Full circle, full throttle: Adley Rutschman, rebuilt Orioles loom large at All-Star Game

SEATTLE – For Adley Rutschman, it is a full-circle moment. For the Baltimore Orioles, it is a re-introduction to the baseball world.

Sunday, Rutschman and three Orioles teammates descended on Seattle, an upstart baseball squad rolling deep at baseball's All-Star Game, an event in which their participation has for so many years been token.

Yet their impact on this game will likely reflect the Orioles' stellar first half, a 54-35 journey that has them within striking distance of the suddenly reeling Tampa Bay Rays.

Rutschman, the 25-year-old second-year catcher rapidly evolving into the Orioles’ franchise player, will be the No. 8 seed in Monday’s Home Run Derby, a significant underdog in a field of behemoths. And should the American League prevail in Tuesday’s All-Star Game, it’s highly likely he will close down the party, too, catching the final inning from teammate Felix Bautista.

An AL postgame victory line means the 6-2 Rutschman once again getting on his tiptoes to embrace the 6-8, 285-pound Bautista, the hulking closer nicknamed the Mountain, looming large as Rainier this week.

That Rutschman will be both intimately familiar with his surroundings and his teammates makes him something of a homecoming king even before a pitch is thrown.

"Being an All-Star is an unbelievable honor," he said in accepting his honor as a backup to fan-voted starter Jonah Heim.

"The fact that it's in the Northwest means a lot as well."

A family affair

It would be an overstatement to say Rutschman grew up at Safeco Field, now T-Mobile Park. He hails from Sherwood, Oregon, south of Portland and about a three-hour drive, far enough that he wasn’t a ballpark rat in his youth.

Yet Edgar Martinez Drive served as so many of his baseball checkpoints.

There was young Rutschman, 8 years old, winning a Pitch, Hit and Run regional at Safeco Field. Playing with his Sherwood High School teammates in a prep tournament there.

Returning to the rebranded T-Mobile Park as an Oregon State Beaver for the Seattle Baseball Showcase in 2019.

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And, just three years later, hitting a home run there in the first big league game his grandfather saw him play.

Ad Rutschman, 91, is coaching royalty in Portland, where he piloted Linfield College’s football team for 24 seasons, winning three NAIA titles; he still has a hand in the football staff as a nonagenarian, and also coached baseball for 13 years.

Should Ad make it to the Derby, it will truly be a family affair: Adley’s father, Randy, will be his pitcher.

Rutschman’s Derby invite added urgency to what should have been a languid time, with Randy and Rutschman’s mother, Carol, joining him in Baltimore for the final home series of the first half and then continuing on to New York.

But there are no half-measures in the Rutschman athletic lineage.

Randy Rutschman threw batting practice to his son at Yankee Stadium, and then, as Carol returned home, continued to the Orioles’ final first-half series in Minneapolis for more BP sessions. Rutschman – with 12 home runs in the first half – looks like an easy mark against the Chicago White Sox’s Luis Robert, whose 26 home runs trail only Shohei Ohtani in the AL.

But it certainly won’t be for lack of commitment. And Rutschman’s impact on the Orioles – they’re 122-89 since his May 2022 call-up, and he’s accumulated 7.4 WAR in 197 career games – means nobody’s talking about his All-Star debut as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

"I wish he was starting," says Orioles manager Brandon Hyde, "but he's gonna have a lot of starts in the All-Star Game over his career. And this is the first of many."

'An All-Star on a good team'

That likely won’t be the case for Austin Hays, the Orioles outfielder who’s a first-time All-Star at 28 and whose inclusion on the squad was announced last among the four by Hyde, for dramatic effect.

Injuries to Aaron Judge and Mike Trout means Hays will start the game; serving as Rutschman’s hype man for the Derby is just a bonus.

"It’s a pretty good gig getting to watch your teammate do it," he says, "rather than tiring yourself out. I can kind of vicariously live through it on the sideline."

Hays was drafted in 2016 when, he says, "it was a star-studded locker room" in Baltimore, with Adam Jones and Manny Machado spearheading three playoff berths in five years.

Five Orioles were selected to the All-Star Game in 2016 – followed by five consecutive seasons with just one selection. That was no accident: An ugly but necessary rebuild was underway, and the team would lose 118, 108 and 110 games in the three full seasons between 2018 and 2021.

Hays was there for most of it, battling injuries and riding the minor league shuttle. Skeptically, he seemed an unlikely candidate to make it out the other side when the Orioles were once again good.

Now, the Orioles' 54 wins at the break are more than their entire 2021 total. And Hays' .314 batting average and .853 OPS says loud and clear that he's a big part of it.

"To be an All-Star on a good team," he says, "definitely means a lot."

Given to fly

Hays will likely be out of Tuesday’s game by the time Bautista and his set-up man, Yennier Cano, get to perform. At 6-4 and 245 pounds, Cano looks diminished only when he stands next to the Mountain.

Yet Cano, 29, is actually three years older than Bautista, technically still a rookie. It was one year ago when Bautista exhibited preternatural calm in seizing a job in Baltimore’s bullpen, and then inherited the closer’s role when the lone 2021 All-Star, Jorge Lopez, was traded to Minnesota.

"I feel like Bautista had confidence from the very beginning. And it's not normal," says Hyde.

Meanwhile, the Lopez trade netted Cano, who was erratic in a three-game stint with Baltimore in 2022, but did not give up a run in his first 17 outings this season, a streak of 21 ⅔ innings. Hyde feels like Cano locked in after leaving spring training camp for the birth of his son, just the first of many presents this season.

"I’m just really happy that it paid off," Cano says through a translator, "and that baseball gives this back to me."

While all are older than Rutschman, they are in a sense following him to Seattle; Rutschman’s arrival coincided with the club’s 2022 takeoff, and his selection as the No. 1 overall pick in 2019 was a crucial moment in general manager Mike Elias’s rebuild.

When Rutschman first played as a pro in Seattle, many clad in orange and black wore Oregon State gear, remnants of his most outstanding player turn in the 2018 College World Series. This time, 29 other teams will be represented, but four will be Orioles, proof that one All-Star arrived on schedule, back where it began.

He already has plenty of company.

"It’s not easy being an All-Star," says Orioles veteran starter Kyle Gibson. "It’s easier for the organization to take a breath and say 'hey, we did OK these last three years.' Because this was a process to get here, I can only imagine.

"They’ve endured some tough years. And now they’re seeing a lot of their hard work come to light and come to fruition."

Contributing: Larry Berger in New York

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Adley Rutschman, rebuilt Orioles loom large at All-Star Game