In sizing up his previous starts compared to Wednesday night's outing against Boston, Orioles right-hander Dylan Bundy said what happened tonight was easy to explain.
"They hit everything," he said. "I guess. I don't know. I threw some good pitches and they still hit 'em. Just one of those nights, I guess. Just have to learn from it and get better from here. Those guys came out hacking and they hit the ball well."
Bundy gave up career highs with nine hits and five runs over 4 1/3 innings as the Orioles lost a rain-shortened six-inning game 8-1 to Boston. Bundy had pitched to an ERA of 1.45 over his previous three starts and to a 2.76 ERA in his six starts overall before the Sox hit him hard tonight.
He allowed two-run homers to Jackie Bradley Jr. and Sandy Leon as Boston (67-52) swept the two-game series to move ahead of the Orioles (66-53) in the American League East standings. First-place Toronto holds a one-game lead over the Red Sox and a two-game lead over the Orioles.
Bundy was asked about his right ankle injury that happened on a David Ortiz groundout in the third inning.
"I was going to get the ball and came down on my right foot," he said. "Tried to go after it and just kind of rolled. It's fine. Obviously we'll see how it is tomorrow, but I was able to pitch after that. So it should be fine. Growing up, you roll your ankle a lot as a kid. Richie (Bancells, head athletic trainer) was telling me that is a good thing I rolled them before. They won't swell up as bad."
Bundy is 2-2 with a 3.27 ERA at Oriole Park and tonight's loss snapped his career-best three-game win streak.
The Orioles got just four hits off Boston's David Price, who is 11-8 with an ERA of 4.19. One was a Chris Davis solo homer in the second inning that, at the time, tied the game at 1-1. Davis was asked yet again if that homer could get his bat going more consistently.
"The past couple of years, I feel like he's thrown me a lot of changeups," Davis said. "It's been a good pitch for him. I was fortunate enough to see a lot of his pitches with (Steve) Pearce having a long at-bat right ahead of me. Just went out and looked for a pitch up that I could drive.
"I felt like I've been one pitch away all year. It's just a matter of doing it over and over again. It would be nice to say, yeah, absolutely. But there is nothing that is guaranteed in this game, so I'm going to continue to grind it out and do whatever I can."
The Orioles dropped two games in this series and fell into third place for the first time in 2016.
"They're tough," Davis said. "You know, last night I thought obviously it was a little bit better game on our part and tonight it just got away from us. Obviously, with the rain, we didn't have a chance to get back in it. Thankfully, it was only a two-game series and we still have a lot of time left. We'll regroup and get after them tomorrow.
"I mean, it's so close, the separation between the teams. And it's going to be all the way down the stretch. I think that is kind of a given. The important part is to keep going, regroup and get back on track."
In this series, he made back-to-back starts in right field.
"It felt pretty good," he said. "It is something that, obviously, I have a little history out there and I feel pretty comfortable playing right field here. I've done it enough to know where I need to be. It's something I've always been open to. With our lineup and the guys that we have, we kind of rotate the DH. To be able to give Mark (Trumbo) a couple of days off, it's good."
Davis' homer tonight was the 86th in Camden Yards history to go onto Eutaw Street and the ninth by Davis. He has hit the most there in ballpark history. Manny Machado went 0-for-3 to snap a six-game hitting streak. Boston has won six in a row, hitting 15 homers and scoring 47 runs in the six games. The Orioles host Houston to start a four-game series on Thursday night.
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