O's game blog: Tillman on the mound in series opener against Tampa Bay

After starting the season with 19 straight games against American League East opponents, the Orioles played one non-division game this week against Chicago. Tonight, they get right back into playing AL East teams.

They open a series at Tropicana Field tonight where they will play three games this weekend serving as the home team. It begins a stretch where they'll play 10 of the next 12 games versus the AL East.

Tampa Bay is 12-10 and has won six of its last eight games. But the Rays just lost two of three against the Yankees in New York, scoring only six total runs in the three games and going just 3-for-27 with runners in scoring position. The Rays have scored two runs or less nine times already.

Tampa Bay is 1-2 against the Orioles this year, 2-7 combined against the O's and Yankees and 10-3 versus everyone else.

The Rays just completed their first winning April since 2012 (15-8) and just the fifth in their 18-year history. They did it with 10 rookies on the roster and with a major league-high 13 players on the disabled list.

The Orioles have put together a three-game winning streak that's taken five days. They outscored Boston and Chicago 31-13 in the three wins that leave them at 10-10.

The offense has been very good lately, with the O's scoring 26 runs the last two games, 42 runs in the past five and 59 runs over the last nine games. The Birds have scored six runs or more in half of their games, doing so 10 times.

The Orioles have four straight games with 10 hits or more batting .351 in that stretch including a batting average of .404 (19-for-47) with RISP.

The Orioles are averaging a major league leading 5.6 runs per game. They'll face a Rays staff this weekend that has a team ERA of 3.70 to rank fifth-best in the AL.

On the mound tonight, Chris Tillman (2-2, 7.58 ERA) faces 26-year-old rookie right-hander Alex Colome (0-0, 0.00 ERA) who is making his 2015 major league debut.

Colome is being activated off the DL today after missing the start of the year due to both visa problems and pneumonia. In four rehab starts in the minors, he went 1-1 with a 2.35 ERA. Ranked by Baseball America as the Rays' No. 1 pitching propsect and No. 4 overall, he has a streak of 17 2/3 consecutive scoreless innings as a starter dating to last year. In six career starts, Colome is 3-1 with a 1.30 ERA.

Tillman got the win at the Trop on opening day, allowing one run and four hits over 6 2/3 innings. He is 5-6 with a 3.87 ERA in 15 career starts against Tampa Bay. Tillman has made four starts this year. In the two against Tampa and Boston he allowed just two runs over 12 innings. In two against Toronto he has given up 14 runs over seven innings.

O's starters went six innings or more just four times in the first 16 games and now they've done it four times in a row. The starters ERA in those first 16 games was 5.82. Over the past four games, it is 2.93.