The Orioles' offense has not exactly been prolific lately. But maybe tonight they will get things going versus struggling Yankee right-hander Phil Hughes.
While the Orioles have pitched well on this homestand - with a team ERA of 3.14 in seven games - the O's are averaging only 3.7 runs per game in the White Sox and Yankees series.
The Orioles have scored four runs or fewer in eight of the last nine and 12 of the last 16 games.
But Hughes is 4-13 on the year with an ERA of 5.11. In his...
Two games. Two blown leads. Two missed chances. Two games the Orioles could have gained on Tampa Bay the last two nights. Two games that could have moved the Orioles into the lead in the chase for the second AL wild card spot.
So frustrating for the team and its fans. The O's just can't get on a roll. Will all the missed chances, blown leads, blown saves and lack of hits with runners in scoring position finally do this team in?
This seems to be the pennant race that they just never fall out...
Moments after the second tough loss to the Yankees in two days, Tommy Hunter talked about the pitch that Robinson Cano hit off him for a tiebreaking homer in the ninth inning.
"I mean, it is always tough to lose," Hunter said. "Always tough to be the guy to give it up. You know, he had to hit it. He did. It's tough to say tip your cap, but sometimes you have to do it.
"I was trying to throw a changeup that he swung and missed and I didn't do that. He didn't miss it."
Hunter came on...
The Orioles held a 4-1 lead in the fifth inning last night and a 3-1 lead starting the fifth tonight, but they didn't win either game against the Yankees.
Robinson Cano led off the ninth with a solo homer to right-center off of Tommy Hunter as the Yankees rallied for a 5-4 win over the Orioles in front of 20,141 at Camden Yards.
Cano hit his 27th homer, the homer was his second RBI of the night and his 100th for the season, as the blast broke a 3-3 tie. The homer followed a bottom of the...
The Orioles six-game home winning streak against the Yankees ended with last night's 7-5 loss, but they will try to start a new one tonight. The win streak was the longest for the O's at home vs. the Yankees since they took 10 in a row at Memorial Stadium from 1981-1983.
The Orioles lead the season series 9-8 with New York with two games to play. The Orioles are 18-13 in their last 31 regular season games against New York.
More notes on the O's:
* Chris Davis had two hits last night,...
Orioles manager Buck Showalter often talks about playing the game 90 feet at a time. But many nights, we see the Orioles lacking in the area of situational hitting.
They've been a little better at that in this series against New York, particularly Monday night, when they had a sacrifice bunt and two sac flies.
It was just the fifth time this season the O's had more than one sacrifice fly in a game.
There was also a key play in that game by J.J. Hardy that helped the Orioles score a run....
When Kevin Gausman came out to pitch the eighth last night, I was totally fine with that. There, I said it. No problem with the kid on the mound with a one-run lead last night.
That is how I felt then and I won't act differently now that he gave up three runs that put New York into the lead.
Buck Showalter said a couple of relievers were not available last night and if he was referring to Tommy Hunter and Darren O'Day, that made Gausman pitching the eighth even more understandable.
Gausman...
After Kevin Gausman retired the Yankees in order in the top of the seventh, getting two strikeouts, he had pitched 10 shutout innings this season with 12 strikeouts against the Yankees.
But they got to him fast an inning later. An Alex Rodriguez double was followed by a Robinson Cano single to tie the game at 4-4. Alfonso Soriano then hit a two-run homer the Yankees had a quick 6-4 lead on the rookie right-hander on their way to a 7-5 win over the Orioles.
"Kind of missed my spot against...
The Orioles finally got to Ivan Nova. But the Yankees got to Kevin Gausman and Francisco Rodriguez.
Down 4-3 heading to the top of the eighth, the Yankees doubled, singled and homered against Gausman to take a two-run lead and beat the Orioles 7-5 at Camden Yards. Gausman had pitched a 1-2-3 seventh but gave up an Alex Rodriguez double, Robinson Cano RBI single and Alfonso Soriano two-run homer as New York quickly scored three to take a 6-4 lead. They added a run off of Francisco Rodriguez on...
Tonight the Orioles try to figure out how to hit Yankees right-hander Ivan Nova. While Nova doesn't have dominant career numbers against the Orioles, he has been dominant in his last two starts against them.
On July 5 Nova pitched a complete game, three-hitter in a 3-2 Yankees win. On Aug. 31 at Camden Yards he pitched a complete-game, three-hit shutout in a 2-0 win. He needed just 102 pitches in the first game and 104 in the second. The Orioles hit .105 (6-for-57) in those two games.
He is...
Nate McLouth admits that in his start against the Orioles about a week and a half ago, Yankees right-hander Ivan Nova dominated the Birds.
He threw a 104-pitch, complete-game, three-hit shutout as the Yankees won 2-0. In the start before that against the Orioles on July 5, Nova pitched a complete-game three-hitter in a 3-2 win.
The 26-year-old Nova has pitched back-to-back complete games against the Orioles with two walks and 16 strikeouts. The O's hit just .105 in those games.
To say the...
Over the last 15 years, the Orioles have not won a season series once against the New York Yankees. They lost 13 times and tied the season series twice - going 9-9 last year against New York and 9-9 in 2007.
That is a lot of losing to the Yankees over the years.
The O's are now 18-12 in their last 30 regular season games against the Yankees, but before that, they went 12-41 over a 53-game stretch. A lot of losing indeed.
But if the O's win just one of the three remaining games in this...
After the game, Nick Markakis was asked what he was thinking when he saw Buck Showalter charge out of the dugout after the last of the first.
"I didn't think it was going to start this early," Markakis said. "But you have two teams battling for the same thing. Any little thing is going to set it off. Two competitive teams out there and things are going to happen but we got a big win and everything worked out good."
Markakis was asked if the win was any sweeter coming against CC Sabathia,...
Orioles third base coach Bobby Dickerson said he had no history of bad feelings with Yankees manager Joe Girardi, who he said was yelling at him tonight almost from the start of the bottom of the first inning.
Dickerson said that was a first for him.
"Never (had that happen to me before)," he said. "Never heard of such a thing.
"I was standing there coaching (third) in the first inning and I started hearing someone yelling at me and I looked in the dugout and Joe was yelling at...
Chris Tillman took the ball in the first inning and control of this game not long after.
The right-hander retired 14 in a row before giving up a leadoff homer in the eighth. He left to a big ovation after that as he pitched the Orioles to a 4-2 win over New York tonight in the series opener before 17,456 at Camden Yards.
Now 16-5 with an ERA of 3.66, Tillman gave up just four hits over seven innings-plus with no walks. His nine strikeouts tied his career high and he threw 110 pitches, 78 for...
Let's get the runners in scoring position stat out of the way first: The Orioles went 0-for-11 yesterday with RISP, 2-for-29 over the last two games, 3-for-37 in the Chicago series and are batting just .109 (7-for-64) over the last seven games with RISP.
Over the last 15 games, the Orioles are batting .174 with RISP and are 7-8 in those games, going 3-6 in the nine games in the stretch decided by two runs or less.
Has to get better, right?
It should come as no surprise when you see those...
To say the least, Danny Valencia is a hot hitter.
Valencia will bat fifth as the DH tonight for the Orioles against CC Sabathia and the Yankees in the opener of a four-game series.
On the year, Valencia is batting .314 with seven homers, 15 RBIs and a .973 OPS in 33 games.
But in his last nine games, he has eight multi-hit games. Even being optioned to the minors couldn't slow him down. His hot hitting began when he went 2-for-4 with a homer Aug. 4 against the Mariners.
Two days later he...
It was an anniversary that Nick Markakis certainly didn't celebrate. One year ago yesterday, his 2012 season ended when he was hit by a pitch from Yankees left-hander CC Sabathia.
Markakis suffered a broken left thumb then and his season was over. Click here to read the story from that night.
There are some Orioles fans that still feel, a year later, that the pitch was intentional, although several Orioles players said they did not feel that way. Either way, it kept Markakis out of the 2012...
The Orioles have 20 games remaining and they are all against AL East opponents with 10 at home and 10 on the road.
They host New York for four beginning tonight and then go on the road to face Toronto, Boston and Tampa before ending the regular season with a six-game homestand against Toronto and Boston.
Adam Jones feels it will be fun.
"I do. Because the teams that are ahead of us are in our division, so I think how we play these next X-amount of games will dictate if we're going home or...
Chris Davis is focusing on the Orioles' pursuit of a playoff berth right now and not thinking too much about how many homers he will hit this year. But for a few moments yesterday, he did take time to talk about chasing Orioles history and the club's single-season home run record.
"It is something that is cool," Davis said. "But our main focus right now is getting into the postseason. Unless those home runs are helping us win games, then they don't really mean a lot."
But team history...