O's outlasted Boston for another AL East series win

Once they pulled ahead to lead 5-2 in the third inning, the Orioles never trailed again on Saturday. It just felt like they did. Or that they were about to.

They gave up 23 hits and gave up three runs or more in three different innings, but when an exhausting day of baseball was over they had a 13-12 win over Boston at Fenway Park.

The Orioles have a 90-win season and now could finish 10-11 in their remaining regular season games and have a 100-win season.

They sure didn't win this game because of their pitching.

But their surging offense has now scored 34 runs the last three games, 60 in the past seven and 141 over the last 20 games.

They have won seven in a row on this road trip after losing the trip opener at Arizona. They have won those games by a 60-32 score.

They hold a four-game lead atop the division as they look for a sweep today.

The O's have now gone 12 straight American League East series without losing one, going 10-0-2 in those 12. They are 12-4 in winning their past five division series, counting this one, and 26-11 in those last 12 series.

Webb discovers changeup again: The Orioles claimed right-hander Jacob Webb on waivers from the Los Angeles Angels on Aug. 7. The club activated him two days later and since that date, Webb has pitched in 17 of 28 O’s games.

He has been really good until he, among other pitchers, struggled Saturday, allowing three runs while getting just two outs.

He’s been busy. And until that Saturday outing, he had a 1.93 ERA in 16 games for Baltimore and had thrown scoreless outings 14 times. Webb has quickly earned the confidence of his new manager, Brandon Hyde.

“That is great,” Webb said in Anaheim. “Anytime a manger has trust in you, that is a great feeling.”

Said Hyde: “I love Webb’s makeup. He is a bulldog and wants to be out there, wants to compete. Unbelievably competitive. Webby throws mid-90s (mph), good slider and good changeup he can get lefties out with. And his numbers were pretty good before he got here. But he’s been absolutely excellent.”

Webb has thrown his changeup more with the Orioles after almost scrapping the pitch toward the end of his time with the Angels.

In his last four games with Los Angeles, he used the pitch just 11.5 percent. In his last two O’s games before yesterday, 12 of his 26 pitches have been changeups.

“At the beginning with the Angels I was throwing it quite often,” he said. “For a little bit there, it kind of disappeared on me. But just getting the confidence back and throwing it more is the biggest thing. When you don’t throw it enough, you lose some confidence and trust in the pitch. But getting the confidence back now.”

He said the Angels staff was almost discouraging him from throwing the pitch, but when he got to the Orioles he was told to show it more.

“It was more so, 'We want you to have all three (pitches). We want you to use all three of your pitches,'” said Webb, who throws a four-seam fastball, sweeper and the changeup.

Rodriguez’s workload: He is pitching so well it can be easy to forget that right-hander Grayson Rodriguez has blown by his season innings total of 2022, a year when he missed time with a lat injury.

Rodriguez pitched 75 2/3 innings last year, all in the minor leagues. In 2023, between Triple-A and Baltimore he is now at 140 1/3 innings. That is 64 2/3 more already, with more regular season starts and the playoffs to come.

Despite that overage, Rodriguez is 3-1 with a 2.85 ERA in nine starts since returning July 17 from his minor league reset. He keeps throwing in the high 90s late in his starts, so he is showing no signs of a heavier 2023 innings load to this point.

Hyde said recently that the right-hander benefitted from the move to a six-man rotation and that the club is keeping close tabs on his arm and his innings. 

“We do a lot of work, post-starts, on what their stuff looked like and the analytics of it. But also the eye test,” said Hyde. “When Grayson is throwing 98, 99 in the fifth and sixth innings (as he was Monday at Anaheim), you feel good about that. He’s a strong guy. We are monitoring him very closely, but we need him also.

“You know there was a decision (Monday night) to send him out at 90 pitches (for the seventh inning). At first, he was going to go back out, and then we scored some runs and decided to go with Webb there. And felt good about that, because maybe I knocked an inning off and we got the win.

“You know it is on my mind all the time, but trying to handle it the best we can.”