August 12-14, 2013. Three games, three Arizona Diamondbacks walk-off wins against the Orioles.
August 9-12, 2015. Four games, two walk-off wins (one each by the Angels & Mariners), & one no-hitter thrown against the Birds. (Fortunately, the O’s had a win sandwiched in there.)
The first set of dates is widely considered the series in which the dream ended for the 2013 Birds. Trying to follow up their magical 2012 run with another postseason appearance, the wheels came off in the desert, and though the team managed back-to-back winning seasons, more October baseball in Charm City was not to be. Not that year.
Will a very similar set of dates – one that has a day of overlap – be looked back upon much the same way for the 2015 Orioles?
For now, the overlap of dates and the stretch of heart-wrenching losses is just a coincidence – it’s nothing more than that…unless the Orioles allow it to become more.
This isn’t a piece about how fans need to have perspective, and the team is still just 2.0 games back of the second Wild Card spot, so the season is far from over, etc. While those things may be true, as a fan I recognize the emotional baggage that comes from seeing our squad embarrassed like they were yesterday.
After being no-hit by Hisashi Iwakuma on Wednesday afternoon – the first time they’d been held hitless in a ballgame since back in the dark years (2007 to be exact) – the Birds need to bounce back in the worst way.
That 2007 lineup looks laughable, yes:
But, if you’re truly honest with yourself, is it all that much worse than this one?
I see the same amount of .300+ hitters (one), and more sub-.260 hitters in the second one. When you’re running out Jimmy Paredes, Ryan Flaherty, and David Lough, you’re basically handing the other team three innings worth of outs before you even take the field.
That right there is a recipe for getting no-hit if I’ve ever seen one. The saddest part is that the 2015 Orioles have jettisoned such players as Ryan Lavarnway, Everth Cabrera, Chris Parmelee, Delmon Young, and Travis Snider, and they STILL have a lineup full of holes that is extremely listless far, far too often.
While, based on those standings stated above, this may still end up being a playoff team, it’s very, very hard to imagine them as a legitimate World Series contender – not with juggernauts like Toronto and Kansas City in front of them. I’m not throwing in the towel by any means – just calling a spade a spade.
When it comes down to it, I can stomach missing the postseason, should it come to that. What I can’t stomach is a downward spiral that culminates in a sub-.500 finish. A September like the ones we saw during the darkest years of the mid-2000’s: the 10-19 of 2007, the 5-20 (!!) of 2008, the 6-20 of 2009. Let’s not do that again, please?
Yes, all of those were pre-Buck. That’s a key point here keeping many of us sane: that Showalter won’t allow that to happen. Unfortunately, for some, the faith in even the great Buck to ward off the coming of the other shoe is starting to waver.
You see, being a Baltimore Orioles fan is a bit of a unique thing. We’re a timid bunch, constantly haunted by the ghosts of Cesar Izturis, Hayden Penn, Daniel Cabrera, and a curious vial of vitamin B12. After being beaten down by 14 straight years of losing, the fan base as a whole is always kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop.
For many in Birdland, that aforementioned series in 2013 was it – THAT was the other shoe dropping. The “experts” who had called the Orioles “lucky” in 2012 were right, and it was all just a fluke, and the cheap owner and blundering GM were ready to let the squad slip into another decade-plus of irrelevance. The jig was up. The Birds were again to be the laughingstock of the AL East.
The “I told you so” brigade was out in full force.
Then, of course, 2014 happened. 96 wins, a division title for the first time since the Clinton administration, an ALDS sweep of Detroit, and ALCS games at Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Life was again peachy in Birdland.
However, many of even the most O’ptimistic, orange sunglass-wearing, orange kool aid-chugging Oriole fans (raises hand) couldn’t help but flinch at every losing streak, ducking at the perceived approach of that proverbial shoe that still hung perched high above our heads, held at bay by the collective will of Buck Showalter, a million Oriole fans, and the breeze created by opponents’ bats when Darren O’Day was on the mound with the bases loaded.
Wednesday, as Iwakuma tossed perfect frame after perfect frame (with the stray walk here and there), Birds fans found ourselves sucked back in time to the dark years. The doom-and-gloom tweets were flying, and the ol’ “Told ya!” soldiers were shouldering their rifles. It was, of course, to be expected. Fans get emotional after losses, and even more so after those of the humiliating variety. Facebook/Twitter – our collective watering hole for grievance airing – isn’t always the best place to search for rational thoughts, and many are likely regretting things they e-said in the heat of the moment yesterday afternoon.
Still, the fears of impending terror & irrelevance are real, even if 140 character bursts of them tend to overstate the situation.
The Orioles need to bounce back and prove that no, this isn’t a return to the dark years.
To send the naysayers within our own ranks packing once again, back into their holes, where they’ll again plot and scheme and prepare to bust out the pitchforks at the next losing skid.
And to keep those of us who’ve learned to stay, for the most part, optimistic, give them the benefit of the doubt, and just enjoy the ride…well, to keep us sane.
Here’s to three of four from Oakland, huh? If you can, get out there Friday, pack the Yard, welcome our boys home…and give a warm ovation when they manage their first hit since Tuesday.
