O's rally from seven runs down comes up short as Tigers take series opener

After allowing just seven runs during a five-game win streak, tonight the Orioles trailed by seven in the fourth inning. That was too big of a hole to completely climb out of tonight. They almost did though. The Orioles rallied before losing 9-8 to the Detroit Tigers in front of 30,136 at Camden Yards.

Coming into tonight, O's starters had gone 4-0 with a 1.25 ERA and five quality start the last six games. But Miguel Gonzalez just did not have it tonight.

He allowed seven hits to the first nine batters he faced and lasted just 3 1/3 innings. It was his shortest outing of the season. Gonzalez allowed 10 hits and five runs on 66 pitches to fall to 9-7 with an ERA of 4.28. In seven starts since returning from the disabled list in late June, Gonzalez has an ERA of 6.19. His ERA was 3.33 before the DL stint.

The subject of trade rumors, Detroit's Yoenis Cespedes homered and drove in three runs. J.D. Martinez added two doubles and three RBIs for the Tigers, who are 50-52.

Trailing 7-0 after the top of the fourth, the Orioles got a two-run homer from Adam Jones in the bottom of that frame to cut it to 7-2. Jones hit his 16th of the year. It was also the 182nd of his Orioles career, to tie Ken Singleton for seventh on the club's all-time homers list.

Detroit added two runs in the sixth for a 9-2 lead before a Chris Davis two-run shot in the sixth cut the margin to 9-4. It was No. 25 for Davis and his 83rd at Camden Yards. That ranks sixth all-time in ballpark history. Over his last nine games, Davis has six homers and 16 RBIs. Over the last three games he has three homers and nine RBIs.

The rally was on in the seventh when the Orioles added three runs off three pitchers to trail 9-7. Davis added a two-run single for a four-RBI night. He has 69 RBIs on the year. A Matt Wieters pinch-hit single made it a 9-7 game. The Orioles closed to within 9-8 on Manny Machado's RBI groundout in the eighth. But they could not get the tying run in and fell to 13-17 in one-run games.

On the day the Tigers traded their closer Joakim Soria, Alex Wilson got the final five outs for the Tigers to record his first career save. He allowed a two-out single in the ninth to Wieters, but got J.J. Hardy to ground out to end it.

But the rally came up short as the Orioles fell to 51-50 for the season and to 30-19 at home.

In the second game of this four-game series on Friday night, Wei-Yin Chen (5-6, 2.88 ERA) faces right-hander Buck Farmer (0-2, 9.22 ERA).