Buck Showalter: "The game's not always kind to you"

The Orioles had lost only once in 52 games before tonight when carrying a lead into the eighth inning. They were ahead by two runs and they had Darren O'Day on the mound.

In most cases, O'Day preserves the lead and Zach Britton closes it out, but the Twins rewrote the script.

O'Day surrendered three runs and the Orioles lost again to the Twins, 4-3, before 32,025 at Camden Yards.

O'Day ranked third in the majors among relievers with a 1.15 ERA, allowing six earned runs in 47 innings, but he walked leadoff hitter Miguel Sano, gave up a bloop single to Trevor Plouffe that second baseman Jonathan Schoop couldn't run down and hit Torii Hunter to load the bases with no outs.

Familiar territory for O'Day, who's executed plenty of escapes in the past, but Eduardo Rosario hit a sacrifice fly to right field and Gerardo Parra missed the cutoff man, putting two runners in scoring position. Kurt Suzuki followed with a bloop single into right-center field to give Minnesota a 4-3 lead.

Adam Jones tried to make a barehanded pickup for a play at the plate, but he couldn't come up with the ball cleanly.

The Twins loaded the bases again before Brian Matusz struck out Joe Mauer. Kevin Jepsen struck out the side in the bottom of the ninth, and the Orioles fell to 0-5 against the Twins this season.

This one really hurt.

"Darren's a pretty tough critic of himself, but he's performed at such a high level, as good as any relief pitcher you want to see," said manager Buck Showalter. "I was kind of happy they finally hit the one line drive to left field (by Brian Dozier), in a way. But that's the way it goes. We've had some of the benefit of that, also.

"Last night, there were obviously a lot of hard-hit balls, but sometimes you go through periods where those things happen for you and happen against you. You've got to overcome them. But we were close."

The Orioles went from losing 15-2 the previous night to squandering a lead in the eighth and falling to 17-20 in one-run games. Was this one tougher to digest?

"No, not necessarily," Showalter said. "It's about wins and losses. Whether it's a fly ball barely out of your...a jam shot out of your grasp or a couple of them, a swinging bunt. It's all relevant."

The Orioles used a three-run homer by Parra in the sixth to take a 3-1 lead. Twins starter Tommy Milone had retired 13 in a row before Nolan Reimold's leadoff single.

"We didn't do much offensively other than the sixth inning, we put together a little something there," Showalter said. "We were hoping to try to make it stand up. They're pitching well and we're not doing a whole lot with what they're doing.

"We missed a cutoff man that didn't allow us to set up the double play. We had to play at a different depth than we would have liked to have played there. But it could have been a close play at third, too. There's a lot of things that go on there.

"Darren got some counts there real close. He pitches in to set up other things and a good hitter's going to get out over the plate on him like Hunter, and those things happen, too."

Showalter didn't believe Schoop could have done anything different to catch Plouffe's fly ball. He reached for it and the ball eluded his glove.

"No, John is one of the best second basemen you'll see," Showalter said. "They just hit it in a place we couldn't get a glove on it. Just one of those things, hit them where they ain't. Suzuki had another one that went about 70 feet that was a key part of that inning.

"Wei-Yin (Chen) was really good again tonight. I was curious to see how he was going to be after his last outing, a little extra and also working on four days, but he was real good tonight working against a right-handed lineup."

The Orioles need to put this one behind them and get ready for the third game of the series.

"As opposed to what? You don't have any alternatives," Showalter said. "It's where you are and the world we live in. It's tough, but we've had some really good wins that maybe didn't look that way for a long time. The baseball gods aren't always kind to you. You wear it and try to come back and know tomorrow you have a chance to have a different feeling.

"They're fighting for the same thing we are and we're going to get everybody's best shot. We're not sneaking up on anybody and that's a good thing because the things our guys have done in the past."

O'Day has earned a mulligan inside the clubhouse based on his past successes. Tonight's loss snapped an 11-game scoreless streak. He hadn't allowed three runs or more in a game since Sept. 2, 2014 against the Reds.

"I feel that way about all our guys who go about it the right way and prepare and are locked in and are competing," Showalter said. "The game's not always kind to you. Nobody cares more than Darren, but he's not the only one. Brad (Brach) had a real good seventh inning that's going to be (overlooked). That's why it's a team game. It's a sum of the parts.

"Everybody's got to do their thing to get to the end game. More times than not I like our chances there. So we'll do it again tomorrow."