The Orioles won a rain shortened game against the Twins last night. Well, maybe "shortened" isn't the best term since it included four rain delays and wasn't officially called until after midnight, but you get my drift.
I really think the 5 inning game is the secret to the Orioles success. Think about it. Koji would be the best pitcher in the league if the games were 5 innings. We'd rarely have to see George Sherrill. Even Mark Hendrickson looks good in 5 inning games!
The O's got off to a quick start after a short rain delay. In the first Adam Jones continued his awesomeness with a double, followed by a Nick Markakis line drive that hit the right field foul pole for a home run. O's up 2-0! But they weren't finished as an Aubrey Huff double set up Luke Scott to get the RBI.
Mark Hendrickson started the game 6 up, 6 down. He looked pretty good, but it also appeared that the strike zone was a little large, perhaps to get as much of the game in as possible before the rain returned. Then, with Brian Roberts at the plate in the 2nd, the rain did return. RAIN DELAY!
After the delay, Hendrickson returned to the mound and had another solid inning. The O's went 1,2,3 in the 3rd. Then, another rain delay!
About an hour and a half later, play resumed. It was really quite handy. I got to watch LOST without missing one pitch of the game. Brian Bass took over for Hendrickson and Craig Breslow took over for the Twins. Bass pitched the rest of the game for the O's and looked pretty good out there.
Luke took the first pitch he saw from Breslow into the bottom of the 4th and deposited it in the center field bleachers where the two fans in the entire bleachers cheered.
The rain stayed away until the top of the 6th when, with two outs on the Twins, it started pouring. Rain delay #4! This would be the last one as the game would finally be called at 12:19 a.m. O's win!
Play of the game: With runners on 1st and 3rd, Brian Bass picked off Nick Punto at first. After his awesome pick off he forgot to cover first so Izturis had no one to throw to. It worked out because during the run down Carlos Gomez at third tried to score. Cesar fired to Zaun at home and Zaun tagged Gomez out by punching him in the head. Gomez's helmet flew off and he was seriously dazed. Zaun didn't care, though, because he's heavy metal.