So once upon a time we were leading this game 2-0. Then an inning happened where Zach Britton imploded and gave up five runs, and here we are. Now we’re back one game in the division again. We’re still firmly in the second Wild Card spot, but I just love the idea of winning the division, gah.
This is dedicated to you tonight, Zach:
Everyone go and sleep. We need it. At least we’re playing at 4:05 tomorrow, which isn’t too late…
I’m writing this as the Orioles have just come off of a 12-0 victory over the Blue Jays. This isn’t necessarily the biggest news of the day, though. Things were pretty quiet for the first four innings before the Orioles put up three runs, one run, three runs and five runs over the next four innings. Their ninth was quiet, but their work was done. Zach Britton also notably went seven innings and only allowed four hits, striking out two and walking nobody. Even Kevin Gregg struck someone out tonight. Oh, and for a little while the roof stopped working at the Rogers Centre and people got wet.
Still, though, none of those stories is the biggest story right now. That’s the game that’s still going on right now on the Gulf Coast of Florida.
As I write this, the Yankees are losing, and that would put the Orioles in a tie with them for first place in the American League East.
This, ladies and gentlemen, is unfathomable, or so everyone seemed to think back in February and March. Everyone thought this team hadn’t properly addressed its needs. Everyone thought they’d be cellar dwellers again. Whilst many of the otaku who congregate in Baltimore for Otakon are, true to the connotations the word ‘otaku‘ carries in Japan, actual cellar dwellers, the Orioles most certainly are not.* This team has a couple of intangibles: drive and confidence. It’s made them believers, allowing them to carry themselves this far. They believed that they could do this, and sometimes that’s genuinely what it takes to actually make people do things: the knowledge, or at the very least the belief, that those things are possible.
And it happened. Here they are, tied for first place. In the time it took me to write this article, the Yankees lost to the Rays 5-2. We’re in first place. It’s a tie, but we’re in first place. It’s September 4th.
*Let it be known that this otaku lives in her own bedroom in her parents’ house right now, but does not live in the basement.
Your unlikely hero tonight, folks.
The final score makes this game seem like it was a lot closer than it actually was, so let me set this straight: it was all Orioles tonight. To be even more accurate, it was all Chris Davis.
Four out of the six Orioles runs were scored because Chris Davis homered three times on the night. Since Chris Davis doesn’t typically do things like this, the crowd went insane at Camden Yards tonight. It’s always the players you don’t expect, after all, isn’t it?
Beating up on Toronto isn’t much of an achievement this season, given that Toronto’s had their fair share of injuries and would definitely be playing much better than they are if the team was entirely healthy. Toronto definitely has plenty of fight left in them, as they put two runs on the board in the ninth inning (via a two-run homer) and the Orioles were forced to bring in Jim Johnson. He ended up retiring all three batters he faced, quickly ending things. Zach Britton kept them mostly handcuffed before that in his 6.2 innings, chalking up six strikeouts before his night was done. (He was responsible for the other two runs, although one was allowed by Darren O’Day, who inherited the runner after Britton left the game.)
Another bright spot: THE SITE MASCOT IS BACK! Brian Matusz came out of the bullpen tonight and retired the only batter he faced. Although he doesn’t seem too keen on coming out of the ‘pen, he pitched darn well tonight, which means I get to start drawing cartoons of him again. I don’t know why I like drawing him, but there’s something genuinely goofy about him that makes him a cartoonist’s dream come true.
Let’s go again tomorrow, shall we? BIRD BATTLE!
Chris Davis is the reason we’re in the win column tonight.
I’d give Zach Britton some credit, too, but to be fair he kept getting pretty darn lucky. He did go seven innings without imploding and he didn’t give up any runs, but he kept escaping close calls with the help of the defense. A bunch of double plays were turned behind him tonight, and the Tigers were stupid enough to try to run on Matt Wieters.
Chris Davis hitting that three-run homer in the seventh inning was absolutely huge. He not only crushed the ball, but also put Britton out in front – and Britton held onto the lead in the bottom of the inning. Pedro Strop had a less-than-stellar outing and gave up two runs, but not the lead, and Jim Johnson was able to close things out. It was a typical Orioles win this season – barely enough offense, but a strong enough pitching performance that we were able to eke it out.
Oh, but check this out!
That is absolutely INSANE. That’s an incredible statistic. I’m amazed that it’s held up for the entire season so far. If that manages to last for the next 42 games, I’ll be astounded.
It’s a Saturday and I’m a nerd, so I’m going to watch documentaries on time travel now. For once, I’m not interested in going back and restarting the baseball season because we’re playing like crap – and that’s a good thing.
There was originally going to be a Morris Marina and a few paragraphs of me complaining here, but that was all deleted after an incredible seventh inning by the Orioles.
To recap briefly: Zach Britton put the team in a 5-0 hole after two innings, then settled down for a bit before giving up two more runs. Mercy came in the form of Kevin Gregg of all people in the 5th inning after Zach couldn’t record an out in the inning. To put this in perspective compared to Zach’s pitching last year, MASN ran this graphic during the game:
There’s really nothing else to say. Zach’s walks are up and his strikeouts are down, and it’s all being sponsored by Kia. He’s not exactly the Star on a Reasonably Priced Team, now, is he? Look at that thinly veiled Top Gear joke.
Zach’s location is also clearly struggling – I mean, look at those home runs he gave up tonight. It’s like we have two Tommy Hunters on the team right now. Zach was rushed to the front and he’s suffering in return this season; someone on Twitter pointed out that his 2012 is mirroring Matusz’s 2011, and I’m inclined to agree (which is why I retweeted it). I think Zach could use some more time in Norfolk, but he wasn’t exactly doing well there, either, so maybe some time in Bowie will both help him develop and snap him out of this.
Anyhow, that wasn’t so brief, so let’s get to the part where the Orioles were at a 7-3 deficit and CAME BACK ALL IN ONE INNING. Mark Reynolds doubled and was singled in by Omar Quintanilla, Nick Markakis singled, and then J.J. Hardy stepped to the plate and absolutely demolished a ball out to left field. At first I was going to point out Markakis having three hits and Wieters having two solo shots as the only good things from this game offensively, but then the team came through and did this, so I guess I’m in no position to complain.
Nothing happened after that for a very, very long time. The Orioles bullpen even pitched nine scoreless innings of relief – a complete game shutout. It wasn’t until the bottom of the 14th that the Mariners somehow managed to put an Oriole on every base and pitch to Adam Jones, who lined a pitch out to right that wouldn’t be caught. Finally, we were victorious (although the @CharmCityYakyuu Twitter account was working overtime to keep up with this game).
You can all go to sleep now.
Oh, and one last thing that I want to toss onto the end of this recap: DONUTS!
This is how many saves our closer has.
It took the Indians nine innings to score those first two runs. They came on a homer in the ninth inning off of Luis Ayala, who was going for one of those uncommon feats wherein a relief pitcher closes the game out by pitching the final two innings. In the end, it didn’t happen, so Jim Johnson came out and promptly gave up a double, which became a third run.
This all came after Zach Britton pitched a solid six innings and got three runs of support, with the fourth run being tacked on in the eighth by Wilson Betemit (who blasted a homer into the right field stands). Britton only gave up four hits total and walked two batters, striking out five. He actually looked pretty darn good today, which is certainly exciting given that we haven’t had him around for most of the year. It’s reassuring knowing that we have pitchers in reserve, at least.
Of course, the problem today was that we couldn’t exactly subdue the opponents in the final inning of the game after pretty much smothering them for the first eight. Credit to the Indians for not knowing when they’re beaten, because that’s a mentality that I think all sports teams should have, but the Orioles bullpen really made it possible for them. Jim Johnson ended up with save number 30, sure, but he allowed a run and ended up walking a batter before finally getting things done. It was more stressful than it needed to be.
Oh, but Jim Johnson is leading the AL in saves, so there’s that, at least.
Tomorrow night we play Cleveland again, somewhat oddly ending a series on a Monday night, before we get to return home. We don’t have an off-day until August 2nd. That’s actually a longer time than it seems because we’re playing every night. Eh, we’ll manage now that we’ve remembered how to win again. It’s such a relief knowing that this team hasn’t completely forgotten everything.
I was sick last night from heat exhaustion. The Orioles were sick last night from starting pitching.
Zach Britton made his season debut, and although everyone was excited to see him back he struggled once he hit the fifth inning, which is really just following the trend of pitchers not being able to put together quality starts lately. Poor Luis Ayala had to come in to mop things up and ended up being tagged with the loss when he allowed two runs to score a few innings later in the seventh.
At least Adam Jones had a three-run homer in there. It’s nice to know that somebody’s functioning lately.
This is what we call a funk or a slump, of course, and I think this team differs from Orioles teams of the past two or three years because they’ll be able to put things together again. It’s like kids learning to spell, actually. They’ll make errors at the beginning, but over time they’ll remember how things go and spell them correctly.
Or they’ll be adults who do this, but I’m hoping for the former.
Hawaiin pizza? What’s that? I know what a Hawaiian pizza is, but…
People are in camp, guys. That’s pretty awesome.
The Orioles actually made quite a few waves this offseason, and at some point this week I’m going to try to sit down and write a full offseason retrospective. Since it’s February break and my elementary school librarian mother – and my kid brother – are home from school for the week, that task has become monumentally easier.
Right now, though, let’s take a quick look at what stories are starting to emerge from camp.
You know what my favorite part of this post is? I get to tag a bunch of players in it. That means that a bunch of players are here. Just being able to write that makes me smile so, so big.
Stay tuned – I’ll have a post coming up within the next few days showing you all how to draw everyone’s favorite mascot, the Oriole Bird!
As it usually is with the Orioles, whenever one of those rare positive things happens, something bad has to happen, as well. So here’s a wonderful and depressing edition of your Orioles Chirps.
See? Good news, bad news. It’s great to know that Adam Jones is all set to go and the team successfully avoided arbitration – that’s averted a potential major distraction for everyone. Britton still being irritated by his shoulder injury, however, is really troubling – he’s expected to compete for a spot in the rotation during Spring Training this season, and if he’s hurt…well, then we’ve lost one of our better starters. We don’t really have too many of those, so this is a huge blow. Great.
At least Spring Training is right around the corner.
