Are the Orioles bats… back?
Baltimore successfully rebounded from an underwhelming loss in the series opener, notching a 6-2 victory in each of the last two games and claiming the series against the San Francisco Giants.
Though Birdland finally has some offense to cheer about, the series generated injuries to some key players.
Catcher Adley Rutschman was unexpectedly scratched from Saturday’s lineup and placed on the 10-day injured list with ankle inflammation.
O’s Place Adley Rutschman on 10-Day IL With Left Ankle Inflammation
His replacement in the lineup, Ryan Mountcastle, suffered a broken bone in his left foot while he was rounding first base during Saturday night’s contest. His MRI on Sunday revealed a fracture in the fourth metatarsal, an injury that standardly requires six to eight weeks of recovery time.
The latest development in Oriole injuries is outfielder Tyler O’Neill, who reportedly suffered a concussion after fainting from dehydration on Baltimore’s off day. He has since been placed on the seven-day concussion injured list, marking another significant blow to the team’s key contributors.
Nonetheless, the O’s powered through it and picked up a giant series victory.
Baltimore’s series finale started hot.
Samuel Basallo, who caught in consecutive games in wake of Rutschman’s untimely injury, went liftoff in the first inning. Baltimore’s former top prospect took an Adrian Houser sinker 396 feet into left-center field for a two-run homer, his second of the young season.
The bats cooled temporarily before Pete Alonso scorched a double into left field, driving in two more Orioles runs and giving the team a 4-1 lead in the fifth inning.
Alonso, whose batting average slumped to .167 before Sunday’s game, notched his third multi-hit game with the O’s. The win also marked the second time Baltimore’s $155 million first baseman reached base three times in a game.
Coby Mayo kept things going in the sixth inning with an RBI single that drove Leody Taveras in from second. Mayo collected RBIs in back-to-back games against the Giants, something he did just twice all of last season.
Colton Cowser followed suit in the next inning, reaching base on a soft dribbler to the left side of the infield and driving in Baltimore’s sixth run of the game. Cowser, like many of the team’s hitters, was in the midst of a slump before he slashed three hits in the past two games.
The bottom of the lineup was just sizzling hot in the final two games of the series.
And one player largely responsible for that was second baseman Jeremiah Jackson, our Player of the Series.
Jackson entered the series hitting .214/.233/.214 on the year.
Fast forward three games against the Giants, and he has brought that line up to .275/.286/.375. Jackson went 5-for-12 against San Francisco, collecting nine total bases and tallying his first home run of the 2026 season.
A much needed offensive explosion from Jackson and his teammates in the back-end of Baltimore’s lineup.
And after the Giants spoiled Shane Baz’s third start in the O’s city connect debut, the surge from the team’s six through nine hitters was satisfying for Birdland.
Baltimore sprayed 20 hits across games two and three of the series.
One of those came from Gunnar Henderson’s league-leading sixth home run, which he accrued in the third inning of game two. Henderson was the only Oriole to amass a hit in each game of the series.
The clutch factor, however, still remained absent, as the O’s batted just 4-for-29 (.138) with runners in scoring position. The team also left 25 runners on base across the series, tying a series high that they set just days ago against the Chicago White Sox.
Yes, the burst was nice, but there is still much more work to do.
The team earned a 8-7 record with the win, floating above .500 for the first time since beating the Minnesota Twins on March 29 to achieve a 2-1 record.
And after a sweep of the New York Yankees by the Tampa Bay Rays, 8-7 is just enough for Baltimore to be grouped in a three-way tie atop the AL East.
Key Takeaways
The bottom of the lineup is pivotal to the hitting product.
Baltimore’s bottom of the lineup has arguably been the team’s weakest point through the first five series of baseball.
Entering Friday night’s game, three of the team’s regular six through nine hitters—Jackson, Cowser and Mayo—had batting averages under .225. Before the series, the O’s had not exceeded six runs in a game since April 1.
The back-end of Baltimore’s lineup plays such a crucial role in the run total after nine innings, especially with two of the O’s most promising hitters, Alonso and Basallo, slumping.
The team’s six through nine hitters slashed a combined .304 batting average (14-for-46), totaling eight RBIs, three doubles and a homer.
And, they tied a season-high for most runs scored in a series (15) because of it.
Gunnar Henderson is coming for MVP.
Henderson is not messing around this year.
The All-Star shortstop blasted his sixth home run of the season, standing alone as the MLB’s home run leader before St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Jordan Walker crushed his sixth and seventh long shots on Saturday and Sunday.
Henderson has now homered in four of his last six games and five of his last nine.
He is hitting .242 on the new season with a .919 OPS, and has accounted for most of Baltimore’s offensive life over the past week.
After a year where he notched a full season career-low 17 home runs, Henderson seems to have his eye set on the AL MVP, or at the very least, a home run title.
The bullpen continues to dominate.
There has been so much chatter about Baltimore’s tandem of relief pitchers across the past few months.
‘Unproven’ was the term most people, including myself, used to describe them.
And while they may still justifiably hold that title, the bullpen has given fans a lot to be pleased with recently.
Against the Giants, Baltimore’s ‘pen posted a combined 3.37 ERA, allowing four runs across 10 ⅔ innings.
That may seem average, but three of those four runs stemmed from a shaky outing by the O’s most recently added arm, Nick Raquet. Remove his inning, and Baltimore’s bullpen ERA for the three-game stint is 0.93.
Rico Garcia, Grant Wolfram and Anthony Nunez are among the arms that have stood out across the bullpen’s recent surge. The three kept San Francisco scoreless, combining for five strikeouts and just one hit allowed across 3 ⅓ innings.
The O’s next two opponents, the Arizona Diamondbacks and Cleveland Guardians, each have 9-7 records, so the bullpen will need to stay composed as Baltimore potentially faces its toughest stretch to date.
