Mychal Givens on his improved recent pitching (and other notes)

It probably gets somewhat lost amidst what else happened in Sunday's win by the Orioles, but righty reliever Mychal Givens recorded another scoreless inning. He rolled through a 1-2-3 top of the eighth on just eight pitches, all fastballs.

Givens had an ERA of 7.04 after his first six games of the 2018 season. But he has now allowed just one run over his past six innings. In his last four games he's pitched four scoreless innings on two hits with two walks and seven strikeouts. This has lowered his season ERA from 6.52 to 4.61.

Yesterday he averaged 94.8 mph on his fastball and threw his fastest pitch at 95.4 mph.

"It was good," Givens said of his strong but quick eighth inning. "Been putting up a couple of good outings lately. In that situation tried to give us a chance and with Pedro (Alvarez's) bat we got a win today."

Givens is pitching better than he was earlier in the year, but he hasn't made any adjustments or changes.

"Nothing has changed. Just trying to go out there and get outs. Didn't have as much luck as I wanted in the beginning of the season, but it's a long year and you have to keep grinding and keep working," he said.

As the Orioles get ready to begin a six-game West Coast road trip at Anaheim on Tuesday night, at least they have some momentum after taking two of three versus Detroit. This was just their second series win of the season and first at home after losing their first four series at Camden Yards against Minnesota, Toronto, Cleveland and Tampa Bay.

"This was really important since next we have a good, competitive team like the Angels. We need to go the West Coast and have a good road trip," Givens said.

The Orioles are now 5-10 at home and 3-10 on the road. They have played nine series, going 2-7.

The Orioles were scheduled to face Japanese right-hander Shohei Ohtani on Tuesday night at Angels Stadium but he recently suffered an ankle injury and is not expected to make that start. He could start the series finale on Thursday. Ohtani is 2-1 with a 4.43 ERA in four major league starts. He has allowed seven runs over 7 1/3 in his past two starts against Boston and Houston. Ohtani is also being used as a hitter by the Angels. In 12 games he is batting . 341 with a double, one triple, four homers, 12 RBIs and an OPS of 1.065.

Even with Sunday's win and the series victory, the Orioles are 12 games under the .500 mark. It is a bit daunting to think they could win 10 in a row and would still be an under .500 club.

The Orioles went 2-4 against the Angels in 2017 and the clubs have split their past 24 games. Since 2013, the Orioles are 9-7 in Anaheim.