Hyde on Iglesias, Phillips, Kremer, offense and defense

Orioles shortstop José Iglesias is receiving treatment again today on his sore left wrist and hasn't been shut down for the week.

Manager Brandon Hyde still believes that Iglesias could return to the lineup before the Orioles play their final game on Sunday in Buffalo.

"He feels better," Hyde said during his Zoom conference call with the media. "Hopefully the next couple days."

Reliever Evan Phillips won't pitch again this season due to soreness in his right elbow. He's on the 10-day injured list and expected to undergo more tests.

"We're hopeful that we dodged a bullet there from an injury standpoint," Hyde said. "He's got some elbow soreness. That's as far as I can go with it right now."

Dean Kremer is making his final start of 2020 after allowing three runs and striking out 20 batters in 16 innings.

"I was really high on him in spring training," Hyde said. "I liked his pitch mix, I liked how he attacked guys in big league spring training games, and he's been even more impressive in these games.

"You never really know how someone's going to react until they're pitching in a big league stadium, and I think he's a real confident guy who trusts his stuff. I like his mound presence, I like how competitive he is, I like how he's got different weapons. Doesn't just rely on a mid-90s fastball. He understands how to pitch, also. He's done that his last three starts. I think all three starts he had a little bit of different stuff, different pitches working, and he was able to navigate through the order and being able to utilize the pitchers that were working. Just a great job so far."

The Orioles haven't had much success against Red Sox starter Nathan Eovaldi, who's held them to two runs in 13 innings.

"When Nathan's throwing strikes he's tough to hit," Hyde said. "It's a 100 mph fastball with good secondary stuff, real good cutter. When we've gotten to him in the past it was because he's fallen behind in the count. He's pitched well against us this year because he's really commanded the ball well.

"Hopefully, we can grind him out a little bit, wear him out, take some good at-bats, get some traffic. We haven't had a whole lot of traffic here the last couple weeks on the bases. Be able to make some things happen and disrupt his rhythm and timing, because he is a guy who has plus-plus stuff and he's a tough at-bat.

"We need to get in the strike zone. That's something we haven't done very well, either, the last couple weeks is not being able to expand out of the strike zone, but get him in the strike zone and take good at-bats."

The offense has scored three runs or fewer in 10 of the last 13 games.

"We have a bunch of guys kind of going through some rough patches," Hyde said. "They're trying to finish the season strong and probably trying too hard in a lot of ways, and that's what we've really been going through the last two weeks is really trying to do too much by myself and not having more of a team aspect look, a team aspect at-bat. But putting too much pressure on myself to come through.

"It seems like we have a group of guys that right now are scuffling because they're just trying to do too much."

The struggles extend to the defensive side of the game. Errors that show up in the box score, mishaps that don't but are just as costly. And it's also an occasional issue on the bases.

"It's just really hard to play in this league and win in this league and be competitive without playing solid defense and making the routine play," Hyde said. "We're going to make errors, there's no doubt about it. Guys are going to make mistakes on the bases, we're going to make errors defensively. It's learning from those errors and continuing to improve.

"We have a lot of areas to improve on, but those are two that we really have to get better at is being able to catch the ball more consistently, being a better baserunning group. Those are things we have to get better at going forward. There's an emphasis in our minor leagues, and unfortunately, so many guys lost a year of development this year and those two areas, areas where you develop baserunning instincts, you develop defensive instincts.

"It's one thing to take ground balls on a back field, it's another thing to take 100 ground balls hit to you at Fenway Park in a big spot. And so just being able to practice game situation stuff, we lost a year of development in the minor leagues. We've only played 50-something games this year. Going forward we're going to continue to pound these guys about playing the game the right way defensively and on the bases."