Miley's start, Jones atop the order and Gausman's grit

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - Is it possible for a pitcher to better locate the strike zone after he's settled into his comfort zone?

The Orioles are banking on Wade Miley to carry on his success against the Rays and inside Tropicana Field as they continue their three-game series.

Miley is 4-3 with a 2.60 ERA and 1.075 WHIP in 10 career starts against the Rays over 62 1/3 innings. He faced them on April 25 at Camden Yards and allowed two runs and four hits over seven innings.

Miley also walked six batters and struck out eight. He's put up some crazy lines this season.

In four career starts at The Trop, Miley has gone 2-1 with a 1.78 ERA by allowing five runs and 17 hits over 25 1/3 innings.

The current group is batting .202 (19-for-94) against Miley. Evan Longoria is 5-for-26 (.192) with three doubles, two home runs and nine strikeouts.

Tampa Bay rookie Jacob Faria has allowed one run in five of his eight starts and three earned runs or fewer in seven outings. His worst start is his most recent, when he permitted four runs and six hits and walked four batters over five innings in Oakland.

The Orioles faced Faria in back-to-back starts in late June and he allowed a combined five earned runs (six total) and nine hits in 12 2/3 innings. He walked one batter and struck out 13.

Adam Jones, Welington Castillo and Joey Rickard homered off Faria. Jones also has a double in six at-bats, and Rickard is 3-for-5 with a double.

Jones had three more hits last night, coming within a triple of the cycle, and he's batting .485/.500/.939 (16-for-33) during a seven-game streak. He has three doubles, four home runs and 11 RBIs.

This is the second time in two seasons that Jones has collected RBIs in six consecutive games from the leadoff spot, tying the team record. J.J. Hardy did it from Aug. 2-11, 2011 and Brady Anderson did it in 1994, 1996 and 1999.

Jones is batting .354 (17-for-48) since moving to the leadoff spot.

"I think any leadoff hitter who gets on base helps the team," Jones said. "You see what (Steven) Souza's been doing the last few weeks when he moved to the leadoff spot. He's getting on base and scoring a lot of runs, so you get on base, especially with our lineup, I'm able to run the bases well.

"We've got Manny (Machado) and Schoopy (Jonathan Schoop), CD (Chris Davis), (Mark) Trumbo behind me. (Trey) Mancini, also. So when I get on base, the chances of me scoring are pretty good."

Kevin Gausman has a scoreless streak of 20 1/3 innings in his last three starts against the Rays. He's the first Orioles starter with three straight scoreless outings against the Rays and the first with three in a row versus the same team since Mike Flanagan from April 30, 1981-May 21, 1982 against the Blue Jays.

Last night's game felt like one of those that the Orioles normally would have lost. We've seen much bigger leads dissolve. We've seen starters fail to produce shutdown innings. Game stories are rewritten, early angles destroyed. But Gausman kept fighting back and denying the Rays.

"Being able to limit the damage," he said. "Bases loaded, two outs with a veteran hitter like Longoria. He battled and you just try to get out of those situations. That's one thing during the season, up to this point, that I haven't been able to do. If these guys give me a three-run lead, more often than not I've kind of gone out and kind of given it right back. It's good to be able to kind of shut the door.

"Their guy (Blake Snell) pitched great, too. That was one of those things early on where I knew if we could get some runs off this guy and I could kind of limit the damage, we might have a shot to win."