Guthrie golden again as O's shutout Tampa, 5-0

Despite facing the club with the second-best record in the Majors tonight, the O's good pitching continued and so did the winning. Jeremy Guthrie and two relievers teamed on a three-hitter in a 5-0 blanking of the Rays in St. Petersburg. It's the O's second shutout of the year. The Orioles are now 9-2 since Buck Showalter took over as manager, their best 11-game stretch since April of 2005. Guthrie gave up just two hits over six scoreless frames and one of those was a triple to left where Felix Pie fell down in the sixth. Guthrie walked four, fanned three and threw 102 pitches. He is now 7-11, 3.88. Over his last six starts, Guthrie is 4-1, 1.51. O's starters have now recorded 10 quality starts over the last 11 games, pitching to an ERA of just 2.26 in that stretch. Koji Uehara gave up just one hit in pitching the 7th and 8th innings and Mike Gonzalez pitched a scoreless 9th to wrapup the shutout. The Orioles took a 3-0 lead in the top of the first. With two out and none on, Ty Wigginton blooped a single to right and went to second on Luke Scott's single. Both then scored on an Adam Jones triple to right and Felix Pie plated Jones with a double to right as Tampa starter James Shields threw 34 pitches in the inning. Cesar Izturis led off the fourth with a double and scored on Josh Bell's single to left. It was his 4th RBI with the O's. With two outs and none on in the seventh, Scott hit a booming homer to right to make it 5-0. It was his 22nd of the year. It was Scott's 5th homer in the last 11 games and his 10th in the past 23 games. The O's entered this series with a record of 2-7 vs. Tampa this year and 10-35 vs. AL East opponents. The Rays, who began the night two games out of first in the AL East, had won 14 of their past 18 home games before this loss. Tampa has now lost seven of its last nine games and falls to 69-46 on the season. The Orioles improved to 3-1 on this road trip and 41-75 on the year. On Saturday at 4:10 p.m., Brian Matusz (4-11, 5.08) pitches vs. Andy Sonnanstine (2-1, 3.98). That game will be televised on the Fox network.