O's notes on Davis, Cruz, O'Day, extra-inning homers and more

Chris Davis hit 33 homers in 2012 and 53 in 2013. But going into the 11th inning last night, some Orioles fans probably considered him among the most unlikely O's to homer at that point.

But he did just that. When Orioles fans probably least expected it, there it was. Davis with a two-run bomb to right-center and the floodgates opened.

The Orioles hit three homers and scored six times in the 11th inning to stun the Nationals 8-2 at Nats Park. The club continues on a roll and is now a season-high nine games over the .500 mark at 49-40.

Toronto lost again Monday night, 5-2 at Los Angeles, and the Blue Jays have lost five in a row. The Orioles' American League East lead has grown to three games.

The fine folks at Camden Chat, checking the Baseball-Reference.com Web site (no doubt navigating better than I can), sent me a note last night in response to my question via Twitter wondering if the O's had ever hit three homers in a single extra inning. The finding was that the Orioles had never hit three extra-inning homers in the same game, much less the same inning.

Orioles history, in the 11th inning Monday night at Nats Park.

More notes on the O's:

* In winning back-to-back extra-inning games, the Orioles played 23 innings over 8 hours, 44 minutes against the Red Sox and Nationals.

* Since he returned from his suspension, Manny Machado is 9-for-17 in three games with two doubles, a homer and two RBIs. He had a career-high five hits last night. Over his last 11 games, Machado is batting .404 with four homers and eight RBIs. He has hit four homers his last seven games.

* Over his last three games, Nelson Cruz has five, three and three hits. He is 11-for-16 in that stretch with three doubles, two homers, five runs and five RBIs.

* In 45 road games, Cruz is batting .346 with 11 doubles, 18 homers, 51 RBIs, a .709 slugging percentage and an OPS of 1.108. Yes, that is ridiculous.

* The O's offense is heating up, for sure. Over the last three games, the O's have scored 22 runs on 47 hits, with 15 or more hits each game.

* Over their last nine games, the Orioles have scored 57 runs on 103 hits and a team average of .303 along with 18 doubles, a triple and 17 home runs.

* The Orioles have scored seven runs or more six times the last nine games.

* The Nationals began Monday's game with the best ERA in the majors and were second in the National League with a plus-59 run differential.

* Nick Markakis leads all active players and ranks fourth all-time with an interleague batting average of .341. He went 3-for-6 last night.

* Before Cruz had five hits Saturday night, the last O's player with a five-hit game was J.J. Hardy on May 6, 2012 in a 17-inning game at Boston. Now, after Machado's five-hit game the O's have had two in the last three games.

* Davis has two homers, both go-ahead blasts, in the ninth inning or later in the last 14 days. He entered that stretch with two go-ahead homers in such situations in his entire career.

* According to MASN's "O's Xtra" postgame show last night, Darren O'Day's 34-pitch outing last night was the most pitches he has thrown in 176 games as an Oriole. O'Day has put together nine consecutive scoreless outings. In that time he has pitched 10 scoreless innings on seven hits with one walk and 13 strikeouts.

* The O's have won seven of eight games heading into tonight's contest at Nats Park, where Bud Norris (7-5, 3.62 ERA) pitches against Doug Fister ( 7-2, 2.93).