Once more, everything goes right for O’s at home
and beaten four times on it, Showalter expressed his relief to be home, where the surroundings are familiar.
Those surroundings would continue to provide the backdrop for his team’s success.
On Sunday, the Orioles swept an Indians team that entered the series with the American League’s best record and had ceded that title to the Orioles by the time they left town. The Indians are still the best road team in baseball, but even they couldn’t grab even one of three games in Baltimore.
The Orioles climbed to 36-14 at home, and are on pace to go 58-23 at Camden Yards this season. That would be the most home victories by any team since the 1998 New York Yankees went 62-19 en route to a 114-win season.
Since Major League Baseball installed a second wild-card playoff spot for the 2012 season, every AL team that has won 50 home games has made the playoffs. There have been 14 such teams, though none has had as wide a disparity between home and road fortunes as these Orioles.
Their struggles away from Camden Yards this season, where they are 21-26, put them on pace for a more ignominious distinction. At their current rate, the Orioles’ projected 36 road wins would be the second-fewest of the dual-wild-card era in the AL, ahead of only the Houston Astros’ 33-48 mark from last season.
Away from Camden Yards, it seems little has gone right this year. Outfielder Mark Trumbo said he hopes it doesn’t get to a point where the difference in their play is too vast.
“We probably could have done a little better job sometimes on the road, but the effort’s still there,” Trumbo said. No such equivocating is required when they’re in Baltimore.
This homestand featured just about everything that has made the Orioles wreckers at home in 2016. They homered early and often, with first-inning home runs by Trumbo on Friday and Saturday staking them to 3-0 leads in both games. On Friday, shortstop Manny Machado added insurance, and designated hitter Pedro Alvarez did on Saturday. The Orioles’ Jonathan Schoop points to Manny Machado after scoring on Machado’s fourth-inning single. Schoop also hit his 17th homer of the year.
On Sunday, second baseman Jonathan Schoop’s 17th home run of the year gave the Orioles a 3-2 lead, and after a rare slip by reliever Brad Brach, Reimold hit the team’s sixth home run of the series — this one in the ninth inning for a walk-off win.
Of the Orioles’ 148 home runs this year, 80 have come at home.
“I don’t know what it is but for some reason when we do come home we do seem to play allaround better,” Vance Worley, Sunday’s starter, said. “I don’t know if it’s because of our home fans or what, but we just seem to click. When we need big hits, we get it done.”
Camden Yards has also been a haven for the Orioles’ pitchers this year. Their team ERA is 3.82 at home and 4.73 on the road. The Orioles’ current starters have an impressive 2.81 home ERA between them, even if that comes with the caveats of Yovani Gallardo spending half the season on the disabled list, plus Worley and Dylan Bundy spending all but the past few weeks in the bullpen.
The Orioles will certainly embrace the home success.
“You want to play consistent in both places, but if for whatever reason it shakes out that we’re far more comfortable here, you’ve got to roll with it,” Trumbo said. “I think it can play to your advantage when teams come in, that sometimes if you can plant that seed a little bit, it can work with you.”
There seemed to be some of that in play in the series with Cleveland. The Indians twice failed to turn routine double plays, causing runs to score and innings to extend. In the crucial ninth inning Sunday, the ball got past Indians catcher Roberto Perez when Alvarez struck out.
Perez’s throw up the first-base line plunked Alvarez on the head, allowing the Orioles DH to reach safely. With an extra out to work with, the Orioles turned to Reimold, who turned on a fastball and was rewarded with water coolers dumped onto his head at home plate.
“A win like that, you can look back at the end of the year and look through and kind of think about some wins that told you a little bit about the team, what it was composed of and the guys that were on it,” said reliever Darren O’Day, who returned from the disabled list Sunday and earned the win. “I think it has the makings for a really strong team. You kind of felt that in spring training, but you learn more about yourself and about each other as the year goes on.”