O’s lose by walk-off grand slam in 12th
DETROIT — A matchup of the two worst teams in baseball, somehow, lived up to the hype.
The Orioles were one out from a second straight victory against the Detroit Tigers, the only team with a worse record than them, when leadoff hitter Victor Reyes hit a game-tying solo shot off Baltimore closer Mychal Givens in the ninth. After they again gained a lead in the top of the 12th, it evaporated when Ryan Eades entered with the bases loaded and one out and issued game-tying, four-pitch walk before serving up a walk-off grand slam to John Hicks in an 8-4 loss.
The defeat lowered Baltimore’s lead on the Tigers to 31⁄2 games with 14 to play while delivering their 100th loss of 2019. After suffering through triple-digit defeats only twice from 1954 to 2017, the Orioles (48-100) now have back-to-back 100-loss campaigns.
Givens was pitching for the third time in four games when he allowed his careerhigh 11th home run. He only had a lead to protect in the ninth because Trey Mancini’s 32nd home run was a go-ahead, three-run shot in the eighth, spoiling a Tigers (44-103) shutout bid.
Rio Ruiz delivered a go-ahead single in the top of the 12th, but after Paul Fry loaded the bases, Eades was unable to get an out in his third appearance in the three weeks he’s been an Oriole.
Mancini comes through
After the Orioles opened this four-game series with a victory, manager Brandon Hyde called it “a beautiful thing” to watch Mancini hit an opposite-field home run.
Mancini gave his manager all the reason to feel the same way about pull-side blasts with Saturday’s eighth-inning, three-run home run to spoil Detroit’s shutout bid and put the Orioles ahead 3-2. Of Mancini’s 32 home runs, 24 have been straightaway
Detroit’s pitching combination of Daniel Norris and Drew VerHagen held Baltimore scoreless through the first seven innings. Bryan Garcia got the first two outs of the eighth before consecutive singles by Hanser Alberto and Jonathan Villar, with an error on the latter putting both runners in scoring position. Mancini then sent Garcia’s elevated 1-0 slider out to left for his third home run in eight games after hitting none in his prior 19 starts.
Bullpen’s strong run fizzles
The Tigers tagged Orioles start Gabriel Ynoa for two runs on Harold Castro’s third-inning solo shot and the Victor Reyes RBI single that ended his evening with no outs in the fifth.
From there, an Orioles bullpen that entered play with baseball’s best relief ERA since Aug. 20 continued that run. Lefthander Tanner Scott retired the two left-handed batters he faced around an intentional walk to Miguel Cabrera before yielding to Dillon Tate, who got the last out of the fifth to strand two then pitched a scoreless sixth. Richard Bleier covered the seventh and the first out of the eighth, with Miguel Castro finishing the frame.
After Reyes tied the game with what was only his second home run of the season, Shawn Armstrong pitched a clean 10th, , and Branden Kline and Paul Fry combined for a scoreless 11th as the Orioles’ bullpen started its night with one run allowed in six innings.
Before Detroit’s five-run 12th, the Orioles’ bullpen had a 2.64 ERA since Aug. 20.