O's game blog: Jordan Lyles faces the A's in Oakland

OAKLAND – The Orioles have not been able to take much advantage of the outstanding pitching they have been getting with the team scoring so few runs. They are holding the other teams’ offenses down, but right now it’s not translating into wins.

So they hope today will be the day to turn that corner and get into the win column in Oakland, where they have lost 5-1 and 2-1 to begin this four-game series and 10-game road trip.

The last two nights, O’s pitchers have held the A’s to three earned runs on 12 hits, but still no wins. The frustration just grew here on Tuesday when the Orioles hit 10 balls in play at 100 mph or more and yet seven were turned into outs. Right now they’d love to just see a bloop fall with men on base to get something going. The momentum they hoped they had built in Sunday’s win over Yankees is long gone now.

The Orioles (3-8) begin play looking for their first road win of 2022 at 0-5, and they are in fifth in the American League East and three games behind the Red Sox, Blue Jays and Yankees – all tied for first at 6-5.

In this series the O’s have scored just two runs on 15 hits, going 1-for-13 with runners in scoring position. They have scored two runs or fewer in eight of their 11 games, with a season high of five runs.

But on the mound the team is ranked with some of the best pitching staffs in baseball to begin the season. The team ERA has gone down twice in this series. It was 3.04 at game time Monday and then fell to 2.86, and last night fell further, to 2.81. That is second-best in the American League (behind only New York at 2.48) and fifth-best in the majors.

The rotation pitchers have been on a real roll. In this series, Spenser Watkins and Chris Ellis combined to allow one run over 9 1/3 innings. O’s starting pitchers have allowed two earned runs or fewer in eight consecutive games, allowing one or none in seven of the eight games and five in a row. On April 13, John Means allowed two earned runs in four innings. That was statistically the poorest start in the last eight games. The rotation ERA is 1.30 in those games.

Right-hander Jordan Lyles (0-1, 5.23 ERA) gets the ball today at Oakland. In his two starts he has allowed 13 hits and six runs in 10 1/3 innings. After he gave up five runs versus Tampa Bay in his season debut, he went 5 1/3 innings Friday against New York and had a strong outing, yielding six hits and one run on 91 pitches.

Lyles has been using his fastball 47 percent with an average velocity of 91.8 mph. He’s throwing his slider 22 percent, curveball 16 percent and changeup 15 percent and his change is producing a 38 percent whiff rate.

In eight career games (six starts) versus Oakland, he is 3-2 with a 4.22 ERA and 1.367 WHIP over 49 innings. In three career games at Oakland Coliseum he is 2-1 with a 4.15 ERA.

Right-hander Daulton Jefferies (1-1, 1.93 ERA) will start for Oakland. He allowed two hits and no runs in his first start at Philadelphia and gave up two runs and seven hits over 4 1/3 in his last outing at Toronto.

Jefferies averages 92.6 mph on his fastball, which he uses 52 percent. He throws his changeup 21 percent and uses his cutter 16 percent and slider 11 percent.