Birds tee off on Tampa to back a balky Bradish, secure series win, 9-5

After Friday’s news that two Baltimore starters, John Means and Tyler Wells, are lost for the season with elbow injuries, the Orioles will be needing some clutch performances out of their starting rotation.

Well … today wasn’t that. With all the concern about starting pitching these days, we can’t sugarcoat it: Kyle Bradish’s sixth start of the season was pretty disastrous. It took him 76 pitches to get through 2 ⅔ laborious frames, during which he surrendered five runs.

This stings a lot less because, when the smoke cleared, Tampa Bay’s Taj Bradley looked even worse, allowing an eye-popping nine runs in 3 ⅓ innings. Nine runs and four homers off the starter will normally bag you a win. And tonight, they did. Kudos, too, to the O’s bullpen, which delivered 6 ⅓ shutout innings without breaking a sweat, giving the Birds a comfortable 9-5 win, despite their starter’s struggles.

Let’s talk about Bradish today. The first inning was an omen, with Bradish allowing runners on the corners before escaping trouble with two gorgeous strikeouts.

But it got worse in the second. After being gifted a 3-0 lead, Bradish handed the runs right back. Three singles cut the lead to 3-1. Then, with two on, Bradish hung a curveball that Yandy Díaz launched off the scoreboard. It was a triple, I guess, but Santander badly misplayed the ball, and the game was tied, 3-3.

By the time the third rolled around, you wanted nothing more in the world than a shutdown inning from Bradish. Alas—not happening. The Rays’ Jonathan Aranda reached with some weird dropped third-strike thing, then scored on a José Siri single. Ironically, Rays manager Kevin Cash got ejected for complaining about the strike zone, just before Bradish walked the bases loaded, and then walked in a fifth run. Oof. It was ugly.

At that point, Jacob Webb galloped to Bradish’s rescue, with a flyball out to close out the third and then a scoreless fourth of his own. (Wait: we could still have shutdown innings in this game?)

But yeah: this was a concerning outing for Bradish. Too many pitches up in the zone, too much contact allowed, too many walks. He did strike out six in 2 ⅔ innings, which is cool. But watching this, you wouldn’t be crazy for thinking he’s not feeling quite right. (FWIW, a sulky postgame Bradish reported feeling fine, despite the lack of command today.)

We now interrupt this downer of a pitching report to bring you some good news: Orioles runs. Lots and lots of them.

O’s hitters had certainly read the scouting report on Tampa Bay’s Taj Bradley, who has three good offspeed pitches but a hittable fastball. With Adley Rutschman aboard and two outs in the first inning, Ryan Mountcastle smoked a heater 400 feet to center. The O’s first baseman has been making solid contact lately, and this time, it paid off for two quick Orioles runs.

Immediately after, Santander scooped out a ball a foot off the turf and launched it onto Eutaw Street. A vintage Santander home run, and as it was Anthony Santander Bobblehead (or, as MASN’s Melanie Newman called it, “Tiny Tater”) Day, this was fitting.

More Bradley fastballs in the second inning; more Baltimore bombs raining down. Jordan Westburg smoked a fastball 414 feet, so I guess his hand is doing fine.

The party continued in the third. Mountcastle and Santander walked consecutively, and Westburg singled up the middle, scoring Mounty. Santander, not fleet of foot, didn’t make it home, but a Kyle Stowers scorcher (106 off the bat) did the trick next. Now it was 6-5, Orioles. They’d add one more run on a Jorge Mateo sac fly.

A 7-5 lead felt good, but hardly untouchable given these two starters’ struggles. I guess Tampa Bay was trying to save their bullpen, but Taj Bradley came out again for the fourth, and again, the Orioles made him pay. Ryan O’Hearn, hitting just .222 in his last two weeks, saw something he liked, singling to set the table for the other Ryan, who went yard for a second time. This one traveled 431 feet into the Orioles bullpen. It was an absolute tank.

Probably no O’s power hitter was more hurt by the 2022 reshuffling of the left-field dimensions than Ryan Mountcastle, but right now, it’s hard to feel very bad about his power. Mounty is currently hitting .293 with an .838 OPS while playing great defense at first. We’ll take it!!

So that was the first four innings (lol). Maybe it’s just me, but I was pretty ready for some good pitching at this point.

The Orioles bullpen delivered, and in spades. A huge tip of the cap to Jacob Webb, who took over from Bradish with the bases juiced in the third, righted the ship, then added two perfect innings of his own to earn his first win as an Oriole.

Dillon Tate was confounding and unhittable for one inning, but allowed two hits with no outs in the seventh, and Cionel Pérez had to come clean it up. No problem: Pérez got two swinging K’s, including of right-hander José Siri, and a weak grounder to strand two Rays and keep it 9-5 with six outs left.

Yennier Cano took up the baton in the eighth, and though he went 3-2 on two consecutive hitters, he left the mound unblemished, with two swinging K’s of his own and a groundout.

With a 7.00 ERA in his last seven outings, Keegan Akin wasn’t someone you were thrilled to see pitch the ninth. But with a four-run lead, Brandon Hyde gave him a chance (Craig Kimbrel got up to warm up in the ‘pen just in case, though). Akin rewarded Hyde’s trust with a scoreless ninth.

It’s true that, over the last three innings, the Orioles didn’t do anything against a Rays reliever tag team of Chris Devenski and Kevin Kelly. But that’s OK, they didn’t need much more after shellacking the starter.

With this win, the Orioles lock up a series victory Tampa Bay, making them (by my count) 15-0-5 in their past 20 series against AL East opponents.