Orioles Walk It Off Against The Nationals Despite Max Scherzer's Great Start, Orioles Now Have Best Record In Baseball
Max Scherzer held the Orioles without a hit until the bottom of the 6th, that is when Seth Smith went deep to get the O’s on the board. Scherzer had one of his typical nights, 8 IP, 4 H, 2 ER, 11 K, 2 HR. Ubaldo Jimenez was going pitch-for-pitch with Scherzer, the only miscue he had early on was a homer given up to Daniel Murphy. Jimenez cruised into the 8th where he ran into trouble. Anthony Rendon singled, Matt Wieters fisted one into center, and that was all before anyone was up and warming in the pen.
After Jimenez got Chris Heisey to K, Adam Lind came in to pinch hit. Naturally he goes yard to dead center field to bust the game open, 4-1 Nats. Ubaldo gets taken out, and ruined a pretty good start (7 2/3 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 6 K, 2 BB) for him, only his second start of the season to go over 4.1 IP. Probably shouldn’t have been in the game, I would have expected Buck to have a short leash for him in the 8th, but Buck wasn’t quick enough. This was the Ubaldo we have come to know over the last 3 years. 4 bad starts, 1 good, followed by 3 bad ones. He is consistently inconsistent.
O’s got back on the board in the 8th when Adam Jones connected for his 5th homer of the year, causing Dusty Baker to come out to the mound. I thought he was taking out Scherzer, but Max wasn’t having that as you can see below. Guy is a god damn psycho, just chill out, man.
O’s went into the bottom of the ninth down 4-2. Nats and their lovely bullpen brought out Enny Romero, the big old lefty. He proceeded to walk Chris Davis, Trumbo pops up to right center, but Brian Goodwin and Bryce Harper had a miscommunication causing the ball to drop, Goodwin throws out Davis at second. Not sure why Davis didn’t slide into the bag? He probably would have been safe. Trey Mancini flies out to center, and then Romero balks the next at-bat with Schoop at-bat. Schoop lines a double to the wall with 2 outs in the ninth and Trumbo comes around to score. Could have been a tied game if Davis slides, but oh well. JJ Hardy is the last hope, down a run with 2 outs. Naturally he gets a worm killer by Daniel Murphy and pinch runner, Craig Gentry comes around the tie it up, 4-4.
Washington goes down quietly in the top of the 10th against Logan Merrett and Seth Smith leads off the top of the 10th with a single. Fatt Albers relieves Romero, and Adam Jones decided to bunt, unfortunately right back to Albers, 1 down. Machado hits a hard hit grounder to Rendon who solves it to Wilmer Difo. Difo can’t hold onto the ball, and Rickard, pinch running for Smith, is safe at second. O’s have first and second with 1 down. But then Chris Davis and Mark Trumbo have 2 of the worst at-bats I’ve ever seen, Davis Ks, and Trumbo pops up. Top of the 11th and the Nationals go down in order. O’s have Flaherty ground out, Gentry K on 3 pitches. Hardy lines a double with 2 outs with Joseph at the dish. Joseph singled on a line drive to Harper, and for some god damn reason, Hardy is sent from second. Harper guns out Hardy at home, because why wouldn’t he? It’s Bryce Harper against the slowest person on the east coast?
Seriously, Harper makes that throw 9 times out of 10. Terrible decision to send him IMO. Nats ended the 12th on a terrible base running blunder by Goodwin who took off on the hit and run, Trea Turner lined to Craig Gentry, and Goodwin was already around second. Inning ends as Flaherty tosses the ball to Davis to double him up.
With 1 out in the bottom of the 12th, Jones singles to right, Manny singled to center and Jones with a great heads up play, makes it to third. Davis is put on intentionally, to bring up Trumbo with 1 down and the bases juiced. Mark comes through and delivers the walk off, keeping the MASN Cup in Baltimore yet again. Nationals haven’t won a season series against the Orioles since 2007. Not too shabby for the Orioles and their “rivals”. Typical Orioles game, thinking you’re gonna get no-hit one minute, and a few innings later, they’re walking it off. Logan Verrett had a great 3 innings tonight, limiting this dangerous lineup to only 2 hits in his appearance and picking up the win.
O’s win their 6th straight, head into the 2 game series in DC with the best record in the MLB at 22-10, and the best home record at 13-3. Wade Miley vs Stephen Strasburg tonight, and Dylan Bundy goes for the Orioles on Thursday.
I will say I questioned Buck a few times tonight, mostly with trotting out Ubaldo for the 8th, but my biggest question was the one to put Harper on intentionally, bringing up the hottest hitter of this short season, Ryan Zimmerman. It ended up working out, as Zim eventually grounded out, and it always seems to work like that with Buck, we question him, and more times than not, it works in his favor.
Yankees are playing over their head, while the Red Sox are underachieving right now. Meanwhile, the Orioles are playing unreal baseball with the best closer in baseball sidelined for 45-60 days, Trumbo not hitting, Davis not hitting, Tillman still not 100%, Gausman not performing well, and having Ubaldo Jimenez in their rotation. Time to give these guys credit for playing some damn good baseball.
@BarstoolRDT