O's game blog: Looking for a win in a rubber match game in Houston

Looking for their first series win since April 22-24, the Orioles will try to win one today in an unlikely place to do so. Houston has not lost a series this season at Minute Maid Park and, at 23-9, has the best home record in the league.

But today the O's will look for back-to-back wins there. If they get that, they'll snap both their 0-11-1 run in series play and Houston's 9-0-1 winning series run. Houston is 7-0-2 in home series in 2019.

On the mound today, right-hander Dylan Bundy (3-6, 4.64 ERA) will make his 13th start. In six starts through April, Bundy was 0-4 with a 6.67 ERA. Since May 1, he is 3-2 with a 3.03 ERA in six games while allowing five homers. Bundy has allowed three earned runs or fewer in six straight and eight of his past nine starts.

Bundy allows a batting average of .208 and OPS of .665 when facing a team the first time through the batting order. Those numbers are .267/.920 the second time and .255/.837 the third time through. Bundy has allowed two homers or more four times in 2019, but just once in the last six games.

Former Orioles lefty Wade Miley (5-3, 3.39 ERA) will get the start today for Houston. Miley, who has seven quality starts in 13 outings, is 1-1 with a 3.13 ERA over his past four games.

In six home starts, he is 3-1 with a 2.23 ERA and 0.963 WHIP. The Astros are 9-4 in his starts. Lefty batters hit .194 off him with an OPS of .557, and right-handers bat .248/.736.

Miley has pitched much better since he left the Orioles. Over the 2016-17 seasons he went 10-20 with a 5.75 ERA and 1.689 WHIP in 43 starts with Baltimore.

Houston has called up one of its best prospects for today's game and he's batting fifth this afternoon as the DH. That is 21-year-old power hitting lefty batter Yordan Alvarez. He is ranked as Houston's No. 3 prospect overall and No. 23 in the current top 100 by MLBPipeline.com. In 56 games at Triple, Alvarez was batting .343/.443/.742 with 16 doubles, 23 homers, 71 RBIs and an OPS of 1.184. He will help an Astros lineup missing Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa and George Springer right now.

The Single-A Delmarva Shorebirds, who at 46-15, maintain the best record in all of minor league baseball, can clinch a playoff berth today. The Shorebirds magic number to win their first-half division title is two. It would be Delmarva's first playoff berth since 2005.