Mancini on starting tonight, Wieters on Gausman's improved third pitch

After getting called up to the majors for the first time on Sunday, tonight Trey Mancini will make his major league debut for the Orioles. He's batting seventh as the designated hitter against Eduardo Rodriguez and the Boston Red Sox.

"It is really exciting," Mancini said this afternoon. "This is what I've been waiting for my whole life. But at the same time, it's the same game I've been playing for 20 years so I've got to try and calm my emotions. I know that will be tough, especially the first at bat. But really excited.

"The first time I walked out on the field and saw the big stadium, that is when it hit me that I was a major leaguer. It's been really cool to be part of the dugout the last few days and part of the game. Been really neat so far."

The Orioles' 2015 minor league Player of the Year, the 24-year-old Mancini batted .282/.357/.458 with 26 doubles, five triples, 20 home runs and 68 RBIs over 142 games between Double-A Bowie and Triple-A Norfolk this year.

A right-handed hitter, he did hit a little better against left-handed pitching. He went 5-for-10 with three homers in April at Bowie off lefties. At Norfolk, he hit .283 with two homers and 10 RBIs in 113 at-bats off lefties. He slugged .442 with an .802 OPS.

"I know that my splits in my career have been better against lefties," Mancini said. "I'm always ready to go. The other day a lefty was in the 'pen and I went and got loose and took a few swings. You never know when your name will be called and you have to be ready to go in every game."

Mancini has yet to play as an Oriole of course, but was asked today if the speed of the game is faster up here.

"Overall, it's the major leagues with the best players in the world," Mancini said. "So I know from Triple-A to the majors will be a jump, just as it has been going up every level in my career. It's another jump but possibly the biggest one and I look forward to experiencing it tonight."

On the mound for the Orioles tonight is right-hander Kevin Gausman (8-10, 3.43 ERA). He is 5-0 with a 1.59 ERA over his last six starts.

After years of trying to find a third pitch, this may be the year Gausman truly found one. Catcher Matt Wieters calls it a hard curve and it now provides a strong compliment to Gausman's mid 90s fastball and two changeups.

"It's big in the fact that as a starter you want to have three pitches you feel like can throw in any situation," Wieters said. "It's not that he didn't have it before, but now he feels like he can throw his breaking ball in any situation, which is really when you have a pitch. A lot of guys say they have a pitch, but if it's 3-2 with the bases loaded and you don't feel like you can throw it, then you don't really have that pitch. I think now he has the confidence to, in whatever situation, if he feels his breaking ball is the right pitch he'll throw it."

Over the past six starts, Gausman has thrown the pitch between 11 and 15 percent of the time. That is not a lot but it is a pitch that opponent batters can no longer discount.

"He kind of changed the way he was throwing it a couple of years ago and it can take a couple of years to master it at this level as much as you can," Wieters said. "We saw that with (Chris) Tillman and his slider. It took him a couple of years of throwing it in games to feel comfortable with it."