Bundy leaves tonight's game with right knee soreness

Dylan Bundy began to notice some soreness in his right knee today while long tossing in the outfield and again throughout his bullpen session. He didn't say anything about it until after the first inning. After giving up seven runs and eight hits, throwing 37 pitches and watching someone else work the second.

Bundy received treatment on the knee and the Orioles, coming off an embarrassing 16-4 loss to the Rays at Camden Yards, will evaluate him again Saturday morning while preparing to play a doubleheader.

"My knee's a little sore," Bundy said, "but I just wasn't locating and didn't really have any good movement on my pitches and they came out aggressive and hitting the ball where there's plenty of grass and I couldn't slow them down."

The discomfort never subsided and Bundy was saddled with a season high in runs allowed.

"You're going to have little things like that," he said, "and you just try to go out there and give your team a chance and I wasn't able to stay in the game long enough to do that."

Gabriel Ynoa replaced Bundy after the first inning. Bundy informed manager Brandon Hyde of his condition and the decision was made the pull him from the game.

Asked whether he considered telling Hyde earlier, Bundy replied, "There might have been a slight thought in there, but like I said, you always want to go out there and give your team a chance and hopefully it will get better throughout the game, but it just didn't today."

Bundy described what he's feeling as general soreness. Nothing more specific.

The swelling is in his ERA, which grew from 4.65 to 5.28 after the Rays sent 11 batters to the plate.

"I'm not a doctor. I couldn't tell you what was wrong with it," Bundy said. "So I guess we'll come in tomorrow and see how it feels tomorrow."

Tommy Pham delivered a solo home run off Bundy with one out and the Rays collected four doubles among their eight hits. He also threw a wild pitch and committed a balk.

What was going through Bundy's mind?

"Quit giving up hits. Trying to hit your location better, throw different pitches," he said.

"You're just really trying to do whatever you can to get them to hit the ball right to somebody or get a strikeout."

Ynoa covered the next 5 1/3 innings and was charged with seven earned runs and nine total. Bundy unexpectedly had become an opener.

"He should be OK," Hyde said. "Gabby did a nice job of eating some innings for us in a tough situation.

"We were just checking on him after the first inning. We just wanted to see how he was physically and he said he was a little sore, so we decided to put Gabby in the game."

Hyde said he didn't suspect that Bundy was dealing with a health issue.

"I just felt they were on everything," he said. "No, I didn't know that anything was wrong physically."

The Orioles played one of their worst games as they came out of the break, including two Jonathan Villar errors and poor decisions and execution that allowed batters to reach or take an extra base.

It happened just as Hyde was beginning to feel better about his team's overall performance.

"It's one game," he said. "Obviously really disappointed with how we played. We did not play the game well. There are a lot of things to clean up and just get back to work because that was really sloppy defensively and just poor baseball. So it's one of 162, got a lot of games left and we need to get better."

Just as the good teams are going to do, which increases the challenges awaiting the Orioles.

"It's the way the game goes and a lot of these playoff teams are going to be loading up and improving," Hyde said. "Our job is to improve with the 25 guys that we have here and compete every night and I thought tonight was not our best night obviously and we have a big challenge ahead of us.

"There are a lot of really good teams that have a lot of really good players and we're in our situation. Best thing to do is prepare and coach and try to compete every single night."

Stevie Wilkerson turned out to be the most effective pitcher, retiring the side in order in the ninth on three fly balls while making his debut on the mound. He was the fourth position player to pitch this season.

"Impressed? Big time," Hyde said. "Wilky's got a lot of confidence, so now it's even boosted a little bit higher.

"That's one of the better innings from a position player I've seen actually, a guy able to throw strike after strike and get guys to swing the bat early. He did a nice job there throwing strikes. I'm taking that as a positive tonight."

Renato Núñez had a solo home run and RBI double. He leads the club with 21 home runs and 51 RBIs.

"I'm just happy to be here now," he said. "I'm happy with the results I'm getting now. I'm appreciative of the opportunity the Orioles gave me and I'll keep working and hopefully doing well."

He'll also hope for better results from the club after tonight's performance.

"I think we were playing great," he said. "We were playing much better. What can I say? It's another day and hopefully tomorrow will be a little better than today."