Holliday gets first hit, helps O’s avert sweep
BALTIMORE — Jackson Holliday delivered his first big league hit in the seventh inning, then scored the tiebreaking run to help the Baltimore Orioles avoid a sweep with a 6-4 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers on Sunday.
“Pretty relieved,” said Holliday, baseball's topranked prospect. “It's very nice to finally get it out of the way and just kind of enjoy playing baseball now versus trying to fight for a hit.”
Holliday struck out in his first two at-bats and was 0 for 13 with nine Ks since his call-up before he came up with the Orioles down 4-3 in the seventh. With a man on first and no outs, Holliday pulled a 99 mph offering from reliever Abner Uribe (1-1) into right field for a single.
“Someone made a joke that he just had to face someone with 100 I guess,” teammate Colton Cowser said.
Then the rookie infielder flashed his speed, barely making it from first to third on Gunnar Henderson's RBI single. That was an important extra base, because it enabled Holliday to score and put the Orioles up 5-4 when Adley Rutschman bounced into a double play.
At 20 years, 132 days, Holliday became the youngest Orioles player to produce a hit since Manny Machado (20 years, 85 days) did it in 2012.
“If you go 0-for for three or four games, it's going to happen in baseball,” Holliday said. “I'd prefer it not to be at the beginning of my career, but it's going to happen. I'm glad to hopefully learn from it.”
Cowser went deep the following inning for Baltimore's third solo homer of the day. Holliday stranded two runners that inning with a groundout.
Cedric Mullins and Ryan O'Hearn also homered for Baltimore.
Yennier Cano (2-1) got four outs for the win, although he allowed a solo homer in the seventh by Blake Perkins that put the Brewers up 4-3. Danny Coulombe finished the eighth, and Craig Kimbrel allowed two singles in the ninth but struck out three for his third save.
Baltimore's Corbin Burnes allowed two earned runs in five innings against his former team. The Brewers traded Burnes to the Orioles in the offseason, and William Contreras greeted him with a leadoff homer in the first.
Milwaukee had tied a franchise record by scoring at least seven runs in six straight games. That included 11 each in two wins in this series. Regression hit hard Sunday, however. Milwaukee went 2 for 17 with runners in scoring position after going 33 for 69 over those previous six games.
The Orioles have gone 96 consecutive regularseason series of at least two decisions without being swept, although they did lose the AL Division Series to Texas last year in three straight games.
BLUE JAYS 5, ROCKIES 0
José Berríos and two relievers combined on a two-hitter, Justin Turner had three hits and three RBIs and host Toronto earned its second shutout victory of the season.
TIGERS 4, TWINS 3
Mark Canha's two-run double highlighted a fourrun eighth inning for host Detroit as it rallied to avoid a sweep. The Tigers trailed 3-0 after seven innings, but took the lead against Caleb Thielbar and Griffin Jax.
PIRATES 9, PHILLIES 2
Andrew McCutchen hit his 300th home run, Jack Suwinski had a grand slam and visiting Pittsburgh gained a split of the four-game series. Phillies star Bryce Harper was 0 for 4 and is in a 2-for-30 slide that has dropped his average to .190.
BRAVES 9, MARLINS 7
Marcell Ozuna hit a three-run homer off Tanner Scott with two outs in the ninth inning as visiting Atlanta took two of three from Miami.
RED SOX 5, ANGELS 4
Masataka Yoshida hit his first homer of the season, one of three home runs by host Boston.
GUARDIANS 8 YANKEES 7 (10)
Andrés Giménez's sacrifice fly capped host Cleveland's wild, threerun rally in the 10th inning as it salvaged the finale of a three-game series.
REDS 11 WHITE SOX 4
Christian EncarnacionStrand tied a career high with four RBIs as visiting Cincinnati completed the three-game sweep.
METS 2, ROYALS 1
Harrison Bader broke a scoreless tie with an infield single in the eighth inning, and Edwin Díaz earned his first save at Citi Field since October 2022 on a day when former Mets great Dwight Gooden's No. 16 was retired.
ASTROS 8, RANGERS 5
Jose Altuve homered off Nathan Eovaldi in his first two at-bats for Houston.