O's notes and quotes before the Cincinnati series begins

Even with a loss on Monday afternoon, the Orioles are having a pretty good homestand. They have gone 3-1 in both series and are 6-2 with three games left on the homestand.

The Orioles have outscored their opponents 47-27 during these last eight games, with a team batting average of .279, scoring 5.9 runs per game and with a team ERA of 3.00.

Monday's loss was just the 11th by the Orioles this year when they hit two or more homers. They are now 41-11 with a multi-homer game.

Kevin Gausman had an interesting answer when asked about all the homers the Orioles have hit this year. He basically said he has come to expect them and enjoys watching the show when he is not pitching.

"You're just kind of waiting for it, to be honest," Gausman said. "What is fun is it can be anybody in our lineup. It's fun to come to the park every day. Four out of five days, I'm kind of a cheerleader. Cheer these guys on and get to watch good baseball."

The Orioles' magic number to clinch their first American League East title since is 1997 is 19. Gausman said the players know the standings, even if they don't much talk about them.

"We think about it, but it's one of those things we don't talk about," he said. "We know what is going on around the league and how many games we are up. We face a tough month with all these AL East teams. If we can come out of this with a good solid month, think we've got something special."

Catcher Nick Hundley said no one in the O's clubhouse is getting too far ahead of themselves right now, even with an 8 1/2-game division lead.

"We have a great opportunity in front of us. The first five months, we put ourselves in the position to be successful in the last month. So if we go out and continue to win series and we'll be where we want to be," Hundley said.

The Orioles host the Cincinnati Reds tonight and it's the start of their final interleague series of the 2014 season.

Chris Davis said it's a little strange to be playing a September series against a National League foe.

"Yeah, it's a little different. But we have to treat it like any other series. Have to win as many games as possible. If we just focus on the nine innings ahead of us, we'll be fine," Davis said.

The O's need to take two of three from the Reds to have a third straight winning year of interleague play. The Orioles went 11-7 in 2012 and 11-9 last year. They are 9-8 this season against the NL. The Orioles, who had just two winning seasons in the first 11 years of interleague play, are 67-60 in these games since 2008.

Right-hander Evan Meek was a September call-up and pitched a scoreless ninth inning yesterday. The right-hander went 2-0 with a 1.94 ERA and 16 saves this year for Triple-A Norfolk and this is his fifth stint in 2014 with the Orioles.

Meek ended his time with the Tides with 13 consecutive scoreless innings, allowing seven hits with one walk and 11 strikeouts over 13 innings. He has pitched to an ERA of 1.17 since May 11.

On the attendance front, Sunday's crowd of 33,156 put the Orioles over the two-million mark. The season total is now 2,026,018.

With 13 home dates remaining, the Orioles are on a pace to draw 2.42 million fans for the season. That would be the largest home attendance since the Orioles drew 2.62 million in 2005.