O's game blog: The series opener at Milwaukee

With a 20-10 road record on the year, the Orioles open a series at Milwaukee tonight looking for yet another series win and another road series win.

On the season, the Orioles are 13-5-1 in series play and they are 8-2 in road series. They lost their first road series of the season at Boston and have lost just one road series since then, at Atlanta. Since losing that series to the Braves they have won their past three road series at Toronto, New York and San Francisco, going 7-2 in the last nine road games.

According to Stats Perform, the Orioles’ 20 road wins in their first 30 away games ties for the second-most ever by an O’s club in the first 30 road contests. It trails only the 1969 club that won 23 of its first 30 on the road.

The American League East as the Milwaukee series begins:

* Tampa Bay, 43-19 (.694)

* Baltimore, 37-22 (.627), 4 1/2 games behind

* New York, 36-25 (.590), 6 1/2 GB

* Toronto, 33-28 (.541), 9 1/2 GB

* Boston, 30-30 (.500), 12 GB

The Orioles won 3-2 Friday at Oracle Park in San Francisco, lost 4-0 Saturday night and won the series with Sunday’s 8-3 victory.

The Orioles are 14-5 in series-opening games and ended a three-game losing streak in such games with Friday’s win. They are 9-1 in road series openers.

O’s catcher James McCann hit his third homer of the year in Sunday’s win. Seven of his 15 hits on the season have gone for extra bases. He's also hit four doubles.

O’s catcher Adley Rutschman scored the 100^th run of his career in that game. He is the second Oriole ever to have 100 runs in his first 171 games, joining Brian Roberts, who scored 103 in his first 171.

Milwaukee (32-28) begins this series half a game out of first place, trailing Pittsburgh in the National League Central. The Brewers lost 2-0 to Cincinnati yesterday, missing out on a four-game sweep of the Reds. The Brewers got off to a 6-1 start this season and they were 18-9 on April 29. But since that point, Milwaukee is 14-19.

The Brewers, who are 16-12 at home, have lost three series to AL East clubs, going 1-2 each versus the Red Sox, Rays and Jays.

Tonight right-hander Kyle Gibson (7-3, 3.89 ERA) will make his 13^th start of the year. The Orioles are 8-4 in his outings.

Per Stats Perform, if Gibson is a winning pitcher this evening, he will be the first O’s pitcher with eight wins in his first 13 starts of a season since Jimmy Key was 10-1 in 1997.

Over his past three games, Gibson is 3-0 with a 1.83 ERA and has gone seven innings twice. He has a 2.93 ERA over his past five starts, allowing a .241 batting average and .616 OPS.

Gibson’s career wins high is 13, set in 2014. His current strikeout rate of just 5.9 per nine innings is also his lowest since that 2014 season.

Among the AL stats leaders, Gibson is tied for third in wins, tied for sixth in homer rate (0.75/9), tied for eighth in innings (71 2/3), 10^th in fewest pitches per inning (15.4) and 20^th in ERA.

Right-hander Freddy Peralta (5-5, 4.62 ERA) gets the start for the home team, his 12^th. Over his past four starts, his ERA is 7.32 and he has allowed a .980 OPS. The Brewers are 5-6 in his games this year, and he does have seven quality starts. He has never faced the Orioles.

The Brewers have a minus-21 run differential, while the Orioles are plus-30.