Jimenez and Wieters after O's loss to Angels

After his latest poor outing - one in which he gave up five runs and five hits in 1 1/3 innings - Orioles right-hander Ubaldo Jimenez said this is the toughest stretch of his career.

"There is no doubt about it," he said. "This is the toughest thing I've had to face, but like I've said before, I'm never going to put my head down. I know I let the team down. I didn't do what I'm supposed to do, helping the team. But it's part of baseball. It's part of baseball. I have to keep going, keep working hard and hopefully find something that is going to get me out of this thing."

Jimenez took the loss tonight to the Angels' 9-5 victory at Camden Yards as his record falls to 5-9 with a 7.38 ERA. He has had four starts this year of 2 1/3 or fewer innings and three have come over his past six starts.

One thing is certain: This is not a physical issue.

"Yeah, I'm good, no problems. I have nothing to complain (about)," Jimenez said.

Tonight, he got the first out of the game before a walk, two singles, a wild pitch and two runs followed. He allowed three more runs in the second and was out of the game after just 45 pitches.

"The sinker was too short," he said. "I couldn't get it to the strike zone. It was too low. And then I didn't have the breaking balls."

I asked Jimenez if he is concerned he might be running out of chances.

"You know what? The only thing I can control is to work hard every day," he said. "And get prepared for whatever I have to do to help the team. I can't control what they are going to do."

Catcher Matt Wieters was behind the plate trying to help Jimenez get his act together tonight, but it didn't happen.

"He was keeping a quick pace going, but some balls just kept leaking back (over the) middle on him," Wieters said. "Couple innings, just couldn't quite hit his spot to get a big out when we needed it. But we had some opportunities to score runs. It's a team loss all around. We didn't pitch, we didn't play defense and we didn't have some timely hitting tonight."

Last season, Jimenez went 12-10 with a 4.11 ERA. Now his ERA is more than three runs higher than that. What is the difference?

"I think command," Wieters said. "The fastball command is a lot more middle than it's been. That is always the first place to start. He'll put in the time and work, it's just a matter of grinding it out. In baseball, it is just like hitting. You don't know when it is going to click. You just keep working and you have to know confidently it is going to turn at some point.

"He's a professional. He knows, every day he shows up here, he is going to do what he can to help the team. He is going to do what he can to get himself better. He knows he wants to pitch better for the team and we want him to pitch better. He comes here and works every day. We are all rooting for him to get turned around and pitch like we know he can."

With their sixth loss in eight games, the Orioles fall to 49-36 and their American League East lead is down to one game over Toronto. Adam Jones hit the second leadoff homer of his career tonight. It was also the 210th of his O's career, moving him past Brady Anderson into sixth on the club's all-time list. Jones trails Rafael Palmeiro with 223 homers. Jonathan Schoop had two hits, including a home run, and is batting .418 with 11 multi-hit games his last 19 contests.