O's mash four homers in shutout of Yankees, take series opener

For a team that had scored three or fewer runs in 24 of 46 second-half games (going 3-21), tonight's second inning was quite welcome.

The team leading the majors in homers mashed three of them in a span of four batters to take an early 6-0 lead. The Orioles went on to blank New York 8-0 in front of 24,226 at Camden Yards to start a three-game series. Dylan Bundy and three relievers teamed on a two-hitter for the O's sixth shutout.

Looking to end a five-series American League East losing streak, the O's take the opener to improve to 73-61 overall, to 44-24 at home and to 29-25 in division games.

There were two outs and a man on second after J.J. Hardy's double in the O's second when Adam Jones blooped a single to center off Chad Green to give the Orioles a 1-0 lead. Green may have wanted to keep the score right there, but it would change in a hurry over the next few hitters.

Pedro Alvarez crushed a 3-2 pitch, a 93 mph fastball, 424 feet onto Eutaw Street and that made it a 3-0 Orioles lead. Alvarez hit No. 20. It was the 88th homer onto Eutaw Street and 40th by an Oriole in Camden Yards history. It was the sixth this year by an Oriole and second for Alvarez (also on May 8).

Green then walked Manny Machado and left the game with a trainer. Later, it would be announced he had right elbow pain.

Then the Orioles greeted reliever Nick Goody badly. Chris Davis blasted a two-run homer for a 5-0 lead and Mark Trumbo followed with a solo shot for a 6-0 edge. It was the 17th time the O's have hit-back-to-back homers. Davis hit No. 33 on a 1-1 fastball and Trumbo hit No. 41 off an 0-2 pitch.

With Alvarez's homer, the Orioles have six players with 20 or more homers, becoming the 19th team in major league history to do that. The last was Toronto in 2010 with seven players. The 1996 Orioles are the only other club in O's history to do so and they had seven players hit 20 or more.

The Orioles added a fourth homer of the night when Machado blasted a two-run shot to left in the fourth. That made the lead 8-0. Machado hit No. 33 on the first pitch. He drove in his 299th and 300th career runs.

According to STATS, LLC., Machado is the second-youngest Oriole in club history to reach 300 career RBIs, behind only Boog Powell. Powell did so at 24 years, 38 days and Machado at 24 years, 58 days.

The Orioles have hit 11 homers in their last four games versus the Yankees and 37 in the last 16 games overall. They've hit 213 for the season.

Bundy didn't need all those runs tonight, but he'll take it. He pitched 5 2/3 scoreless innings on just two hits with four walks and five strikeouts. The same team got to him for five runs in four innings last Saturday in the Bronx. But tonight, he threw 97 pitches, 63 for strikes. This was Bundy's second scoreless start of the year and he improved to 8-5 with an ERA of 3.47. O's starters have pitched to an ERA of 2.51 over the last five games. Donnie Hart went 1 1/3 innings, while Vance Worley and Tommy Hunter went one inning each.

In the second game of the series on Saturday night, right-hander Kevin Gausman (6-10, 3.73 ERA) faces lefty CC Sabathia (8-11, 4.31 ERA).