Over the weekend, the Orioles completed an unlikely three-game sweep of the Texas Rangers, and as a result surpassed Ron Washington’s club in the Wild Card standings. It was just the Birds’ second three-game sweep of the season, with the other coming June 28-30 against the New York Yankees at home.
The O’s outscored Texas 14-7 in the series, and despite three straight testy ninth innings, held on each time for some much-needed post-ASB momentum. In fact, the Birds have now won four straight games in Texas going back to the 2012 Wild Card game, and in each contest the Rangers have threatened in the ninth only to ultimately be turned back.
Our own Gordon Dixon put together a few GIFs from the series, which we’ll feature here.
From Friday: Nick Markakis robs Adrian Beltre of a home run.
Beltre has been an O’s nemesis this year, belting several home runs in a series at OPACY prior to the ASB. Though he finally broke through in his final AB of this series, Nick Markakis made sure he didn’t get off to the start he wanted to on Friday, with this amazing catch.
After the game, Nick said that it was the first time in his life he had ever taken a HR away from somebody.
On Saturday, O’s rookie Henry Urrutia made his MLB debut. After striking out in his first AB with the bases juiced, “Hank” got another shot with the sacks full in the top of the fourth.
This time, he came through.
Congrats to Urrutia on his first MLB hit and RBI (he likely would have had two RBI on the hit, were any Oriole other than Matt Wieters and his refrigerator rounding third). Here’s to many, many more of both.
Just prior to scoring on this hit, Chris Davis had decided to use third base coach Bobby Dickerson as a towel (this GIF c/o @OriolesGIFs).
Also on Saturday night, Jim Johnson came in to close things down for the second straight night.
Ian Kinsler looked to get things started for Texas with a slow roller toward third base. Of course, that’s pretty much the worst place to hit a slow roller against the Orioles these days.
Manny Machado, naturally, took care of business in spectacular fashion.
Let’s also give a nod to Chris Davis for a great catch while keeping his foot on the bag to nail the speedy Kinsler.
Hopefully this upcoming four-game set in Kansas City will feature as many great plays (and at least as many wins) by the O’s.
