20, 2022 Adley was told he would be playing with Baltimore officially for the first time. In a meeting that was secretly being recorded, the Norfolk Tides manager tells Rutschman that the reason he didn’t play in that day’s game was because they were saving him for Camden Yards. A smile appears on Adley’s face as he can’t contain his excitement. Many of his Tides teammates who were hiding in the hallway run in to celebrate with him and they all start jumping in one of the most wholesome videos you’ll ever see of a baseball team. The next day was Adley’s debut. As he takes his position behind the plate you see him take a second to capture an image of what’s happening in the moment. He made it; he is in the big leagues. Every little kids’ dream! Adley does a 360 spin as the crowd gives him a standing ovation. You can see the moment when the atmosphere of Old Bay and Natty Boh gets to him and he gets emotional. That night Adley received a standing ovation for nearly everything. From his first career strikeout to his first career hit, fans were excited about the future of this franchise. At the bottom of the seventh inning, Adley smoked a ball down the right field line for his first career hit. Chaos ensued as the ball hit the corner of the field and fans went wild. Would his first MLB hit be multiple bases? As Adley is rounding first it becomes clear that this hit is an easy double, maybe even a triple if he’s fast enough! Sure enough he kicks it into high gear. And soon enough we see Adley Rutschman standing on third, safe, with his first MLB hit as a standup triple. In the MLB a triple is one of the hardest hits to get, in 2017 only 249 being hit in the entire season! If this one hit would be a way to describe his career, then the Orioles are looking at a bright future.
Adley’s presence didn’t just excite fans; it excited the team. The Orioles had been coming off of a five year streak of losing records. Rutschman was called up at a crucial time in the Orioles development and some would even say he turned the organization around. Baltimore had been losing fans and was the laughingstock of the MLB from 2017-2022 but all of that changed after Adley brought his charisma to the clubhouse. The Orioles set an American League record after calling Adley up. They played over 106 series and weren’t swept once! His chemistry with his teammates radiates throughout Baltimore with his connections to Gunnar Henderson, Colton Cowser, and many more. The Orioles finished their 2022 season with a 83-79 record which was a quick turnaround from the previous season’s 52-110 record. The next year, 2023, Adley led his command of the Orioles to their first playoff berth since 2016. It also wasn’t just any playoff berth, they finished first in the American League with an astounding 101-61 record! This gave them a bye in the playoffs to the second round, sadly losing to the Texas Rangers. But the turnaround of the Orioles isn’t over yet, the 2024 season brought even more surprises. They finished 91-71 with second place in the American League East. These boys were flipping the script. What once were the scrawny Baltimore Orioles have become the powerhouse we know of today.

Starting in the 2023 season, the Orioles started leaning more towards social media to show fans the personality of these baseball players. One of the strongest personalities being Adley, hosting many “mini-mic” interviews on the Orioles TikTok page. These interviews varying from questions like “Go-to karaoke song” or something as simple as “Best Orioles dynamic duo”, he always added hilarious commentary to give the audience a laugh. This was also a strategy the organization used to get more people engaged with the team. Another strategy used by, what some deemed, “the best personality in baseball” is a new celebration for extra base hits. If you hit a single, you pretend to turn on faucets. If you hit a double or triple, you hit the sprinkler at your base as the dugout spits water! And for home runs, you and whoever scores a run gets to drink from their modified hose. Fans loved this new era of Orioles baseball. Whether or not it was due to the introduction of Adley or not, fans from across teams can agree he has made a big impact on this new era of Major League Baseball.