Orioles playoff choke confirms their leadership handed supremacy to Yankees

We have all the receipts, don't you worry. From Jeff Passan telling New York Yankees fans they "wish they were the Baltimore Orioles" to O's fans being among the worst for various reasons (attendance, trash talk) to us (Yes, Yanks Go Yard) predicting how this would play out before the season even started.

How much did we have to hear from Orioles fans that their front office was the second coming of Alex Anthopoulos in Atlanta? This team's supporters became Prospect Lords, exercising their largely unfounded power upon anybody who dared to converse on the topic. They would just scream "Gunnar Henderson" and "Jackson Holliday" in your face, spit and all. They laughed at the Yankees in the middle of the summer for being punked by one of the youngest teams in MLB despite New York's $300+ million payroll. Yeah, as if regular season losses don't happen.

But like we said, prospects don't get you very far. A good prospect core might be essential to a World Series-contending roster, but it's certainly not the featured ingredient. Most of the time, you also need star players and battle-tested veterans to concoct the perfect potion.

This past offseason, the Orioles opted not to aggressively supplement their state-of-art group of youngsters everybody was talking about. They spent $13 million Craig Kimbrel instead of adding a real bullpen stalwart. They added zero impact bats, failing to go over the edge and build a juggernaut offense.

They made one tremendous move, trading for Brewers All-Star Corbin Burnes and blocked him from going to the Yankees. But most agreed more was necessary to build the Orioles' depth as well as protect from regression and injuries. Nine months later, and Burnes is already gone after the O's were eliminated from the postseason. He'll probably be the highest-paid free agent this winter.

OK, so the Orioles passed on a premier offseason to spend money on star free agent pitchers and veteran offensive talent. They'd surely have a second chance to right that wrong at the trade deadline, right?

They indeed did ... except the revered Mike Elias failed miserably. He acquired Eloy Jimenez, Trevor Rogers, Zach Eflin, Seranthony Dominguez and Gregory Soto, with only Eflin providing the help they needed. They team surrendered some serious talent in all of those deals, too, depleting what they could work with in trade talks come the offseason and next year. The result was the Orioles limping into the playoffs, watching the AL East gradually slip through their fingertips, and it culminated with Wednesday's Wild Card sweep at the hands of the Kansas City Royals — a team that lost 106 games last year to the Orioles' 101 wins.

Of course you're going to hit on some top draft picks when your strategy is to tank for four straight years. Do they deserve credit for identifying the right talent? Sure. But if they didn't, they'd still be rebuilding. The goal was to take this roster to the next level after striking gold on a few selections, and Phase II of the operation has left the door wide open for the Yankees to maintain supremacy in the division for years to come. That is, unless Baltimore does a drastic about-face this offseason.

But this was no throwaway year. It was considered the very beginning of the World Series window that's instead gotten off to the most underwhelming start possible. Everyone's learned the hard way, too. Ownership tried to avoid spending more money, and that never works. The fans got ahead of themselves with the trash talk and got burned spectacularly.

And now it'll be a long offseason of reflection while they're forced to potentially watch the Yankees make a playoff run. Their only hope is rooting for the team that just sent them packing, and that's certainly no way to go through fandom.