Wednesday afternoon Orioles game thread: vs. Athletics, 3:05

Before this series against the Athletics started, it looked like the Orioles would be going up against Sean Manaea in the series finale today. The Orioles rocked him back in Oakland - so the Athletics have decided to scratch him today and call up rookie Daniel Gossett to make the start.

Gossett, a 24-year-old righty, was Oakland's second round pick in the 2014 draft. He's made a total of 10 big league starts in his career, in which he has a 5.17 ERA. A particular good sign for the O's may be that he's given up 11 home runs in 54 innings of work, but you never really know how things will go with a guy the O's have never seen before.

The Orioles need this game. This doesn't mean a whole lot. They've needed a lot of games over the last couple of weeks and what they keep doing is winning a series opener and then splitting or losing the series. That pattern could play out again today if they lose this series.

Although there are still 36 games left to play, time is starting to run out on the Orioles. What they need is a streak where they win six in a row or win eight out of ten. How do you do that with a starting rotation that seems to include all of Ubaldo Jimenez, Wade Miley, Jeremy Hellickson, and Chris Tillman? So far, the answer is the obvious one: You don't. But maybe behind Dylan Bundy, they can surprise us and start to change that today.