Jon Meoli: Snubbed or not, Gunnar Henderson’s WBC response is great for the Orioles

Gunnar Henderson knew what he signed up for. That doesn’t mean he has to be happy about it.

But if this is how he responds to it — with star-level performances and a fire that might as well be coming out of the earflap of his helmet — then the Orioles’ best player may well use this experience as a launching point to solidify himself as one of the game’s best.

Of all the things that might make this Orioles season better than the last one, none would help more than that.

Now this isn’t the men’s Olympic hockey team, which left home elite goal scorers to fill the roster with grittier players it thought it would need to win the gold medal (and ultimately did).

Everyone on the U.S. roster for the World Baseball Classic is a star, and when Henderson signed on in early December, it was unclear what kind of role he’d play.

Bobby Witt Jr., who finished second and fourth in the AL MVP voting the last two years, committed to be the team’s shortstop in June. He had an .852 OPS last year, and as we now know, a shoulder injury meant Henderson didn’t slug and had a .787 OPS. When Witt committed to the team, Henderson was in a spell in which he had one home run over a 35-game span.

It was always going to be hard for Henderson to supplant Witt in the optimal U.S. lineup; what’s less clear is when third baseman Alex Bregman signed on. He announced he was playing in January after signing with the Cubs, but it’s possible that his involvement was kept quiet so as not to impact his free agency.

However it shook out, this isn’t about whether Henderson should have played more often — not to me at least. I don’t think USA Baseball has covered itself in glory on any front these last few weeks, so we’re trying to clear a low bar here.

I’m much more interested in Henderson’s reaction, and I bet everyone around and employed by the Orioles has watched the last couple of weeks play out thinking Henderson was going to be on a mission.

They remember when he was just a teenager in the summer of 2020 at the alternate training site in Bowie, getting carved up by big league pitchers, fighting like hell to figure out how to hit them. He eventually did.

They remember, that fall at instructional camp in Sarasota, how competitive Henderson was with Jordan Westburg in their shortstop reps. They pushed each other for years, alternating days at shortstop and trying to outdo each other when they did. Henderson, it should be noted, ultimately won, with Westburg settling at third.

Henderson is not a boat rocker, though. It seemed almost provocative for him to tell me last month that he felt the Orioles took winning for granted and didn’t have enough fire last year. He calls people like me “sir.”

So he’s not going to agitate for more playing time. He’s just going to try to prove he belongs on the field with the best.

That’s how someone sits a game, then goes 4-for-5 with an exhilarating double; sits a game, then homers to spark a near-comeback against Italy; then sits a game and homers to start the U.S. scoring in the semifinal against the Dominican Republic.

The fact that he and many who have watched him play as regularly as we have believe he belongs on that field can only get him so far.

He did an admirable thing playing through pain last year. You could tell he wasn’t at his best in the moment, but you couldn’t deny how hard he played in a lost season for the Orioles. Stars have down seasons. But you need to be a star for a long time to get a starting spot on a roster full of the best players this country has to offer solely on reputation.

Henderson can get to that point. Everyone knows it. I doubt he wants to, though, and I doubt he’d ever let it come to that. He knows the only tonic for what roiled his gut these last few weeks is to take the next step and be a superstar.

There might not have been a better hitter in the league than Henderson the first few months of 2024. If he responds to his inconsistent role on this team by being that hitter for a full season and seasons to come, I’ll look back at this month and understand exactly what sparked it.