LOS ANGELES – The Orioles are slowly getting healthier and manager Brandon Hyde would say “knock on wood” when you mention that. His team currently has 12 players on the injured list. 

Righty reliever Jacob Webb is reporting to Triple-A Norfolk to soon throw for the Tides. Perhaps as soon as early next week, the O’s could get a key piece in their bullpen back. Meanwhile, starter Zach Eflin is eligible to return from the injured list on Sunday and Hyde today confirmed what Eflin earlier told reporters – he will not need a rehab assignment. Perhaps he gets that Sunday start in Colorado.

Eflin and right-hander Grayson Rodriguez (on the IL with right lat discomfort) both did some light tossing pregame today in the Dodger Stadium outfield.

As for Webb, he last pitched on Aug. 2 and went on the IL a few days later due to right shoulder inflammation.

“He’s going to throw here in the next few days,” Hyde said of Webb, who has a 3.08 ERA and .188 batting average against over 53 games. “If all goes well, could be anytime. Sometime beginning of September. Which would be huge.”

LOS ANGELES – Center fielder Cedric Mullins is back in the Orioles lineup tonight as they begin their road trip against the Dodgers.

Mullins left Friday's game early with left quad tightness and missed the last two games of the Houston series. He took batting practice before Sunday's game and will make the start tonight.

Ryan O'Hearn, who has not homered since July 20, gets the start at first base after Ryan Mountcastle went on the injured list Monday with a left wrist sprain.

With 30 games left in their regular season, the Orioles have three road trips remaining, the first beginning with their series-opener tonight at Dodger Stadium.

The Dodgers (78-53) have the best record in the major leagues and are 12-4 in their past 16 games. 

The Orioles are laboring on offense, hurting for healthy starting pitching and unable to fully trust their bullpen. Otherwise, there’s nothing to see here.

They’re also only two games behind in the division and are first in the wild card chase.

I say “only” knowing that it’s a genuine concern compared to leading the pack, which they’ve done for much of the season. But no one is running away with a division. No one is playing .600 ball. There isn't a dominant team.

The Dodgers are the closest at .595 and are 43-23 at home, and the Orioles arrived yesterday for a three-game series beginning tonight. But otherwise, really, there’s nothing to see here.

There are questions in the mailbag that I cannot ignore. Time again to drum up a sequel to the beloved 2008 original. You ask, I attempt to answer, sometimes the same inquiry comes as if I’m typing in invisible ink, sometimes I playfully ridicule.

The Orioles can’t keep playing with a short bench. They can’t keep waiting for Ryan Mountcastle’s status to shift from day-to-day.

They also can't maintain a healthy stretch in 2024.

Mountcastle was placed on the 10-day injured list this afternoon, retroactive to Friday, with a left wrist sprain. Infielder Livan Soto was recalled again from Triple-A Norfolk.

The injury occurred Thursday night against the Astros after Mountcastle slid head-first into second base with a double in the second inning. He was removed in the top of the ninth and didn’t play in the next three games.

The earliest that Mountcastle can return is Sept. 2, a day after rosters expand to 28 players.

The trade that brought Eloy Jiménez to the Orioles was celebrated in some Chicago circles. Always injured, not hitting, clogging a roster spot and some payroll space. And the cost for the Orioles was Triple-A left-handed reliever Trey McGough, who never cracked a prospect top 30 list.

“We hope we can get Eloy on a heater,” executive vice president/general manager Mike Elias said that night on the MASN broadcast.

Since he left the Windy City, you could warm your hands over Jiménez, who slashed .240/.297/.345 in 65 games with the White Sox and began last night 16-for-52 (.308) in 17 games with the Orioles. He had their first hit with a leadoff single in the fifth inning.

What gives?

“I think everybody just kind of elevates when they’re around good players,” said Orioles offensive strategy coach Cody Asche. “That’s not to say that Chicago doesn’t have good players, but I think we’ve got really good players. We’ve got a lot of good guys with impeccable work ethics, preparation, so I think he’s just been able to kind of follow the lead of guys like Ced (Mullins), Gunn (Gunnar Henderson), Tony (Santander).

A team has only so many dramatic comebacks in the bank. Expecting three in a row seems a bit unreasonable, a tall order that can’t always be scaled. Maybe spread them out a little.

Make a baseball life a little easier while fighting to get back into first place.

Dean Kremer ran into two-out trouble in the fourth inning tonight, surrendering three runs and receiving no offensive support except for a walk. No hits or rallies. Nothing unusual for this team.

Ramón Urías tied the game in the fifth inning with a three-run homer, the uprising a tad earlier than usual, but Alex Bregman and Yanier Diaz went back-to-back on consecutive Burch Smith pitches in the seventh in the Astros’ 6-3 victory over the Orioles before an announced crowd of 21,654 at Camden Yards that split the series.

The heroics ran out for the Orioles, who were held to a season-low two hits and are 76-56.

Samuel Basallo on up to Triple-A. The Orioles' top 100 catching prospect is being promoted to Norfolk after homering for Bowie today in his final game with the Double-A Baysox.

Basallo is ranked as the No. 11 prospect in baseball per MLBPipeline.com and No. 17 by Baseball America. He’s had a very solid year at Double-A that included an appearance in the All-Star Futures Game in July in Arington, Tex.

Now, in just his second year of full-season minor league ball, he is moving up again. He began last year at Low-A Delmarva, moved to High-A Aberdeen and ended 2023 with Bowie, hitting 20 homers with an OPS of .953 for those clubs. This year he takes the step from Double-A to Triple-A having turned 20 just 12 days ago.

In 106 Bowie games, Basallo has hit .289/.355/.465/.820 with 22 doubles, 16 homers and 55 RBIs. Basallo began this season as a DH-only with the Orioles in big league camp after suffering a stress fracture in his right elbow over the winter. He’s been catching since early this season. He has made 45 starts this season catching with a 27 percent caught stealing percentage, 27 starts at first base and 29 as DH.

He became the 14^th Baysox player selected to play in the Futures Game, where he batted fourth for the American League team, going 0-for-1 with a walk.

Triple-A Norfolk outfielder Daniel Johnson is on the Orioles’ 24-hour taxi squad while center fielder Cedric Mullins is reevaluated for left quadriceps tightness.

Mullins exited Friday's game due to discomfort and so far he's avoided the injured list. Johnson was removed from Norfolk’s game after two at-bats that night, and he’s got a locker at Camden Yards in case Mullins’ quad doesn’t improve enough to let him play.

Johnson, also a left-handed bat, is hitting .267/.333/.479 with 17 doubles, a triple, 20 home runs and 70 RBIs in 98 games with Norfolk. He hasn’t played in the majors since 2021 with Cleveland.

The Orioles would need to make a corresponding 40-man roster move to accommodate him.

“A lot of at-bats,” Johnson said when asked to explain his success with the Tides. “Get a lot of at-bats, you can do a lot every single day. So just the ABs. It’s an opportunity.”

The Orioles designated left-hander Nick Vespi for assignment this afternoon after optioning him for a fifth time, and they claimed right-hander Brooks Kriske on waivers from the Reds.

Kriske was optioned to Triple-A Norfolk to leave the active roster untouched. The 40-man remains full.

Vespi couldn’t be optioned again without passing through waivers. He tossed a scoreless inning Thursday against the Astros.

Kriske provides more flexibility, and he’s back in the organization after appearing in four games with the Orioles in 2021 and allowing five runs in 3 2/3 innings. He hasn’t pitched in the majors since 2023 with the Royals, spending the next two years in Japan.

The Reds signed Kriske as a free agent in December. He had a 3.10 ERA in 42 games with Triple-A Louisville and struck out 72 batters in 49 1/3 innings.

Anthony Santander didn’t save the Orioles season.

So why does it feel that way?

They were on the verge of falling 2 ½ games behind the first-place Yankees, with zero momentum or offensive thrust. The bullpen was a mess, whether middle, late or closing. Teams in the wild card chase were gaining ground.

I don't recommend panicking but I would have understood.

The Orioles loaded the bases with no outs in the eighth inning Friday night on a couple of singles and a brain cramp from Astros reliever Bryan Abreu, who fielded a comebacker and bypassed the force at second base or easy out at first. Up stepped Santander, who whipped a crowd of almost 40,000 into an absolute, playoff-feel frenzy with his fourth career grand slam to erase a 5-2 deficit.

For the second game in a row, the contest was moving to the later innings. The O’s offense had been very quiet but the Orioles loaded the bases in the sixth down 2-0 looking for that one big swing.

They got it again today.

Jackson Holliday’s pinch-hit, bases-clearing double turned a 2-0 deficit into a 3-2 lead today in the last of the sixth. Another big Camden Yards crowd was roaring as the kid ended an 0-for-20 slump in a huge way.

Holliday attacked the first pitch from reliever Tayler Scott, who entered the game with a 1.92 ERA, an OPS against of .543 and a batting average against of .196 when pitching with runners in scoring position.

But Holliday lined Scott's splitter into the gap in right-center at 105.9 mph off the bat to score three for the lead.

Riding the high of Friday's comeback win over Houston, the Orioles (75-55) host the Astros (69-59) today in the third game of the four-game series at Oriole Park.

After being shut out 6-0 on three hits in the series opener Thursday, the O's were down 5-2 when they batted in the eighth inning last night. Anthony Santander hit his 38th homer, a go-ahead grand slam that produced a 6-5 lead and eventual 7-5 win.

When Santander produced the slam, at that point the Orioles had been 2-for-31 with runners in scoring position the last seven games. 

The Orioles snapped a five-game losing streak versus Houston after going 0-4 against the Astros this year. Houston had won nine in a row on the road. 

Today the Baltimore batters have a real challenge in facing lefty Framber Valdez (13-5, 3.20 ERA). He finished 11th in the American League Cy Young Award voting in 2020, fifth in 2022 and ninth last year.

The bond between outfielder Nick Markakis and hitting coach Terry Crowley really began to develop early in the 2006 season.

The former Orioles first-round draft pick was struggling as a rookie. Talk of sending him back to the minors grew louder. Few, if any, signs existed that he’d eventually receive votes for Rookie of the Year.

“The first month and a half I did not feel solidified. That’s when I started working with Crow,” Markakis said yesterday after the Orioles Hall of Fame luncheon.

“We basically started from the bottom. Get a good foundation, get the basics out of the way.”

Crowley had a knack for making a player feel relaxed, to keep the instruction and advice from becoming too complicated or cumbersome.

The Orioles were six outs away from losing more ground in the American League East.

Anthony Santander made it shake at Camden Yards.

Santander hit a grand slam off Astros reliever Bryan Abreu in the eighth inning to give the Orioles a thrilling 7-5 win before an announced Gunnar Henderson bobblehead crowd of 39,578.

Santander’s 38^th home run followed singles by Colton Cowser and Adley Rutschman and a comebacker from Henderson that enticed Abreu to try for the out at third base.

Cowser was safe, the crowd stayed on its feet and Santander sent it into a frenzy with his fourth career slam and second this year.

Oriole first baseman Ryan Mountcastle could play later tonight depending on how he reacts to treatments on his sore wrist.

Mountcastle was removed from last night’s game in the top of the ninth inning. Ryan O’Hearn switched from right field to first base and Austin Slater batted in Mountcastle’s spot in the bottom of the ninth.

Manager Brandon Hyde said afterward that the wrist gradually became more sore after Mountcastle’s slide into second base on a double in the second inning – one of only three hits for the Orioles.

“He’s better today, it’s a little better,” Hyde said. “He’s getting treatment right now. He’s going to get treatment up until game time, so we’ll see if he’s available or not. It got pretty sore as the game went on last night but it’s a little bit better today.”

The offense needs a boost. Mountcastle hasn’t homered since July 29 and he’s batting .225/.257/.310 this month in 19 games but he has hits in 11 of his last 17, including three on Aug. 10 and two on the 13^th, 16^th and 19^th.

Last fall, he was playing in the World Series for the Diamondbacks. It capped a 2023 season that began with him playing for Puerto Rico in the World Baseball Classic. It ended chasing a championship.

He went 2-for-5 with two runs and two RBIs in the World Series versus the Rangers, who won the World Series in five games.

But on Monday, corner infielder Emmanuel Rivera was designated for assignment by the Marlins. The Orioles claimed him two days later and now he is with them waiting for his first chance to play for his new team.

A right-handed hitter, Rivera, 28, played in 96 games with Miami, taking 229 plate appearances and batting .214/.294/.269/.563. He has a career .656 OPS over 313 big league games with Kansas City, Arizona and Miami.

“I think it’s a great opportunity,” he said of his chance with the O’s, with interpreting help from Brandon Quinones. “Thank God, you know, for being able to stay healthy and that I’m now here with this team.

Ryan Mountcastle is out of the Orioles lineup tonight after leaving last night’s game in the ninth inning with wrist soreness.

Ryan O’Hearn is playing first base and Adley Rutschman is the designated hitter and batting second.

The Orioles began the day 1 ½ games behind the Yankees in the division race and they’re counting on rookie Cade Povich, making his 10^th major league start, to give them length before turning to the bullpen.

Povich lowered his ERA to 5.77 by holding the Red Sox to two runs over a career-high 6 1/3 innings in his last start. He was optioned later that night but returned with Zach Eflin on the injured list.

Left-hander Keegan Akin was reinstated from the paternity list and the Orioles optioned lefty Nick Vespi, who tossed a scoreless inning last night.

Orioles' manager Brandon Hyde wasn’t ready to commit to a six-man rotation when asked about it earlier this week. Too many balls in the air to grab hold of an exact plan.

Actions could be pointing the team in that direction.

By keeping Cole Irvin and also needing a starter for Sunday night against the Astros, the Orioles could commit to the six-man alignment at least for the moment. And it provides extra rest for the entire crew.

There’s no other reason to keep Irvin unless he’s starting or the Orioles don’t want to run him through waivers again and risk a claim, which didn’t happen the first time.

Irvin isn’t any use to the bullpen this weekend after throwing 83 pitches Wednesday at Citi Field. The Orioles added two fresh relievers yesterday in Nick Vespi and Matt Bowman and sent down Colin Selby, who tossed three scoreless innings in two appearances.

Corbin Burnes shortened his hair and lengthened his start, but what happened tonight wasn’t pretty.

Burnes allowed four runs in the sixth inning and the offense ran cold again in the Orioles’ 6-0 loss to the Astros before an announced crowd of 22,212 at Camden Yards.

The Yankees lead the division by 1 ½ games, the Orioles’ largest deficit since being two back on June 25.

After surrendering a career-high eight runs and 10 hits last week, Burnes was poised to produce his 20^th quality start. However, the Astros sent eight batters to the plate in the sixth, broke open the game and forced manager Brandon Hyde to dig into his bullpen after 5 2/3.

Burnes allowed six runs (five earned) and eight hits. Damage came heavy with two outs in the sixth, when Ben Gamel singled at only 77.8 mph off the bat to drive in a run, Burnes fielded Jake Meyers’ bunt and threw the ball past first base, and Shay Whitcomb delivered a two-run single.

The lack of fresh relievers impacted starter Trevor Rogers.

The Orioles optioned Rogers early this afternoon within a bevy of roster moves that included calling up left-hander Nick Vespi and selecting right-hander Matt Bowman’s contract from Triple-A Norfolk.

Rogers’ next turn in the rotation was Sunday but the spot became listed as TBA.

“Just kind of where we are bullpen-wise,” said manager Brandon Hyde. “We feel like we needed to get some help in the bullpen, get some guys that are able to pitch tonight. Cade (Povich) is gonna throw tomorrow, so we want Trevor to stay ready. We’ll see what happens here. We just want him to stay ready and we’ll see how things shake out the next couple weeks.”

The Orioles sent outfielder Kyle Stowers and second baseman Connor Norby to the Marlins for Rogers at the trade deadline. He’s posted a 7.11 ERA and 1.842 WHIP in four starts and hasn’t gone more than five innings.