Cashner offers more quality, Davis breaks tie in 6-3 win (with quotes)

Andrew Cashner has been sneaky good.

It's easy to get overlooked on a team with 84 losses and the worst record in baseball, but Cashner posted his sixth quality start tonight in his past nine outings. He's allowed two earned runs or fewer in five of his last seven starts and three or fewer in 10 of 12, including the rain game in D.C. that forced his exit after four scoreless innings.

The time has passed for the Orioles to jump into a pennant race or Cashner to enter the Cy Young picture, but give the man his due.

Cashner was scored upon in only one of his seven innings tonight, Chris Davis broke a tie with a long home run in the seventh and the Orioles beat the Mets for the third time in three tries 6-3 before an announced crowd of 20,527 at Camden Yards.

The Orioles are 36-84 overall and 21-39 at home. They've held the Mets to four runs in 27 innings this season, including their two-game sweep at Citi Field.

Mychal Givens was warming in the bottom of the eighth after Paul Fry retired the side in order, but Tim Beckham eliminated the save opportunity with a two-run homer off Paul Sewald. Miguel Castro revived it by giving up a leadoff triple to Brandon Nimmo in the ninth and committing a throwing error on Todd Frazier's infield hit.

Givens recorded his fourth save and is the undisputed closer with Zach Britton and Brad Brach gone.

Davis launched a changeup from Bobby Wahl an estimated 424 feet to center field, according to Statcast. He was 0-for-12 with eight strikeouts in the last three games before notching his 15th home of the season. He also singled in the eighth.

Renato Núñez provided an insurance run later in the seventh with a single on a ball that deflected off Frazier's glove and scored Caleb Joseph.

I think Donny Osmond said it best, despite the grammatical flub, when he sang, "One bad apple don't spoil the whole bunch, girl." The theory also can apply to games.

(And that, my friends, is my first and last Osmonds reference on this blog.)

The Mets exceeded their Flushing total in the fifth inning by scoring twice to take a 2-1 lead. Both runs came with two outs on RBI singles by Kevin Plawecki and Amed Rosario.

Cashner threw 32 pitches in the inning and was hurt by his leadoff walk to Nimmo and two-out walk to Jose Bautista after a double play. He came back with a 12-pitch sixth inning, leaving his total at 92, and stranded a runner in the seventh as Fry warmed in the bullpen.

Kept on the mound for 105 pitches, Cashner was charged with two runs and five hits over seven innings. He walked three batters and struck out three.

Left-hander Jason Vargas has been hot garbage since signing his two-year, $16 million deal with the Mets, going 2-8 with an 8.75 ERA and 1.838 WHIP in 12 starts and twice landing on the disabled list, but he held the Orioles to one run through five innings before Adam Jones hit a game-tying home run in the sixth.

Jones lined a changeup into the left field seats for his 13th home run.

Tonight marked the 43rd time that Jones and Davis homered in the same game, the most in the majors among active teammates. The Angels' Albert Pujols and Mike Trout are second with 40.

Mark Trumbo broke a scoreless tie with a sacrifice fly in the fourth inning after Núñez's one-out walk and Jones' double to left-center field.

Cashner retired the first 10 batters he faced. His first time through the order, he recorded two called third strikes and induced six fly balls, including four in a row to Jones.

Jeff McNeil ended the mild flirtation with perfection by reaching on a ground ball up the first base line that ricocheted off the bag and over Davis' head.

Tonight's effort provided Cashner with his fourth victory of the season, with the last two coming in Baltimore.

One bad inning didn't spoil an outing. Two swings from Jones and Davis ended a losing streak at five games and made the Orioles 9-6 against teams from New York.

Manager Buck Showalter on Cashner: "You can talk about a lot of things about the game, but it starts with the outing that Andrew had. He was solid. You could tell he was carrying good stuff in the first inning. Really attacking the bottom of the zone. I think he kind of set the tone in the first inning. I know he's frustrated with that one inning, but he got a big out the last out he got. That was toward the end of his outing. Of course, Andrew wanted to go back out there.

"I thought Paulie gave us a good, solid inning. What a job by Mike there. Some tack-on runs, some things we haven't been doing. Gave us some cushion there."

Showalter on what it takes to get Davis going: "I don't put a number (on it). Like we said before the game today, Chris is a guy that can get going and really do a lot of damage for a club for an extended period of time. I thought he had some good at-bats leading up to the home run. And it's funny, you had the softer, not softer, but less velocity guy who's a reverse splits in Vargas and he lined out to right field. And then the guy that was throwing harder, he turned him around.

"I think Chris will probably go home as happy with the single to center field as anything. Chris will tell you he'd like to have nights like this the rest of the way. And that's what he strives for. But you know how hard that is for anybody, especially a guy who can get real hot and do things like he did tonight."

Showalter on other contributors and Castro: "I thought Caleb was good behind the plate, solid. Jonathan (Villar) made a couple of nice plays in the field. I think Miguel had some frustrating outings for him, but I'll tell you, Mike came in and that's about as good as you can change the momentum of a game. He came in in attack mode and got the job done."

Cashner on outing: "I thought I went more four-seam heavy than I have in the past and thought I had good velo to kind of start the game. I think over the last month I've really been changing speeds with my sinker and getting into my arm slot and I think it's had a lot of run. I just continue to keep working on my slider."