Orioles come out swinging early and Wells is untouchable in 10-0 win (updated)

BOSTON – The Orioles got loud in the first inning tonight against a soft-tossing left-hander who gave up nothing against them in an earlier game.

Rich Hill was down a couple runs just three batters into his start. The outs also made noise. There was no hangover for the Orioles after the previous day’s lopsided defeat.

Hangovers and loud noises don’t mix anyway.

Ryan Mountcastle hopped out of the batter’s box after crushing a full-count curveball, hoping to land on the other side of his slump. Ramón Urías got into the act in the third with a two-run shot to dead center field measured at 422 feet.

Tyler Wells grabbed lots of attention by shutting out the Red Sox over six innings, the longest scoreless outing of his career, Mountcastle had four hits, and the Orioles defeated the Red Sox 10-0 at Fenway Park.

The Orioles won three of the five games in the series and went 4-4 on the trip. They host the Mariners Tuesday night.

"That was huge," Mountcastle said. "It seems like that was really like the first time we really just put a team in the dirt a little bit early, and it felt good to get out to a big lead, and hopefully we can keep it going in the homestand."

Wells matched his career high in innings and set a new mark in pitches throw with 88, 64 of them for strikes. He allowed only two hits, walked one and struck out three. Eighteen of 21 batters retired.

"That was six innings, hardly any traffic, only gave up a couple hits," said manager Brandon Hyde. "Not many punchouts, but I thought he had all four pitches working, was working ahead in the count the entire night, fastball velocity stayed throughout the six innings. Kept guys off-balance and just threw a ton of strikes. He was outstanding."

Hill hit Austin Hays to begin the first inning and Trey Mancini followed with his first triple since July 17, 2021 in Kansas City, and the 11^th of his career. Mancini was out at the plate trying to score on a pitch that got past catcher Christian Vázquez, and Mountcastle settled for a solo shot above the Green Monster.

Mancini’s ball hit near the top of the wall in left-center, 401 feet away with an exit velocity of 106.9 mph. Mountcastle’s traveled 418 feet and was 107 mph off the bat.

Urías lined to center field, his exit velo at 103.1 mph. Anthony Santander was the weakling of the group at a mere 99 mph on a fly ball to the base of the left field wall.

Jorge Mateo tripled to center field with one out in the second – his fourth extra-base hit in four games - and was stranded. He did, however, join the velo club at 102.4 mph.

Mountcastle reached on an infield hit in the third and Urías obliterated a slider, his exit velo 104.1 mph. The ball landed in the far-right corner of the Green Monster above the yellow vertical tape.

Seven of the first 10 balls put in play against Hill were 99 mph or higher. And the Orioles led 4-0.

Players in the clubhouse this afternoon watched Urías’ younger brother, Luis, homer for the Brewers. One Oriole jokingly asked Urías if he knew the guy.

They also homered together on April 12, 2021. Tonight marked the first time it happened since Kyle and Corey Seager on Sept. 4, 2021, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

Mountcastle doubled in the fifth after Mancini’s leadoff walk, and Hill was removed from the game. Hirokazu Sawamura let both inherited runners score, leaving Hill with six runs, on Santander’s sacrifice fly and Urías’ grounder.

The Orioles were getting their second look at Hill this season. He tossed four scoreless innings with one hit allowed at Camden Yards.

Mateo was 3-for-33 before starting his extra-base streak. Mountcastle was 3-for-19 with eight strikeouts in his last five games, 5-for-28 with 11 strikeouts in seven and 7-for-39 with 14 strikeouts in 10.

One already began to bust out, and the other found his stroke tonight, getting his fourth hit in the ninth inning before Santander’s three-run homer off Matt Barnes.

"I feel like I've been seeing the ball great," Mountcastle said, "just not really getting the bat on the ball, and today I finally did."

"It was a matter of time for him for me," Hyde said. "Ryan's going to put up big numbers at the end of this year. He's just got to be a little bit patient and the homers are going to come, the hits are going to come."

Wells threw all 11 pitches for strikes in the first inning and 20 of 26 through the second. He retired 12 of the first 14 batters through the fourth, throwing 56 pitches, and struck out two batters in the fifth while stranding Trevor Story after a leadoff walk.

Fifteen of 18 were retired in his 10^th career start and first against the Red Sox, and Hyde let him return for the sixth inning at 75 pitches – four short of his previous high.

"We're always going to evaluate throughout the outing," Hyde said. "He didn't have any baserunners. He only gave up two hits and one walk, and that was kind of spread out. We factored in a lot of things throughout his start and he was cruising tonight."

Wells rewarded Hyde’s faith by getting two ground balls and a fly ball as Dillon Tate warmed. His ERA dropped from 4.30 to 3.71.

"Holty (Chris Holt) asked me how I was feeling, and they immediately came up after I sat down and told me I was going back out," Wells said. "I assume it was just kind of a situational thing, given us playing five games in four days, bullpen being taxed, and given the pitch count I was at, I think it just opened up an opportunity for me to go back out, and that's exactly what we did.

"I was talking to Hyder the other day during BP," Wells said. "Given kind of the situation that we've been in with like what I would classify as restrictions, we were having a conversation about it and I told him, 'I'm trying to go out there and pitch as long as I can for as long as you'll let me,' and so far I've felt really good, I felt really good tonight. But if I do get to a point where I need to communicate with them, 'Hey, maybe I'm not feeling great,' or whatever, then I'll have that conversation, but so far it's been great."

Wells was mostly in sync with catcher Adley Rutschman and praised the rookie later.

"He's a huge part of it," Wells said. "He's been great at game calling both times that I've had him. I shook him off a few times tonight, but we talk a lot, he's really good at communicating. I told him after the game that I was extremely proud of him and what he's been able to do. He's a great kid, and I told him, 'Just communicate with me. Anything you see, anything you want to do, any ideas that you have, feel free to come to me and talk to me about it.' So far, he's been awesome and I'm really happy to have him back there."

Tate struck out two while retiring the side in order in the seventh and lowering his ERA to 1.80. Boston had only five baserunners all night.

Hays led off the top of the seventh with a double against Ryan Brasier and Mancini dumped a single into center field. Plate umpire John Tumpane was nailed in the mask by Mountcastle’s foul ball and came out of the game, causing a long delay. Most of the Red Sox players walked to the dugout.

They returned and saw Hays score on Mountcastle’s double play grounder for a 7-0 lead.

Mancini singled in the ninth, giving him three hits and a walk for the second game in a row. He’s 37-for-99 (.374) this month.

Rutschman caught a shutout and had two hits, including a double in the eighth clocked at 100.4 mph.

Always room for one more in the hard-hit parade.

"This road trip was not easy, especially being here in Boston, playing a bunch of games," Mountcastle said. "For us to almost give our legs a little bit of a rest with how well we pitched, it was great."

"Being here, being able to compete with the guys, the atmosphere in the clubhouse is great," Wells said. "It feels awesome to be able to take the series from them and being able to have that happy flight home."

Said Hyde: "Wellsy set the tone for us, but we also swung the bat extremely well. We haven't had many games where we get a nice lead for our starter and allow him to go for a while. We did that tonight. ... This is one of our better, if not our best offensive game. We hit numerous balls hard, took really good at-bats throughout the order, and just really happy with our overall performance tonight."