The Orioles avoided a sweep and the weather on Thursday, as Jeremiah Jackson’s pinch-hit double in the 8th delivered Baltimore a much-needed win in their series finale with Chicago.
A chaotic bottom of the 8th inning was the defining moment of the O’s win over the Cubbies, and for once the chaos worked in the Orioles favor. Down 2-1, Taylor Ward started the inning with a strikeout. The tying and winning runs then got on base thanks to back-to-back HBP’s. The first game when Chicago reliever Tyler
Ferguson ran a sweeper too far inside on Gunnar Henderson, with the ball just clipping the SS to send him to first. The very next pitch, a sinker got away from Ferguson against Pete Alonso, plunking the O’s slugger and giving Baltimore two runners on with one out.
Manager Craig Albernaz then executed a perfect bait-and-switch to set up Jackson’s game-winning hit. Originally, the Orioles announced that Dylan Beavers would be pinch-hitting for Tyler O’Neill. This prompted the Cubs to bring in left-handed reliever Ryan Rollison, only for Albernaz to swap out Beavers for Jackson. With the count even at 1-1, Rollison tried to sneak a low fastball past Jackson, only for JJ to smash it into the right-center field gap. Henderson scored easily from second to tie the game at two, and Alonso beautifully slid under the tag of catcher Miguel Amaya to put the Orioles on top.
Andrew Kittredge then came in for the save in the top of the 9th as the rain began to pour in Baltimore. Nico Hoerner reached on an E6 by Henderson to start the inning, but was immediately erased when he attempted to steal second, overslid the bag and was tagged out by Gunnar. After an Ian Happ single, Kittredge rolled a would-be double play ball, only for Jackson Holliday to sail the relay throw to first. The missed out wouldn’t matter, as Kittredge got pinch-hitter Michael Conforto to line out to left to end the game.
The O’s rally came after Tyler Wells had surrendered a run in the top of the 8th to give the Cubs their slim and fleeting advantage. NL MVP candidate Pete Crow-Armstrong led off the inning with a sinking line drive to right that deflected off Tyler O’Neill for a double. Alex Bregman then lofted a deep fly out to center, allowing PCA to advance to third. With the potential winning run now 90 feet away, the Orioles pulled in their infield, which allowed a hard grounder from Seiya Suzuki to sneak past Blaze Alexander to put the Cubs up 2-1.
Prior to the 8th, offense had been hard to come by for both teams. O’Neill gave the O’s an early advantage in the 2nd when he blasted a solo homer off Cubs starter David Peterson to put Baltimore up 1-0. After homering in his final two ABs on Wednesday, the long ball on Thursday tied an Orioles record of homering in three straight ABs.
However, two continuing trends kept the Orioles from adding on any insurance: bad hitting against left-handed starters and poor luck at the plate. Despite coming off a start where he allowed nine hits and 10 earned runs, Peterson largely befuddled the O’s offense. Outside of the O’Neill home run, the only other hit the Orioles managed off the former All-Star was a Ward single in the bottom of the 1st. Through the first five innings, with Peterson on the mound, Baltimore went 2-for-16, 0-for-1 with RISP, while striking out twice and working four walks.
The fact that the Orioles continue to turn hard-hit balls into outs didn’t help their cause against Peterson. They got particularly unlucky in the 3rd, where the O’s got the short end of batted-ball luck AND a questionable call by the umpires. To lead off the inning, Leody Taveras laid a perfect bunt down the first-base line for what looked like a sure bunt single. A scrambling Peterson was able to flip the ball to first for a bang-bang, but the first-base umpire originally called Taveras safe. The play went to review, and despite no clear angle that showed the ball beat the runner, the umpires ruled Taveras out.
The O’s would rebound from that injustice by having Adley Rutschman and Ward work back-to-back walks to give Baltimore their first runner in scoring position. That brought the Orioles’ paragon of bad luck, Henderson, up to the plate. The slumping SS smashed a Peterson sinker at 107 mph to the left side of the infield, only for the ball to go right to Cubs’ 2B Nico Hoerner for an inning-ending 4-6-3 double play. The O’s hit five balls Thursday that had an xBA of .500+ that the Cubs turned into outs.
And yet, for a while, it looked like the one run was all the Orioles would need thanks to the continued brilliance of starter Trevor Rogers. The stingy southpaw came into Thursday’s game with a 1.77 ERA over his last six starts and looked just as sharp against Chicago. He worked around a 1st inning, first-and-third, one-out jam by punching out Carson Kelly and getting Michael Busch to fly out, stranding both runners.
Rogers worked a 1-2-3 inning in the 2nd thanks to a pair of groundouts and a K of Dansby Swanson. After a PCA walk in the 3rd, he rolled a double play ball to end the frame and keep the O’s in front.
The Orioles’ de facto ace also got a big boost from his defense as he navigated his fourth quality start in his last seven outings. With Busch on first and two outs in the 4th, Hoerner laced a grounder down the left-field line for a double. Running on contact, Busch came charging hard around third as he tried to tie the game. However, a perfect relay from Ward to Henderson to Samuel Basallo cut the runner down at the plate and preserved the 1-0 lead.
In the 5th, the boost came from the Orioles’ outfield defense as Rogers continued to keep the Cubs off the board. After Swanson singled to left and stole second, Amaya sent a sinking line drive to no-man’s land in center field. However, a good jump and a sliding snag allowed Taveras to rob the Cubs’ catcher of a hit and keep Swanson from scoring.
That aura of invincibility finally wore off for Roger in the 6th. After getting Bregman to ground out to start the inning, he left a changeup over the plate to Suzuki, who clobbered it over the left-field fence to tie the game at 1-1. The Orioles’ lefty would get two more ground outs to finish the inning and closed his line at 6 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 2 BB and 4 K. Since the beginning of June, Rogers now has a 1.73 ERA across seven starts, while holding opponents to a .195 average.
