Saturday night Orioles game thread: at Athletics, 9:05

If everything seems like it sucks for the Orioles right now, that’s probably because it is - but don’t worry, they’re still “just” two games back of a wild card spot. Two games is only two games, though they also have five teams to pass in order to get there. That’s a lot of teams to pass.

One reason why it’s such a bummer to lose a game like last night’s is that Oakland is not a good team. These are supposed to be the gimme games. They traded away their best players before the non-waiver trade deadline, and even one afterwards. The Orioles were leading a game going into the eighth inning! And then they lost. It hurts.

The good news is that they can get back into the win column today. All they have to do is play better. Oh, is that all? Well, it is. The O’s are capable of winning, which is what makes it so frustrating when they don’t.

We know that many of the struggling players are capable of better because we’ve seen them play better. We’ve seen Brad Brach pitch better. We’ve seen many of the rotation members pitch better. We’ve seen Chris Davis and Mark Trumbo hit better. As Buck Showalter often says, they can’t feel sorry for themselves, because nobody else is going to.

They’ll have to win the next two games if they want to get out of Oakland with a .500 record. That’s not that much to ask, surely. Unless it is. I don’t know. I just want the Orioles to win.