O's game blog: Birds, Royals play series finale at Oriole Park

The Orioles have not won a series for almost a month and that run can end tonight. They've split the first two games against the Kansas City Royals with the series-deciding game set for tonight.

Baltimore's last series win was July 25-28, when they took three of four from the Los Angeles Angels in Anaheim. Since then, they split with San Diego and Toronto, and lost series to New York, Houston, New York and Boston.

Kansas City beat the Orioles 5-4 on Monday night and the O's came back to win 4-1 last night at Oriole Park. Hanser Alberto's three-run homer in the eighth broke a 1-1 tie and lifted Baltimore to a win.

The Orioles (40-86) got win No. 40 last season on Aug. 29. They ended an eight-game losing streak last night and won for just the second time in 15 games. They are 19-44 at home and 4-15 in August.

Three homegrown O's pitchers - right-handers Dylan Bundy, Hunter Harvey and Mychal Givens - combined on a six-hitter with 10 strikeouts. Bundy allowed just one run over seven innings and has allowed three earned runs or less in 17 of his 24 starts. He went seven innings or more for the third time on the year and O's pitchers have done that just 10 times this season.

In his second appearance, Harvey got his first major league win, touching 99 and 100 mph as he fanned two batters in a scoreless top of the eighth. He held a 1-1 tie and Alberto's homer then put the O's ahead in the bottom of the frame.

Alberto hit his first career go-ahead home run. The homer extended his hitting streak to a career-high nine games, batting .351 (13-for-37) in this stretch and he's batting .354 (23-for-65) in 18 games in August.

Jonathan Villar went 1-for-4 and he has hit safely in six straight games, hitting .455 (10-for-22) in this stretch. In 19 games this month, he's batting .338 (24-for-71). Since the All-Star break, Villar has batted .313 (47-for-150) in 37 games.

Third baseman Rio Ruiz drove in the game-tying run with his RBI single in the seventh inning. Ruiz is hitting .310/.375/.619 (13-for-42) with 10 RBIs in 18 games since the All-Star game. He is batting .350 (7-for-20) in eight games in August and has driven in a run in four straight home games.

Right-hander Aaron Brooks (2-7, 6.49 ERA) gets the start tonight for the Orioles. He's allowed five runs or more in four of his past five starts. Over his last two games, he's allowed 17 hits and 14 runs over 8 1/3 versus Houston and Boston.