O’s achieve another MB first

ANAHEIM, CALIF. – The Orioles’ 2019 season is beginning to hold quite a bit of real estate in the major league record books. Not all the records have been positive, but the latest has provided its share of victories.

In Saturday’s 8-7 victory over the Los Angeles Angels, home runs from Pedro Severino and Jonathan Villar made the Orioles the first team in major league history with multiple home runs in 10 consecutive games.

The 35-69 club has gone 7-3 in that span and will try to earn its first series sweep of 2019 on Sunday.

“We didn’t have guys who played in multiple All-Star Games up and down our lineup, but we do manufacture runs,” Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said. “We score runs. We hit homers.

“What I like is, I think our guys are getting better over the course of the season and are taking better at-bats than they did the first couple of months and understanding how to win here, understanding how to score runs. That, for me, has been impressive.”

Closer Mychal Givens got the last four outs, getting Justin Upton to pop out to second baseman Hanser Alberto to leave the bases loaded in the ninth. Alberto’s two-run single had broken an eighth-inning tie after the Angels (54-52) had hit hit three home runs themselves, each erasing an Orioles lead.

Mike Trout answered Severino’s two-run single in the first — the first of the catcher’s four hits — with a two-run home run, tying his own franchise record with 12 homers in July. After David Fletcher scored two with a double off Orioles starter Aaron Brooks in the second, Severino returned the lead to Baltimore by following Anthony Santander’s RBI double with a two-run home run, matching his career high with four RBIs.

“This is amazing,” Severino said of the Orioles’ homer spree. “There are a lot of young talent guys we have over here, we teach them how to play baseball. Second half they’ve looked much better than first half. We’ll keep working and see what happens at the end of the year.”

Shohei Ohtani took Brooks deep in the bottom of the third to again even the score. Brooks, making his fourth start for the Orioles, retired nine of the next 11 Angels. His 96 pitches were his most in a major league game since Oct. 2, 2015, with the Oakland Athletics, while his five innings made it his longest outing as an Oriole by four outs.

He was in position for his first win with Baltimore after Villar, serving as the designated hitter because of minor leg soreness, homered in the sixth. It was Villar’s second of the series after hitting the game-winning two-run shot in the 16th inning of Thursday’s epic.

It also gave the Orioles the distinction of being the only team to hit at least two home runs in 10 straight games, breaking a tie with a group of five other clubs that included the 1987 and 1996 Orioles. The record joins a collection of others the team has achieved: Chris Davis’ record hitless streak, the pitching staff’s record pace of allowing home runs, their consecutive 13-0 shutouts against the Cleveland Indians and Stevie Wilkerson’s save early Friday morning, the major leagues’ first by a position player.

Miguel Castro relieved Brooks and promptly allowed a game-tying home run to Albert Pujols on a ball that narrowly cleared the short fence in the right-field corner. It was Pujols’ 100th career home run at Angel Stadium, making he, Mark McGwire and Orioles legend Frank Robinson the only players with 100 career home runs in both an American League and National League ballpark.

But Castro retired the next five batters he faced. Richard Bleier entered and set down the three Angels he faced before Givens came in to close out the game. He got Pujols to end the eighth, but three straight one-out base runners in the ninth brought up Trout with the potential winning run on base. Givens struck him out and intentionally walked Ohtani before inducing the gameending popout for the Orioles’ 13th victory in their past 24 games.

“We’ve been battling,” Givens “That’s the name of the game.”

Smith exits with calf soreness

said.

Orioles left fielder Dwight Smith Jr. exited the game with left calf soreness in the middle of the third after grounding out to short to end the top half of the inning.

Santander moved from center to left and Wilkerson entered the game in center. Smith, hitting .235 with 12 home runs, is day-to-day.