Showalter going for different look with lineup (O's down 5-2)

The Orioles are breaking out another new lineup tonight with a couple of factors in play.

They want to give Trey Mancini his first major league start and are pairing him with Red Sox left-hander Eduardo Rodriguez.

"Run Trey out there and see what he's got," said manager Buck Showalter. "Don't want him to get too far away from at-bats. Anxious to see him get in the flow a little bit."

Mancini had pretty even splits this season at Triple-A Norfolk. He batted .283/.359/.442 in 113 at-bats against left-handers and .278/.346/.422 in 370 at-bats versus right-handers.

"Trey's had a good year. Really, two or three years. Since we signed him he's been very consistent," Showalter said.

"It's the biggest jump in sports from the minor leagues to the big leagues in baseball, so we'll see. There's only one way to find out, right? Good start for him."

Showalter also is looking to spark an offense that's again scuffling to score runs. Similar thinking was applied while batting Chris Davis second for the seventh time in his major league career.

"Obviously, a lot more of that's got to do with how well they pitch," Showalter said. "Same thing with Chris, a little bit different look. Kind of fit in the batting order a little bit better.

"When you've got as good a starting pitching as they run out there, you're really attacking the starter with a batting order as opposed to the bullpen. Until you get guys like (Rick) Porcello out of the game, you're not going to win the game anyway, so the whole left-right-left-right stuff doesn't matter. There are so many neutral and reverse-split guys who are starting nowaways. It's been a big change in the game the last two or three years."

Showalter has separated Davis and Mark Trumbo, putting Manny Machado between them, but he downplayed the motive.

"There are a lot of things that go into it, but very much like Mancini, every once in a while you need to throw a little you know what in the giddy up and try to give a different look. Wake up one morning with a new toy," Showalter said.

"Chris, we've talked about it some. I even thought about leading him off some. And that is a byproduct of it, why I guess it's become some subject matter for, what do they call them, message boards? Something about separating guys. I wish it was that simple, I wish it was that easy.

"There are a lot of people I'd like to separate, but some of them aren't playing baseball."

Good one.

The expanded September rosters aggravate Showalter as teams load up their benches and bullpens and change the way the game is managed and played. However, he's been able to take advantage by having his relievers pass the baton more frequently in shorter bursts.

Tyler Wilson went 1 1/3 innings last night and Vance Worley was used to get the final two outs. Wilson worked only one inning on Sept. 10.

Long relievers no longer asked to cover a significant amount of the game.

"You've got more people to pick from," Showalter said. "We would have needed to make two or three moves in the last week, shuffle people around. There's no place to get them from.

"We're trying to live to fight another day. We were able to stay away from Brad (Brach) and Zach (Britton) and Mychal (Givens) and Donnie Hart last night. We wouldn't have been able to do that in August. We would have paid a penalty for that. We would have made a move and sent Tyler or Vance out after they pitched four or five innings so we had somebody the next day."

Update: Kevin Gausman has been in hot water in each of the first three innings, and he fell behind 1-0 in the third on singles by Mookie Betts and David Ortiz and a fielder's choice bouncer from Hanley Ramirez.

Gausman deflected Ramirez's ball or it might have resulted in a double play. He's at 50 pitches in three innings.

Mancini flied to right field on a 1-0 pitch leading off the bottom of the third. Eduardo Rodriguez has retired the first nine batters.

Update II: Jackie Bradley Jr. homered with one out in the fourth to give Boston a 2-0 lead. Gausman threw 11 pitches in the inning and is up to 61.

The Orioles could use a baserunner or two.

Update III: Mancini broke up Eduardo Rodriguez's no-hitter in the fifth inning with his first major league home run, the ball landing in the visiting bullpen. The Orioles trail 2-1.

According to ESPN Stats & Info, Mancini is the second Oriole in the last 50 seasons to homer in his first game. Jonathan Schoop did it in 2013 versus the Blue Jays.

Update IV: David Ortiz hit a three-run homer off Gausman in the seventh inning and the Orioles got one run back in the bottom half on J.J. Hardy's infield hit that scored Jonathan Schoop. The Orioles are down 5-2 and down to their last three outs.