Wrapping up a 6-4 loss

BOSTON - Kevin Gausman had a pretty good idea tonight that he wasn't coming back out for the fourth inning. A six-run deficit would hold his fingerprints, but the game no longer was in his hands.

Manager Buck Showalter decided that a 39-pitch third inning was too much for Gausman, who remained winless as an Orioles rally fell short in a 6-4 loss to the Red Sox at Fenway Park.

The bullpen offered up five scoreless innings, including 2 2/3 from Odrisamer Despaigne in his Orioles debut. Adam Jones hit a two-run homer in the seventh, and Matt Wieters and Jonathan Schoop each had an RBI in the eighth, but the game ended with the teams again tied for first place in the American League East with identical 37-27 records.

"I think just falling apart, not being able to throw my secondary pitches for strikes," Gausman said. "They came out looking for a fastball and I thought today was one of the best command days I've had with my fastball, but when you have to rely on that you're just kind of putting yourself in bad situations."

It got worse for Gausman when Hanley Ramirez hit a three-run homer in the third to give Boston a 6-0 lead.

"It's frustrating," Gausman said. "I'm kind of in a little funk right now. Feel like I'm throwing the ball well, but a couple pitches here and there. Make quality pitches, hang a breaking ball when you can't do that.

"Hanley Ramirez is a pretty good hitter. He put a good swing on it. It's very frustrating. But I try to go back to the drawing board and take a couple good things from it. Good fastball command, but other than that, I just wasn't very good today.

"Especially with after the way (Chris) Tillman pitched last night, I was really excited. Wanted to be the stopper again today. Didn't do it. In a game where, against a team that's really good, and obviously a series that means a lot right now, I wanted to come out and kind of hit the ground running and pitch well and I just didn't do that."

Gausman was done after only 71 pitches. The three innings were a season low.

"That's one of those things. I always want to go out there," Gausman said. "I didn't want to let us get to the bullpen that early in the game. But Despaigne came in and picked me up, and really picked the whole bullpen up. I commend him for that. He did a great job.

"I obviously would have liked to go back out there, but when you get to a point where you're throwing 40 pitches in an inning, you've got 70 through three innings, that's kind of laboring. Obviously, I respected his opinion."

The frustration grew for Gausman as he watched the Orioles try to spare him the loss with four late runs.

"That's the thing, I've said it from Day One with this lineup, it's just a matter of time," said Gausman, who's winless in his last 17 road starts. "I felt like once we got (Steven) Wright out of the game, if we don't have to face a knuckleballer, I think we've got a pretty good shot. Obviously, he's pitching really well, but I think if I pitch to my abilities, I think we maybe have a chance to win that game."

Mark Trumbo singled twice off Wright and was robbed of another hit on a diving stop up the middle by Dustin Pedroia.

"It's difficult," Trumbo said. "It's more approach than technique, I guess. And there's some luck involved, too. Some of those pitches are moving quite a bit, so you just hope to get one that maybe doesn't move quite as much and catches more plate."

The Red Sox kept flashing the leather, with right fielder Mookie Betts making a nice running catch of Manny Machado's liner down the line leading off the eighth. The defense was top-notch from the first pitch to the end.

"It was excellent," Trumbo said. "They're a really good ballclub. It's not surprising when they do stuff like that. It's going to be a battle all the way. We need do our best to kind of hang with them."

Wright allowed three runs in 7 1/3 innings after tossing a complete game in the last matchup. Advantage or disadvantage to seeing him again?

"It's really hard to say," Trumbo said. "It's all about the quality of the pitch that you get. He's obviously got a really good thing going this year. He's pitching very well, performing well. It's going to be a battle each and every time.

"I saw some improvement from us today, so there were some good takeaways. We made it a tight ballgame."

The six-run deficit was just too much for the Orioles, who have lost four of their last five games.

"It wasn't his best game," Trumbo said of Gausman. "It's going to happen. He was aggressive, but it seemed like they were kind of in sync with what was going on. They didn't miss any pitches. He didn't get any breaks. A team like this, they're prone to do that. You just kind of have to wear it and look forward to the next time."

"He was strong," Showalter said. "He was crisp. Their guns here are a couple of miles an hour fast. You could tell he felt good, almost maybe too good. I'll let him respond to it. I'm not going to respond to it. He'll know a lot more about it than I do.

"It's a good team. He had too good of stuff to give up six runs. A good offensive team. We did a great job out of our bullpen, our guys battled back in. They made, it seemed like, four or five good defensive plays where you're looking at a different type of game. That's why they're where they are. We've done that in this club, too."

Left-hander Brian Duensing followed Odrisamer with 1 1/3 scoreless innings, retiring David Ortiz on a long fly ball to right field to strand two runners in the sixth, and Dylan Bundy stranded two in the eighth after surrendering back-to-back two-out singles.

"I was impressed with our guys out of the 'pen," Showalter said. "Dylan, every time you give him three to five days, he's pretty crisp. It bodes well for the future. Despaigne got out there, and he'll throw the kitchen sink at you and get some outs. "

Showalter wasn't sending Gausman back out for the fourth. It would have to be another bullpen night for the Orioles.

"He threw I think around 40 pitches that other inning," Showalter said. "I thought toward the end, that last hitter, he was struggling a little bit. Just trying to protect him. That's a lot of pitches in three innings and we have 98 games left."

Wright's ERA fell to 1.99 before the Orioles pushed it up to 2.22 with three runs off him.

"Look at it this way, he's got the best ERA in the American League and if he was in the National League, it's usually half a run, he might be leading all of baseball," Showalter said. "Look at the guy leading in the other league. It's Clayton Kershaw at 1.50-something and that's about the equivalent of what an American League ERA is, so we knew we were going to have our work cut out for us. The bullpen held him in check and we took a run at him.

"He's good. He's like (David) Price. You know what he's going to do and he does it. What's he featuring? You don't go over it in an advance meeting. He's got a good sneaky fastball he mixes in there, too, especially when they get a lead. He's not as brave with it when it's a one-run game, but he's good. He's been good for a while. They're lucky to have him, really a weapon. Pitching doubleheaders, three days' rest, four days' rest, extra-inning games. It's a heck of a weapon."

So is the defense behind him.

"They have as good a defensive outfield as you'll see as a group," Showalter said, "and tonight was an example of it."

Showalter already had been updated on shortstop J.J. Hardy, who played seven innings tonight at Double-A Bowie and went 1-for-3 with a walk.

"Everything went well," Showalter said. "He's got early work tomorrow at 3 and probably talk to him afterward on the way back to Baltimore and we'll see where we're going to go. It's all going to be up to him. He'll make the call. It won't be anything before Friday. He'll have to wake up and make the call."

The Orioles have allowed 10 or more hits in four of their last six games, all of them on the road, and have surrendered six runs or more in three of their last four.

The Orioles have homered in six consecutive games, their second-longest streak this season. They reached 11 games April 6-19.

Jones has three home runs and five RBIs in his last three games against the Red Sox and is 9-for-24 with four multi-hit games in his last five.

Schoop extended his hitting streak to six games, going 8-for-22 with four RBIs in that span.

Chris Davis was 0-for-25 against the Red Sox before his single in the sixth inning.