Wrapping up a 17-1 win

Dylan Bundy walked the leadoff hitter today and whatever thoughts had drifted away from his last start came rushing back to it.

This afternoon's outing wouldn't be a duplicate. Bundy retired the next three batters on a ground ball and two strikeouts. He didn't surrendered a hit until two outs in the fourth.

He wouldn't make history against the Rays. He'd simply go back to being Bundy.

The Orioles would become the '27 Yankees, which was far more unpredictable.

Danny Valencia, Joey Rickard and Trey Mancini homered off Rays left-hander Blake Snell in the second inning, the Orioles batted around twice and Bundy didn't let a runner cross the plate in a 17-1 victory over the Rays before an announced crowd of 25,257 at Camden Yards.

The Orioles have won five of their last six games while improving to 13-28. They've claimed back-to-back series for the first time since Aug. 21-30, 2017.

Valencia and Rickard, recalled earlier today, went back-to-back to open the third. Manny Machado and Jonathan Schoop did the same yesterday in Game 1 of the doubleheader.

Mancini reached the flag court in right field with two outs in the inning, and the Orioles took a 4-0 lead in the fourth on third baseman Matt Duffy's throwing error on an attempted force at second base. Machado and Schoop singled to start the rally, and Valencia was credited with the RBI.

Just the tip of the iceberg.

Rickard had his first multi-homer game with his three-run shot off reliever Andrew Kittredge as part of a seven-run fourth, when the Orioles sent 11 batters to the plate. He drove in a career-high five runs. Valencia matched his career high with four hits and drove in four runs.

Every Oriole starter scored a run except Craig Gentry, who contributed a two-run double in the seventh, when the Orioles sent 10 batters to the plate. Caleb Joseph led off with a triple, as the ball scooted past Mallex Smith in center field, and he came home on Mancini's grounder. Machado followed with an RBI double for his third hit of the afternoon.

The Rays used outfielder Johnny Field to pitch the eighth, the second time they've called upon a position player this season and the ninth in franchise history. He walked Jace Peterson, but retired Mancini, Chance Sisco and Schoop on fly balls.

Today's barrage increased the Orioles' run total to 58 in seven games on the current homestand, which continues Tuesday against the Phillies.

A game turned into a party in the fourth, when Kittredge faced seven batters without recording an out. Bundy must have gotten the shivers.

The Rays optioned Kittredge after the game. They'll need to purchase a second seat on the plane for his 9.72 ERA.

Bundy kept the Rays scoreless on two hits over seven innings after failing to retire a batter in his last start against the Royals and serving up four home runs to raise his ERA to 5.31. He had given up 19 earned runs and 22 total in his last three appearances over nine-plus innings, but it proved to be just a big bump in the road.

The Rays drew three walks and stole two batters within the first three innings. Duffy doubled with two outs in the fourth, but Bundy struck out Brad Miller on an 83 mph slider in the dirt. Joey Wendle struck out in the first while chasing a 94 mph fastball.

C.J. Cron doubled to lead off the sixth, the only other hit for the Rays until Rob Refsnyder doubled off Donnie Hart in the eighth and scored on Denard Span's single. Bundy walked four batters, struck out seven and threw 63 of 100 pitches for strikes.

Bundy's adjustments between starts included "just trying to reach more toward the plate and get finish on all my pitchers really," he said, "and getting that little bit of extension I need to get to put the life on my pitches that they need."

"Dylan was crisper," said manager Buck Showalter. "There's more to it than I'm going to talk about here as far as ... but Dylan was rested as he said. I would have been real surprised if he didn't have a good outing today. I would have been real surprised.

"Just his ability to get over his front leg a little more, the ability to get into his drive leg a little more. When you've been around him and he's pitching well, he's able to get off his back leg and post up on his front leg ... And he wasn't doing that, I didn't think. Roger (McDowell) didn't think."

Snell matched his shortest start of the season by lasting only 3 1/3 innings. He allowed two runs or fewer in six of seven outings before today and brought a 2.40 ERA and 0.945 WHIP into the game. The Orioles worked him for 23 pitches in the first without scoring and 25 in the second when they unloaded on him.

"Anytime you can take a little bit of the, I don't want to say 'invincibility' away from him, but I guess I just did, maybe put him a little on his heels, because he's filthy," Showalter said. "Guys really grinded the at-bats. It's one thing to make him throw strikes. It's another thing to give yourself a chance to hit.

"I think pitch count on him at such an early point was big, make him grind everything. He's a good one. Somebody will pay the price for that one next outing."

"It helps a lot," Valencia said. "Obviously, you want to score runs. He's really tough. He didn't have his best day, but I've faced him plenty and he is not a comfortable at bat. He's one of the great left-handed pitchers in our league and to score like that early is huge."

In two career starts at Camden Yards, Snell has surrendered nine runs and 12 hits in 7 2/3 innings. Kittredge let an inherited runner score today, leaving Snell with five runs to go with six hits, and the right-hander was charged with six of his own as the Orioles strung together six hits off him.

The Orioles finished the day with a season-high 19 hits, the most since they collected 21 on Aug. 25, 2017 in Boston.

"It's like I said quite a few times to them in advance meetings and stuff, somebody's going to pay," Showalter said. "Good pitching staff over there and we've been on the other side of that some, OK? The old expression, 'God would never give me more than I could handle, but I wish he didn't have so much confidence in me.' We've had some points like that this year.

"I started looking at the board today and little by little some of the ... just batting averages, you look up there and there's not as many 1s starting as there had been. That's a good sign. I don't know about feeding off each other. There were a lot of base hits the other way, too."

There also was the first winning homestand of 2018.

"It's a challenge for a club when you have a lot of different things show up," Showalter said. (Pedro) Araujo is new to the club. Here comes (Anthony) Santander, kind of new to the club. Joey, who's not new to the club, goes away. You're starting to see some things, kind of like getting the band back together somewhat. Not just the band, but getting ... kind of the atmosphere we're used to back, especially when we get Darren (O'Day) and Zach (Britton) back, Darren hopefully next week and Zach's starting to get close to pitching to hitters.

"Of course, Trum (Mark Trumbo) and Jon have been a big addition for us. We forget sometimes we functioned a lot without them."

The day also included the acquisition of infielder Renato Núñez on waivers from the Rangers. Tim Beckham was transferred to the 60-day disabled list to create a spot.

Núñez, who's out of options, is a career .263/.318/.468 hitter in eight minor league seasons. He's spent parts of the last three seasons with Athletics and Rangers, going 11-for-66 with two home run in 30 games. He committed five errors this year in eight games at third base.

The Orioles like his power potential, but they could repeat what happened with Luis Sardiñas last summer and attempt to run him through waivers and outright him.

"Dan (Duquette) was going to claim him and I know what he's thinking about doing," Showalter said. "We talked about it today. I've seen it come across the medical checkups on it yesterday, doing the background on the medicals."

"I know what his plans are, but I don't think it's going to have to do with our immediate 25-man roster. We'll see."