The upcoming announcements of the winners for the major awards in Major League Baseball for the 2022 season could provide both some excitement and some frustrations for Orioles fans.

There could be excitement next Monday Nov. 7 when the finalists for the Baseball Writers’ Association of America awards are announced. The O’s, it seems likely, will have finalists for the AL Rookie of the Year and Manager of the Year awards in Adley Rutschman and Brandon Hyde.

The frustration could come if both come close to, but do not win, those awards.

Seattle’s Julio Rodriguez seems to be the favorite for the ROY award and there is some sentiment that Cleveland’s Terry Francona will be named top manager.

The BBWAA awards announcements begin on Nov. 14 with the rookies in each league and the AL and NL manager winners will be announced Nov. 15.

The online sportsbook BetOnline listed the win over and under totals for teams in late March and the Orioles were at 62.5 for the season. They won 83 games. Cleveland’s total was 76.5 and the Guardians won 92 and an AL Central title. Seattle’s Scott Servais should get some votes and the Mariners won 90 and made the postseason after a preseason over-under listing of 84.5.

Division-winning managers Dusty Baker of Houston and Aaron Boone of New York could also get some votes. But nothing that happened in the postseason will help or hurt any candidate as the votes had to be in by the first postseason game in the wild card round.

This was the year that Hyde got noticed nationally as being a good manager. It was hard not to notice when he took a team from 52-110 to 83-79. The plus 31-win gain was the second-best in Orioles’ club history behind only the 1989 “Why Not” Orioles who won 87 games a season after the team won 54.

On October 15, 1997, Baltimore closer Armando Benítez gave up a solo home run in the eleventh inning to Cleveland’s Tony Fernandez to give the Indians a 1-0 win in Game Six of the American League Championship Series. Like that, the 1997 ALCS was over, and so was the Orioles’ season. I still remember that moment vividly. An overexcited kid who loved baseball, I was crushed, and went to go cry in the shower.

There’s few things quite as sad as a little kid crying when their baseball team gets kicked out of the playoffs… although just short of 26 years later, the 2023 Orioles have crashed out of the playoffs, and I haven’t been that much more composed about it.

This series was horrible. The quick downshift from euphoria —> gloom. The crushing disappointment at our starting rotation, which had carried us in September, imploding under the pressure. Feeling the hope dwindle as you waited for the bats to show… but of course, they never did.

Everybody has their coping mechanisms. Me, I took a few days off from sports, period, did a digital detox, went to the gym, did some cooking. I came back to the grind just yesterday, in time to watch snippets of Mike Elias’s 30-minute press conference. In truth, it made me feel better. So did a few other bits and bobs from this week. So I figured I’d share.

1. Austin Hays kept it real

MASN beat reporter Roch Kubatko described an almost spooky scene when he went into the visitors’ locker room at Globe Field on Tuesday evening to get his postgame quotes:

I don’t know who finally broke the silence, but for me the quote of the series came from outfielder Austin Hays. “There’s no other way to put it, they kicked our ass.”

I don’t know why, but this instantly made me feel better. The non-sugarcoating. Knowing that as much anger as I was feeling, the players were feeling it, too. “It sucks,” said Hays. “Just couldn’t really get anything going, couldn’t get any momentum on our side to get things going. It hurts. It really hurts.” Misery loves company? Yeah, it’s true. Sue me.

2. So did Brandon Hyde

Ballots for Manager of the Year were in before the playoffs, so no one got to reward Bruce Bochy for his shenanigans in pasting together a decimated rotation. Brandon Hyde remains the favorite to be named AL Manager of the Year, and the beat told him so: