Looking at Urías' good defense, June coming to a close and Cowser's power

The Texas Rangers were trying to come from two runs down and the wildness of the O’s bullpen gave them a great chance. They had cut the O's 2-0 lead to 2-1 in the seventh inning and a key batter, leadoff hitter Marcus Semien, batted with the bases loaded and two outs.

O’s righty Jacob Webb threw him a 2-2 fastball and he hit it hard toward third base. Ramón Urías, the 2022 American League Gold Glove winner at third base, made a nice play to his backhand side and thew out Semien. The ball was hit 96.5 mph off the bat and Statcast gave it an expected batting average of .530.

But the Rangers were turned away.

In a game the Orioles would go on to win 2-1, it was a solid defensive play. And a key one. Actual batting average on the play was .000.

“Yeah. Big play right there,” Urías said in the postgame clubhouse. “Just tried to stay calm. Know the situation and know your runner and I think the main thing is just stay calm.”

And his experience – being on the field for a lot of key plays with the stadium roaring over the years – was important once again.

“Yeah, for sure. I mean, whenever the stadium gets louder you just trust your instincts and believe that you can make the play. Stay ready, stay focused and believe in yourself,” he said.

Urías, an Oriole since 2020, was playing in his 375^th game with the team last night. I asked what it means to him to still be a key member of this club.

“It is such a joy. We have a great team, a lot of talented people here in this clubhouse, and I just go out there and have fun every night,” he said.

The Orioles improved to 8-11 in one-run wins. Coming into that save situation last night, Craig Kimbrel had entered with a one-run lead in the ninth four times for the Orioles, but didn’t get any of those saves. He pitched a 1-2-3 ninth last night for his 18^th save of the year, the 435^th of his career. He is now 1-for-5 with the team in one-run save chances.

No June swoon: The Orioles are coming to the end of a grueling stretch of baseball. They've had one off-day since May 31. After they host Texas tomorrow for "Sunday Night Baseball," they will close the door on this run of 30 games in 31 days.

It is a stretch in which they've played good teams and beaten them, and then lost five in a row versus Houston and Cleveland.

In and around that, they have scored a lot of runs and won a lot games.

“We are getting a little beat up right now, obviously. It’s been a long stretch, and the off-day on Monday will be nice for us,” manager Brandon Hyde said pregame Friday. “After a Sunday night game and then a flight to Seattle. So not much of an off-day. But those are good team problems when you have 'Sunday Night Baseball.'

“But I think we’ve handled it really well. We had a little tough stretch in there. Hard not to have that when you are playing that much baseball against the teams we’ve played against.

“Think we’ve done really, really well. Think we’ve handled it well. We had some pitching injuries and some things. We’ve had to have guys step up. Had to play through nagging injuries. Had a lot of things happen this month, and our guys have competed every night.”

The Orioles are 17-11 (.607) in this stretch thus far:

Went 2-1 at home vs. Tampa Bay
Went 2-2 at Toronto
Went 4-0 at Tampa Bay
Went 2-1 at home vs. Atlanta
Went 2-1 at home vs. Philadelphia
Went 2-1 at the New York Yankees
Went 0-3 at Houston
Went 1-2 at home vs. Cleveland
Are 2-0 versus Texas with two games left in the series

Cowser power: The moo birds have been out a couple of times this week at Camden Yards as rookie Colton Cowser homered Tuesday versus Cleveland and Thursday against Texas. And again last night against Texas, this time off three-time Cy Young Award winner Max Scherzer.

The kid has had a wild ride this season in the big leagues, winning AL Rookie of the Month for March/April when he hit .303 with an OPS of 1.004.

But then his OPS was just .580 in May. However, this month Hyde sees a young player pulling out of an extended rough stretch. And since June 9 over 18 games, while his batting average is just .240, his slugging percentage is .600 and his OPS .896 after Friday night. In that stretch, Cowser has five homers and eight RBIs.

“Think he is starting to (make nice adjustments) the last couple of weeks,” Hyde said Friday. “Not easy being a young player and not easy to go through rough stretches. I think he has identified how teams are pitching him differently, and nice to see him get on an off-speed pitch to stay through it for that double (Thursday). I think he is doing a better job of adjusting back. The power and the bat speed is definitely there."

And compare his full season numbers, after a few ups and downs this year, to what is AL average. Average slugging right now in the AL is .395, and Cowser is at .458. Average OPS is .703 and he is at .777. That produces an OPS+ for him of 122, which is 22 percent above the league average.

When they lost five in a row, the Orioles allowed 40 runs and had a team ERA of 7.71. In winning the past three they have allowed five runs with a team ERA of 1.67.