Extra, extra: Orioles beat Jays in 12 innings,
Castillo ties the game with ninth-inning homer, Trumbo single ends it in the 12th
BALTIMORE— There are all sorts of factors to a blown save, more than a few of which Roberto Osuna believes he has dealt with this year.
But on Sunday, the young reliever only blamed himself for giving up a game-tying solo home run to Welington Castillo in the bottom of the ninth inning.
The Orioles went on to nab their second extra-innings win of the series, a 5-4 victory sealed by a 12thinning RBI single from designated hitter Mark Trumbo.
After throwing three fastballs Castillo’s way in the ninth, Osuna switched to a cutter. But he left the pitch up in the zone for Castillo to whack to left field. It was Osuna’s sixth blown save since the all-star break and his ninth of the season, tied for the most in Major League Baseball.
“I haven’t changed anything,” he said. “It’s mostly one thing at a time. But for the first time I felt like today I’ll take full responsibility. Before it was little bloopers and stuff like that. Today I thought I had the guy with that cutter but he got the best of me.”
The 13th walk-off loss of the season could have been a reckoning moment for a team that started the day 14 games back in the American League East, but bench coach DeMarlo Hale, again filling in for manager John Gibbons, didn’t expect it to hurt his team’s psyche heading into a series against the Boston Red Sox.
“This team is battling and I appreciate the effort these players are putting forth and we’re going to roll into Boston and continue to compete at this level,” Hale said.
Toronto started the series finale as it finished Saturday’s blowout win, with the long ball. Josh Donaldson hit a three-run homer in he third, bringing in Teoscar Hernandez and Richard Urena, who was making his first big-league start. It was Donaldson’s 200th extra-base hit with the Jays.
Lefty Brett Anderson, in his second outing for Toronto, allowed three runs on seven hits over six innings. And while Anderson gave up a pair of solo homers — to Castillo in the third and Trumbo in the fourth — it was the third run that annoyed him.
He had an inkling someone might eventually ambush his curveball and Jonathan Scoop did just that, leading off the sixth with a double and eventually scoring on a Trey Mancini sacrifice fly.
Still, Anderson took some solace in keeping his team in the game.
“Unfortunately it didn’t work out in the end but more times than not, against this lineup in the day, I’ll take it,” he said.
Toronto’s immediate response came through Ryan Goins, who led off the seventh with a double before scoring when pinch-hitter Michael Saunders smacked a hard two-out single down the first baseline and off first baseman Chris Davis’s glove.
Relievers Tom Koehler and Ryan Tepera held down the slim lead for Osuna, who coughed it up against the first batter he faced. Carlos Ramirez, making his second appearance as a Blue Jays, took the ball in the 10th inning. He pitched two frames, leaving the mound with his perfect 0.00 ERA intact.
Osuna was admittedly frustrated on a day when he became No. 3 on the franchise’s list of blown saves in a single season.
“When you’re pitching a good game and the team is playing well and just little things like that get you out of the game,” he said. “Concentration gets a little bit away too when stuff like that happens but hopefully it’s going to get better.”