The Orioles called up their No. 3 prospect, infielder Jordan Westburg, to make his major league debut Monday night. Westburg is the latest in a seemingly never ending parade of acclaimed Orioles minor league hitting prospects to join the big league ranks. Baltimore’s careful yet deliberate injections of youthful talent at the big league level have joined a mix of veterans who’ve either weathered the storms of a rebuild or revitalized their careers following tough stretches elsewhere. Austin Hays, Cedric Mullins, Anthony Santander, Ramón Urías and Ryan Mountcastle were on the 2021 Orioles squad that lost 110 games. Each has also contributed in large to a 2022 team that nearly chased down a playoff spot and now in 2023 are chasing a pennant heading into July. Ryan O’Hearn, Aaron Hicks, Jorge Mateo and Adam Frazier have flashed enough at some point to warrant playing time to some degree, at least in manager Brandon Hyde’s mind.

That’s left a predicament with a handful of prospects who have seemingly accomplished as much as they could in the minors. Westburg and infielder Joey Ortiz are prime examples. Ortiz, a plus defender at multiple infield positions, has looked nothing short of competent and competitive across 34 scattered plate appearances. Yet, Ortiz has been sent down four times, including to make room for Westburg Monday. Westburg, arguably the Orioles most “veteran” prospect, has done nothing short of rake – 36 home runs and 136 RBI’s with a .899 OPS – in his 159 AAA games. It still took until late June for the Orioles to feel they had to bring Westburg up to the big league squad. Not to mention even more top prospects seemingly checking every box they could in the minors, outfielder Colton Cowser and infielder Connor Norby. Cowser and Norby have exactly 359 plate appearances each and checked every box in the box as well as in the field. To go deeper, 2022 No. 1 overall pick Jackson Holliday is anything but on the back burner as he just took over the No. 1 spot on MLB.com’s prospect rankings – the third straight year an Orioles’ minor leaguer has taken the top spot.

All in all, a long winded way of saying. . . the Orioles have a “good problem.” They have too much MLB ready talent to get on the field. It doesn’t look like the train is stopping anytime soon. So how do the Orioles solve that problem? There are two simple answers before digging deeper. Injuries will organically alleviate room at the big league level and the Orioles will likely be active at the trade deadline and send multiple prospects and/or big leagues in exchange to bolster their pitching talent and depth.

The more precise questions? Do the Orioles feel comfortable shipping off veterans contributing to a team that’s currently 19 games over .500? While teams like the Atlanta Braves over the last few years and Cincinnati Reds more recently have surged amidst heavy youth movements, can a team that trots out lineups with five or six first or second year players make a true playoff run? Going deeper, does the Orioles’ brass really care if they make a run this year? Do they care more about being a “good” team this year? Or a “great” team for years to come? If we’ve learned anything from the Orioles’ Executive Vice President and General Manager’s tenure in Houston, it’s that they will prioritize opening up a longer, sustained window. The Astros did so with elite starting pitchers like Justin Verlander, Gerrit Cole and Zack Greinke. While the Orioles’ rotation has been on a nice run led by the likes of Tyler Wells (the MLB leader among qualified starters win WHIP) and Kyle Bradish with no disrespect to Kyle Gibson or Dean Kremer. . . can that rotation, which has also struggled to find any consistent fifth option, go win pennants and hoist a Commissioner’s Trophy or two? It would be quite surprising.

The MLB Network posed an interesting segment examining these exact issues on Tuesday morning.

Their proposal oversimplified: move veterans to find pitching making room for the young guns. However, will the return for the likes of Urías, Mateo, Mountcastle or Santander be enough to snag starting pitchers like Lucas Giolito or Corbin Burnes? It seems unlikely. Maybe the Orioles are willing to depart with Santander, who has been arguably their most dominant hitter, let alone their primary No. 3 hitter, could. . . but it seems far more likely that a team looking to rebuild and re-tool would be intrigued by the likes of prospects like Norby, Cowser or a Heston Kjerstad. Another factor is that a team like Houston was willing to shell out expensive contracts to pitchers. The Orioles haven’t shown that willingness in nearly a decade. Elias has made comments aiming to model after the Tampa Bay Rays, who have been successful while being far more frugal than the traditional top teams. That could spark the Orioles, who clearly trust their ability to draft and develop or revitalize veterans, to depart with upcoming free agents as opposed to departing with top prospects. Perhaps their successful scouting and analytical prowess of lesser valued pitchers like Wells, Bradish, Gibson among a slew of bullpen arms could mean that they make more head-scratching move(s) that they believe in.

All of these factors, in much more nuanced and intelligent detail, will contribute to how the Orioles solve this good problem. It’s likely that the Orioles depart with both veterans and prospects, perhaps across multiple trades. Nonetheless, it’s an exciting time in Baltimore, a team that clearly has flexibility to find the right moves to be a great team, not just one who pushes all their chips into the middle once then remisses back to mediocrity. How Elias and company calibrate and leap will be waited on with baited breath by the invigorated Orioles fanbase who are desperate to see a winner return to Charm City.