O's game blog: O's host Manny Machado and the San Diego Padres

By Steve Melewski

Orioles

June 25, 2019, 3:06pm

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With a 1-6 west coast trip in their rear-view mirror, the Orioles begin a two-team, five-game homestand tonight. They'll host former Oriole Manny Machado and the San Diego Padres tonight and tomorrow afternoon. Cleveland comes to Baltimore this weekend.

The Orioles are 22-56 overall and 9-28 at home. They have lost 11 of 12, 15 of 18 and 19 of their last 24 games. The Orioles are 0-16-1 over their past 17 series.

Third baseman Hanser Alberto is batting .338 (26-for-77) in 19 June games and his 26 hits are tied for the 12th-most in the AL. He's batting .406 (41-for-101) against left-handed pitching, the highest average in the majors. He is hitting .353 in 32 road games, compared to .259 in 31 home games.

Trey Mancini has hit safely in all six Interleague games on the season, batting .400 (10-for-25). He has hit safely in 15 of 18 games with an at-bat this month, batting .324 (22-for-68) in June.

Catcher Pedro Severino is batting .328 (21-for-64) against left-handers, compared to .244 against right-handers. His .840 OPS ranks as the fifth-highest among American League catchers (min. 170 PA). Severino has thrown out 8-of-22 baserunners attempting to steal this season and his 36.4 percent caught stealing rate is the third-best in the majors (min. 10 attempts).

San Diego lost three in a row at Pittsburgh after winning five of six games. At 38-40, the Padres are fourth in the NL West, 15 games behind division-leading Los Angeles. Tonight they play the Orioles for the first time since June 29, 2016 in San Diego. This is their first visit to Baltimore since June 22, 2016.

Machado returns to face his former team tonight. He is batting .278/.354/.493 with 16 homers and 47 RBI's after signing a 10-year, $300 million free agent deal. His bat is red-hot at the moment. He has an 11-game hitting streak batting .469 (23-for-49) with six doubles, six homers, 16 runs and 14 RBIs. He has an RBI in a career-best seven straight games.

Right-hander Jimmy Yacabonis (1-1, 4.70 ERA) will start tonight's game as the opener. Since his latest recall on June 15, Yacabonis has thrown 5 1/3 scoreless on two hits with three walks and seven strikeouts. In eight career Major League starts he is 0-2 with a 4.45 ERA. He pitched as an opener last Wednesday at Oakland and threw two scoreless on 31 pitches.

Lefty Logan Allen (1-0, 0.00 ERA) tonight will make his second MLB start. Last Tuesday he had some debut, throwing seven scoreless on three hits against Milwaukee. An eighth-round pick by Boston in 2015, Allen was traded by the Red Sox to San Diego in the deal where Boston acquired closer Craig Kimbrel on Nov. 13, 2015.

The 22-year-old Allen entered 2019 ranked as the No. 74 prospect in baseball by MLBPipeline.com and was No. 80 on ESPN and No. 92 by Baseball America. At Triple-A El Paso this year he went 4-3 with a 5.15 ERA over 13 games. During an eight-start stretch from April 15-May 24, he pitched to an ERA of 1.91 with a WHIP of 1.12.

On the farm: Short season Single-A Aberdeen has added these 2019 draft picks - OF Kyle Stowers (CBB), C Maverick Handley (6), RHP Griffin McLarty (8), RHP Connor Gillispie (9), RHP Kyle Martin (15), RHP Shelton Perkins (16) RHP Morgan McSweeney (17), RHP Malachi Emond (18) and RHP Jake Lyons (22).

Moving from Aberdeen to the Gulf Coast League Orioles are right-handers Andrew Ciolli and Jose Alejandro along with left-handed pitchers Jason Montville and Nick Meservey and infielder Zach McLeod. The Orioles released righty Parker McFadden.

Right-hander Pedro Araujo today moved from Double-A Bowie to Triple-A Norfolk. He was 1-2 with a 4.55 ERA for the Baysox.

Earlier I wrote about Adley Rutschman's introductory press conference right here.