Aron Estrada drove in a career-high six runs and two touted Orioles prospects made their Double-A debuts as the Chesapeake Baysox routed the Altoona Curve 12-3 on Tuesday night to open a six-game series.
Estrada, Baltimore’s No. 5 prospect according to MLB.com, put Chesapeake (16-11 second half, 45-50 overall) ahead early with a first-inning grand slam off Altoona left-hander Connor Oliver, who took the loss to fall to 2-3. The blast came after an infield hit and two walks loaded the bases, and it marked the second grand slam of Estrada’s season. He finished with four hits for the second time in his professional career — and the second time this month — while setting a new career high for RBI in a game.
The Baysox piled up 16 hits on the night, their second-highest total of the season, with eight different Chesapeake batters recording at least one. Dom Keegan went 3-for-4 with a solo home run in the first inning — his first as a member of the Orioles organization — an RBI single in the fifth and a run-scoring double in the ninth. Brandon Butterworth tripled in the second inning to drive in Griff O’Ferrall, extending his own hot stretch to hits in 11 of his last 12 games; O’Ferrall has hits in five straight games, with multiple hits in each of his last two.
Tuesday’s game also marked the Double-A debuts of two of the organization’s top prospects. Shortstop Wehiwa Aloy, Baltimore’s No. 4 prospect, recorded his first Double-A hit in the fifth inning and added a walk, a stolen base and two runs scored. Aloy, the Orioles’ first-round pick — 31st overall — in the 2025 draft out of Arkansas, arrives at Double-A after a monster July at High-A Frederick, where he hit .425 with a 1.206 OPS over his final 19 games to finish the stint at .300 with 15 home runs, 69 RBIs and 12 stolen bases in 84 games. He won the 2025 Golden Spikes Award as college baseball’s top amateur player before signing with Baltimore.
Infielder Victor Figueroa also debuted at the level Tuesday and matched Estrada with a four-hit night of his own, doubling in the fourth inning before adding RBI singles in the seventh and ninth. Figueroa was part of the same wave of High-A promotions that brought Aloy, right-hander Caden Hunter and right-hander Joe Glassey up to Chesapeake this week.
Chesapeake’s bullpen carried the pitching workload after right-hander Evan Yates opened with three and one-third innings. Relievers Ryan Long, Gerald Ogando, Alex Pham and Glassey combined to throw the final five and two-thirds innings scoreless, allowing just one hit and striking out 10 batters between them. Long earned the win, his first of the season, while Glassey worked a one-two-three ninth inning in his own Double-A debut.
Chesapeake goes for its third straight win Wednesday afternoon as the series continues in Altoona. Left-hander Caden Hunter, promoted from High-A where he went 2-1 with a 1.60 ERA, is set to make his own Double-A debut for the Baysox, with first pitch scheduled for 12:05 p.m. Eastern.
The Baysox will play out the rest of their six-game set in Altoona before returning to Prince George’s Stadium in Bowie on Tuesday, Aug. 4, to open a six-game homestand against the Harrisburg Senators, the Double-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals. First pitch for that series opener is set for 6:35 p.m.
Tuesday’s promotions continue a busy stretch for the Orioles’ farm system as the July 31 trade deadline approaches, with Baltimore also elevating left-hander Luis De León and right-hander Juaron Watts-Brown from Double-A to Triple-A Norfolk this week, part of a broader wave of roster movement across the organization’s minor league affiliates.
The influx of new talent gives Chesapeake one of the more prospect-heavy rosters in the Eastern League down the stretch of the season, with Estrada, Aloy, Figueroa, Hunter and Glassey all appearing on various top-30 organizational prospect lists. For a Baysox club looking to build on a productive second half, Tuesday’s blowout offered an early look at how much offensive and pitching depth the promotions could add over the season’s final two months.
