Orioles shut out in penultimate home game of 2021 (updated)

Zac Lowther turned to watch the ball and slapped his glove against his leg. Knowing where it would land and the implications. Perhaps also knowing that one run might be too much for the Orioles to overcome against Nathan Eovaldi.

J.D. Martinez's 28th homer of the season, a solo shot to center field with one out in the second inning, was the only run surrendered by the rookie left-hander through the fifth. Plenty of hard-hit line drives, but nothing to influence the score.

That happened in the sixth.

Rafael Devers led off with a single and Lowther was removed after 73 pitches. Kelvin Gutiérrez committed a two-base fielding error on Xander Bogaerts' ground ball and both runners scored on Martinez's double against Eric Hanhold.

The Orioles couldn't answer back after building their own rally in the bottom half and lost to the Red Sox 6-0 before an announced crowd of 8,732 at Camden Yards.

Eovaldi spun six scoreless innings with four hits allowed and seven strikeouts, Alex Verdugo had a two-run single off Konner Wade in the eighth, and the Orioles fell to 51-107 overall and 5-13 against the Red Sox heading into Thursday night's final home game.

Tonight marked the season's 10th shutout.

The last appearance for Lowther impressed based on his grit, with only one earned run and two total on his line. He scattered eight hits, walked none and struck out four, and lowered his ERA to 6.67.

"It showed that he kept battling," said manager Brandon Hyde. "I thought they took some good swings off him early. He escaped with only giving up one run there in the second. Putting up zeros there in the third, fourth, fifth, and pitching into the sixth inning. Kind of gave up a jam single to Devers with the heart to their order coming up. Gave up some hard hits, but I thought he changed speeds well, got some big outs when needed, got some double play balls to get him out of some jams. Did a nice job keeping us in the game. We just didn't score tonight."

Hanhold kept the game from getting out of hand after Martinez's double with two strikeouts, a wild pitch and ground ball freezing the margin at three runs.

Cedric Mullins led off the bottom half with a double and Ryan Mountcastle drew a seven-pitch walk after falling behind in the count, but Austin Hays flied out - just missing a hanging curveball - Trey Mancini struck out and Pedro Severino flied out.

Ryan McKenna drew a leadoff walk against Ryan Brasier in the seventh and was stranded.

Eovaldi stranded Hays in the first inning after a two-out double and struck out five of his first seven batters.

Gutiérrez led off the third with a hustle double, but Richie Martin lined out, Mullins grounded out and Mountcastle popped up. Severino's two-out single in the fourth also brought nothing to the table.

Eovaldi walked only one batter to raise his season total to 35 and finished the regular season with a 3.75 ERA and 195 strikeouts in 182 1/3 innings.

Lowther did a fine job of keeping the score 1-0 into the middle innings. Among the hits allowed were singles by Verdugo and José Iglesias to begin the fifth, but Kiké Hernández grounded into a 5-3 double play, with Gutiérrez again showing off a strong arm, and Hunter Renfroe flied out on Lowther's 68th pitch.

Iglesias and Hernández singled in the third to place Lowther in a serious jam, but Gutiérrez caught Renfroe's line drive and fired to second base for the double play.

Devers singled and was erased on a force.

"To face a good offense in really must-win games for them right now and giving up one run into the sixth inning, I think that's a real positive going forward and taken into next year," Hyde said. "Great experience for him. All of these guys are getting great experience pitching in this type of environment against these types of clubs."

Lowther allowed one earned run in 10 innings over his last two starts and struck out 11 batters.

"Very encouraging," Lowther said. "Just a lot of the stuff that we have been working on finally coming to fruition. The past two weeks have been very dedicated work, and just getting in a rhythm up here. It's been really promising for me to see that my stuff, I don't have to change anything, I just have to have a plan, go attack these guys and do my thing out there."

The Orioles squeezed in five starts for Lowther this month. What did he learn from them?

"Just to trust my stuff," he replied. "We have so much data and analytics on what we do well and what the other team does, so just being able to kind of read that stuff and apply it to myself and throughout the week work on stuff that I didn't do well in my last outing or stuff that I need to make more crisp."

Brooks Kriske retired all three batters faced in the seventh. Wade fell into a jam in the eighth on back-to-back one-out singles by Bogaerts and Martinez and a two-out walk to Travis Shaw, and Verdugo singled for a 5-0 lead.

Spenser Watkins was handed the ninth inning, retired the first two batters and surrendered a home run to Renfroe.

Note: Triple-A Norfolk's Ofelky Peralta allowed two runs and four hits in five innings tonight against the Durham Bulls. Isaac Mattson struck out two in a perfect inning, but Paul Fry allowed a run in the seventh with no hits and one walk.

A fielder's choice after the walk, a ground ball and a stolen base tagged Fry with a run.

Patrick Dorrian, Cadyn Grenier and David Lebron moved up to the Tides from Double-A Bowie.