O's game blog: Looking for a series win at Detroit

After winning back-to-back games behind strong starting pitching at Detroit, the Orioles have secured at least a split of the four-game series. Now they look for one more victory and to win their third series in five tries since the All-Star break.

Behind right-hander Matt Harvey Friday and lefty John Means last night, the Orioles beat Detroit 4-3 and 5-2. Means and Harvey allowed just one run over 12 combined innings. The Orioles are finally getting some deeper and better outings from their starters. Over the last 12 games their starters have gone six innings or more six times. They did that just 16 times in the first 91 games.

The O's have 20 quality starts on the year, and five have come over those 12 games with three by Harvey, one by Means and one by Spenser Watkins, today's starter for Baltimore.

The O's rotation ERA was 6.11 at the All-Star break. It is now 4.82 in the second half and 3.55 over the past 12 games, and the Orioles are 8-4 in those games. In the games since the All-Star break when the O's got a six-inning outing, they are 6-0.

Watkins (2-1, 3.10 ERA) will make his fifth start for the club today. The team is 2-2 in the first four. In his first three games as a starter, he pitched to a 1.76 ERA and over 15 1/3 innings allowed 11 hits and three runs. In his last start versus Miami, Watkins gave up nine hits and four runs over four innings, throwing 87 pitches.

Today he is facing the team that drafted him in the 30th round in 2014 out of Western Oregon University. From 2014 through 2019 he pitched on the Detroit farm, throwing 589 2/3 innings for the Tigers organization. He went 41-27 with a 3.88 ERA in 96 starts (116 games) for Tiger affiliates.

The Orioles (37-66) last night won for the sixth time in the last eight games since the beginning of their last homestand. They are now 9-5 since the break and they finished July going 10-12.

Maikel Franco hit a solo homer last night, No. 11. The Orioles have hit two or more homers in seven of their last nine games, hitting 17 total homers in that span.

When Detroit beat the Orioles Thursday night in the series opener, they ran their current home winning streak to 10 in a row, but now they've lost back-to-back at Comerica Park. The Tigers (50-57) are now 10-6 since the All-Star break and 21-15 since June 19.

The Tigers finished the month of July with a 14-12 record, their third consecutive winning month, the first time they have had three straight months with a winning record since June-August 2016. As a team, Detroit hit .264/.329/.445 during the month, while the pitching staff posted a 4.76 ERA.

Future Hall of Famer Miguel Cabrera went 1-for-4 in last night's game to extend his hitting streak to seven games, tying his season long. With that hit, Cabrera now has 2,942 in his career, and is one shy of tying Frank Robinson for 36th place in major league history. Cabrera is 6-for-10 in this series with two homers and three RBIs.

O's center fielder Cedric Mullins has hit safely in 10 straight games, the second-longest active hitting streak in the AL behind Whit Merrifield of Kansas City at 11 in a row. It's his third streak of at least 10 games this season (11 straight from both April 2-13 and from May 5-18). His 125 hits lead the AL and are tied for the second-most in the majors and Mullins' .321 batting average ranks third in the AL and fifth in the majors.