More on Machado's heroics, plus Hays on his power

New York Yankees right-hander Dellin Betances has allowed three homers in 52 2/3 innings this year and two of them have come the past two nights against the Orioles.

Betances made two big mistakes in the ninth last night. First, he walked Tim Beckham to give Manny Machado a chance. And he left a breaking ball up in the zone that Machado could mash. He did. It was a walk-off two-run home run in the last of the ninth as the Orioles, once down 6-1, beat the Yankees 7-6.

Machado has three walk-off homers this year and all have come since Aug. 18. He has hit nine homers over his last 18 games, had two on the night and now has 32 for the year. He's done some special things in recent weeks, this was just the latest among his greatest.

"I'm just looking for something up," Machado said of hitting a 1-0 pitch 431 feet to walk it off. "Something I can do damage with. You know I'm up in the count and just trying to look for a good pitch that I could hit, that I could control. I hit it pretty good."

Yeah, he did. Mark Trumbo, a veteran not prone to hyperbole, had some strong praise for Machado's latest huge home run.

"He's on another level," Trumbo said. "He's a premier talent. This season is going to be one he can use in the future to build off of. He's proven to himself that even if he has a little bit of a struggle, that talent is in there. It's going to come out. It's a character builder and he's played exceptionally.

"It's my favorite (win) of the season, there's no doubt. That's a really good ballclub over there. A ballclub that has played us real tough. CC (Sabathia) was doing a nice job and for a while there. We didn't have much momentum.

"Everyone went nuts. That is kind of what you're hoping for and envision. Something big like that. That was picture perfect."

The Orioles lead the majors with 12 walk-off wins and six have come on homers. The Orioles have hit 10 homers in the past three games and 66 in the last 31. They have 96 homers since the All-Star break to lead the majors.

The win provided skipper Buck Showalter his 1,500th career managerial victory.

The wild card race remains wild. The Los Angeles Angels now hold the second wild card by a half-game over Minnesota and one game over the Orioles. But there are six teams within three games of the Angels. The Orioles are 71-68 with 23 games to go.

Hays talks homers: The Orioles called up outfielder prospect Austin Hays on Tuesday. At just 22, he is in the majors. This was just his first full season in the minor leagues after being drafted in round three (No. 91 overall) in June 2016 out of Jacksonville University.

In 128 games this year between Single-A Frederick and Double-A Bowie, Hays hit .329/.365/.593 with 32 doubles, five triples, 32 homers, 81 runs, 95 RBIs and an OPS of .958. He filled up the stat sheet and had as good a year as anyone in the minors on any team.

Hays' 32 home runs are tied for second in all of minor league baseball. When Hays made his pro debut last year, he hit just four homers in 38 games for short-season Single-A Aberdeen. At that point, we could not have projected he'd hit 32 this year.

But in a recent interview, Hays explained to me that there is one key reason for his power display this year. Not long after he was drafted last June, several O's hitting coaches noticed he was not properly tapping into his power potential.

"In college, I would jump at the ball and allow my hands to drift forward with my body," Hays explained. "This season I've done a really good job of keeping my hands back, so I get those extra couple of inches of momentum and force and power into my swing. And I'm doing that more consistently now than ever.

"I started to understand that these couple of inches are making a big difference in being able to use center field and right center instead of just yanking everything to left. This gave me a lot more power than I had before. In baseball, the tiniest thing can mean everything."

Yep, a couple of inches with the placement of his hands meant many more feet of distance when he would drive a ball this year. Now Hays is an Oriole. He is also among a group of five finalists for Baseball America's minor league Player of the Year award. The winner will be announced Friday.

By the way, here is an interesting comparison. Machado reached the majors from Bowie in 2012 after playing 222 minor league games and getting 832 at-bats. Hays is in the majors after playing in 166 games and getting 663 minor league at-bats.

The playoffs start tonight on the farm: The Bowie Baysox and Frederick Keys begin the playoffs tonight. Four teams make the postseason in each league with two best-of-five series to determine a league champion.

Bowie hosts Altoona the next two nights at Prince George's Stadium before the series moves to Altoona for the remaining games.

Right-hander David Hess (11-9, 3.85) starts Game 1 for the Baysox. He has gone 3-2 with a 2.25 ERA in six starts in August. The Baysox are expected to start lefty Tanner Scott (0-2, 2.22 ERA) in Game 2 and right-hander Lucas Long (9-6, 2.95 ERA) in Game 3.

Frederick hosts Lynchburg the next two nights in the Carolina League playoffs. Right-hander Cristian Alvarado (7-9, 5.00 ERA) will start tonight for the Keys.

The last two championships by O's affiliates were won by Frederick in 2011 and Bowie in 2015. For playoff ticket information, go to Baysox.com and FrederickKeys.com.