Orioles option Phillips, wrapping up 16-5 loss

The Orioles are making another adjustment to their beleaguered bullpen.

Right-hander Evan Phillips has been optioned to Triple-A Norfolk and a corresponding move will be announced before Friday night's series opener in Cleveland.

Phillips faced four batters tonight without recording an out. He let two inherited runners score in the sixth inning after replacing Tanner Scott, walked two batters and served up a grand slam to Kevin Plawecki in the Mets' 16-5 win at Camden Yards.

Acquired in the July 31 trade that sent pitchers Kevin Gausman and Darren O'Day to the Braves, Phillips has allowed eight earned runs (10 total) and walked six batters in only 3 1/3 innings. He leaves behind a 21.60 ERA.

The move was anticipated despite another off-day arriving on Thursday.

Dylan Bundy was charged with seven runs and 11 hits in 5 1/3 innings to raise his ERA to 4.99. He stated again while standing at his locker that health isn't the issue.

"I feel fine," he said. "I made some good pitches tonight and they were just able to find some holes out there. I left a few pitches up in the zone and they were able to get me. They had the homer and that triple there in the sixth inning."

Is there a common link between these difficult starts?

"This game, I couldn't really see too much," he said. "I looked at the pitches on video and most of them were right where I wanted them to go. I've just got to keep looking at video and find out where I'm going wrong."

Bundy has righted himself in the past and will try to figure out how to get back to his pre-Atlanta form.

"You've just got to keep fighting, keep going out there every five days and things will turn around eventually," he said. "I've just got to keep making pitches."

Rookie catcher Austin Wynns shared responsibility for the latest implosion.

"We didn't have command," he said. "His fastball, we were up, we were trying to go in and they just executed. Slider, curveball, change. Basically just execution. And they found all the holes, found the holes in the field and couldn't bounce back from it."

Manager Buck Showalter used three relievers in the sixth inning and they combined to allow seven runs.

"I never witnessed that and that was definitely tough," Wynns said. "Let's try to never do that again. We were all around the zone. Just couldn't locate, bottom line. Just couldn't locate."

The mystery that again has become Bundy will keep bringing questions to Showalter.

"He's not very crisp with his command," Showalter said. "He'll make a couple good pitches and just can't finish the at-bat sometimes. A couple of flares hurt him.

"We know what Dylan is capable of, he just hasn't been able to get there. It's been off and on since the leg injury. He's just not able to carry into the game that consistency that we know Dylan has shown us."

Bundy sprained his ankle while running the bases in a June 23 game in Atlanta, but Showalter hasn't been given any indication that there are lingering effects from it.

"If you see his work days and the things that he does between starts physically, it would be hard to paint that picture," Showalter said. "Certainly you look at those things and you're very aware it, especially when you have that history with him and know when he's good. An extended period where he hasn't pitched like we know Dylan can.

"It's frustrating for him. You can see it. He gets into a sequence when he's got the right pitch to throw and he can't get it where he needs to and now the count gets to where he has to give in, somewhat. And he hasn't carried that three-pitch mix in a while."

Is the solution to skip a start and freshen him up? And does it counteract the goal of increasing his innings?

"If you talk about building innings that means he's gotten a lot of rest," Showalter said. "Every day we update where every pitcher is with guys we have here, guys we might need coming here and where they are in their inning count, their innings pitches, times up, reps, everything. Regardless of what our win-loss record is, (it's important), the health of your people and your pitchers.

"Dylan, I don't want to say he's trying to play catch up, but he's in a good spot as far as innings and starts where you'd like to have him at the end of the season to be ready to go forward. You maybe have to look at it a little differently because sometimes ... He's missed some time this year, so I don't know. We'll look at it again. We constantly do. And most importantly get feedback from him.

"He's very honest about it. It's almost like at times he would rather have some issue physically. But when you don't, which at this point we don't think, you have to look at a lot of different reasons."

The Mets sent 12 batters to the plate in the sixth, scored nine runs and broke open the game. They had totaled four runs against the Orioles in the first three meetings.

"It's tough," Showalter said. "You sign up for the good and the bad. We've got some guys trying to pitch through some inexperience and paying a tough price sometimes. The tough ones survive it.

"I thought (Cody) Carroll was better tonight. Evan couldn't stop the bleeding there, and it was a struggle for us in the pitching department all the way around for the most part with the exception of a somewhat clean inning.

"Usually you think Dylan gets through the first inning, he's going to step on it and get going there. He just always seem to be a pitch ... especially the bottom part of the order. When you see the bottom part of the order doing some damage, which just about everybody did. They were a completely different hitting club than they were last night, which tells you we pitched a whole lot better last night with the personnel we had out there."

Adam Jones had a run-scoring single in the first inning, as the Orioles collected three hits against Zack Wheeler. They stranded two runners in the second and wasted a leadoff single and walk in the fourth.

"I actually thought we had some good at-bats off a really good pitcher, Wheeler," Showalter said.

"We were right on, very close to opening him up. I think there were six line drives tonight caught, maybe five, how you define it. Regardless, if we could have held them there at that point, a lot of different looks you can throw at them, but now you're just trying to get through the game. We've done that quite a few nights."