Coming into this weekend’s series with the Athletics, Baltimore needed some Oriole Magic to try and get back into the running for the playoffs.
Well, second baseman Brian Roberts may have rubbed the magic lamp and let some of the magic out.
Roberts continued to swing a hot bat, hitting his third home run of the year, his first grand slam since 2009, to lift the Orioles to a 9-7 win over the Athletics on Friday. The win brings them within two games of the last wild card spot in the AL. It was great to see the longest tenured Oriole produce in a big game after battling injuries over the last few years.
Francisco Rodriguez struck out two batters in his one inning of work to record his second win of the season and closer Jim Johnson worked a perfect 9th inning to record his 40th save of the season. Johnson was showered with cheers as he was introduced after blowing his previous three save chances.
By winning their 69th game of the year, The Orioles jumped over the Indians for third place in the Wild Card hunt.
Just how you thought the game would go, right?
Center fielder Adam Jones also homered, his 27th of the year, to start the scoring for the birds, who would have to mount two comebacks in order to seal this win. Oakland quickly jumped ahead with one run in the 1st, and two in the 3rd inning. Jones then sent a Dan Straily pitch over the out of town scoreboard in right to get the birds on the board.
The home runs by Jones and Roberts helped bail out a shaky Bud Norris who pitched to a line of 9 H and 7 ER over 4 2/3 innings.
The Oriole bullpen, which has been scrutinized over the last few weeks, came up big Friday, shutting down the Athletics over the final 4 1/3 innings, allowing only four batters to reach base. The bullpen outing tonight was a very encouraging sign, and hopefully Johnson took a step in the right direction to get back on track to his lights out closing days of last year.
Johnson appeared to have his confidence back and looked like a totally different pitcher. The players noticed too.
“I thought tonight he came out really aggressive.” Roberts said after the game. “We all looked at each other and were like, `Whoa. This is almost a different guy.”
By the way Jim, I know you and Oriole fans have had your differences this season, but congrats on becoming the first Oriole reliever with multiple 40 save seasons.
After being down twice in this game it would have been easy for the Orioles to pack it in and focus on tomorrows game. They didn’t. The birds fought back and got a much needed win.
Maybe this is the game we look back on in October where we can say, “This is where they turned it around and strung some wins together.” And while it’s only one win, the Orioles did a lot of things they hadn’t been doing in previous games, such as clutch hitting, and getting a solid effort from the guys in the bullpen.
Do you think this game could be a season changer? Lets hope so.
One Response
Let’s hope you are right. Go O’s!!!