Mike Baumann was the relief pitcher that the Seattle Mariners faced in the eighth inning of their game against the Baltimore Orioles on May 17.
After throwing for the Mariners for six days, Baumann was now with the Seattle hitters, who seemed pleased that the 28-year-old right-hander was now on their team.
When starting pitcher Grayson Rodriguez returned to the Orioles off the disabled list the next day, Baumann ended up being the odd man out after pitching a scoreless inning against the Mariners. At the time, the Mariners were still in Baltimore, and pitching coach Pete Woodworth of Seattle said that the team’s batters showed interest as soon as they learned that Baumann was suddenly available.
“All of our batters said, ‘We need to acquire that kid,’ as soon as he was designated for development. That man is repulsive. Woodworth said to Bump and Stacy of Seattle Sports on Tuesday on The Dugout, “That was one of my least favorite at-bats of the season off that guy.” As luck would have it, we learned that we had acquired Mike Baumann about a day later. Dreams do therefore come true.
It was a little unexpected that Baumann was DFA’d. He has a 3.32 ERA this year and was a valuable member of the Orioles in 2023, making 60 appearances (64 2/3 innings) and recording a 3.76 ERA with six holds and 61 strikeouts.
It turns out that Woodworth knew Baumann back in the day. In 2015 and 2016, while Woodworth was Florida Gulf Coast’s pitching coach, Baumann was a standout player for Jacksonville University, a rival school.
Woodworth said, “I don’t think we ever got a hit off him.”
In his fifth season as the pitching coach for the Minnesota Timberwolves, Woodworth finds value in pairing the hard-throwing, seasoned righty Ryne Stanek with Baumann in Seattle’s bullpen. Stanek joined the team this season.
Woodworth described Baumann as a “big, physical, intimidating dude, and the stuff that’s coming out of his hand is primo.” Thus, he and Stanek are producing some very fantastic back-end bullpen work with him throwing in the mid 90s, Stanek reaching 100 mph, and some nasty secondary stuff that’s coming out of their hands.
