For the Baltimore Orioles and all teams, it begins and ends with starting pitching. Brandon Young replaced Zach Eflin on the roster. Charlie Morton was pushed back to Friday night in Atlanta due to elbow tendinitis, so Young started last night in Texas. Young’s line: 4.0 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 2 BB, 4 K.
It amounted to a bullpen game for the Orioles, whose rancid luck with injuries continued. The fact is that it seems very few key players on the roster have avoided injuries in any capacity this year. Does this mean the training staff needs to do things differently? I’m not a doctor, so I can’t say.
Garcia came up with the bags juiced in the last of the third, and his two-RBI single gave Texas a 2-0 lead. Hein added an RBI-single later in the inning. Sometimes teams use the long ball to get under the Orioles’ skin. And sometimes they piecemeal runners together on base. They all add up.
But the O’s did make a run of things. Gary Sanchez’s two-run home run in the fourth cut the lead to 3-2. However the Birds couldn’t get much going after that. Texas on the other hand, padded their lead.
Osuna’s first big league home run came in the fifth inning, in the form of a two-run shot. Texas would tack on three more later in the game, including one which scored on a wild pitch. Get runners on base, and sometimes things happen.
Keep in mind, the likes of Grayson Rodriguez, Tyler Wells, and Kyle Bradish were supposed to anchor the rotation this year. They’ve yet to pitch an inning due to injuries. Top that off with Eflin among others, and it’s plainly obvious to see why the Orioles’ season has gone the way that it has. Having a next man up mentality is fine. But nobody has equal talent in the minors as they did at the big league level at a certain point.
The Charlie Morton elbow tendinitis thing is also something to watch. There’s no reason to believe he won’t make that start in Atlanta. But it’s something to watch given Morton’s age (41) in a year where if it could go wrong, it has. Or more like if he could get hurt, he did.
Everyone points at Corbin Burnes’ departure as a problem – and make no mistake that it was. But who was out there on his level with whom they could have replaced him? He was going to Arizona unless someone mortgaged the farm to get him given that his family is there. On top of that, he didn’t have the greatest season known to man, this before HE got injured and succumbed to Tommy Johns. Again, injuries can be fickle,
The series concludes this evening at Globe Life Field. Tomoyuki Sugano gets the start for the O’s, and he’ll be opposed by Texas’ Nathan Eovaldi. Game time is set for just after 8 PM,
Birdland Crush 