O’s respond to adversity, jump on A’s early

     After last night’s devastating loss, many teams would have come out sluggish. Not the Orioles. Nick Markakis and Steve Pearce got on to start, and Adam Jones rocketed a 2-0 fastball to left field for a quick 3-0 lead. Later in that inning, JJ Hardy went deep on a 2-2 count making it 4-0 in the 1st.
   
     The third inning again started with a Jones walk, a Cruz single and Chris Davis brought in a fifth run to make it 5-0, putting runners on 2nd and 3rd, and chasing former Oriole Jason Hammel. In that inning, the O’s loaded the bases, but got nothing more wit h an inning ending double play.
     The bottom of that inning seemed to be a momentum change, after a double play to escape the inning, and a lead off homer followed by a single, looked to bring Oakland to life. With no outs and the game 5-1, Nick Punto hit what looked to be a single to keep the rally going, but instead was grabbed by Hardy, flipped to Schoop, and gunned to Davis for a 6-4-3 double play. It didn’t look like much, but to me was a very big play.
     The Orioles again added on, with the familiar start to an inning. A Markakis single, Pearce double, put two more RISP for Jones, and he delivered with his 4th and 5th RBI of the game, making it 7-1.
     Though the game looked out of hand, the pesky A’s got back in it with 2 out 2 RBI double by Jed Lowrie to make it 7-3. Chen though, got out of that inning without further harm.
     Now 7-4, the Orioles had a couple more chances with RISP, but delivered nothing. The score remained, until a lead off homer for Chris Davis off former teammate Jim Johnson made it 8-4 O’s. Again though, with two outs and no one on, the A’s got two on and made it interesting making manager Buck Showalter bring in Zach Britton. After falling behind 3-0 ti Nick Punto, Britton came back to strike him out, sealing the win.
     The Orioles improve to 53-43, and put on an impressive performance after yesterday’s heart breaker. With everyone else in the East winning, the Orioles remain 4 up on Toronto and New York, and 8.5 up on Tampa and Boston.

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