Orioles Overview: Week 4
Another frustrating week goes by for the Orioles. The Orioles did get to above .500 for the first time this season other than opening up the season with a win. This week it was the pitching that could not get it done. The fewest amount of runs given up by Orioles pitching this week was four, giving up a total of 42 runs. Luckily the Orioles were able to score 46.
However we did see Jimenez have his best start of the season. He went six innings giving up four runs on six hits. After giving up two runs in the first, Jimenez was lights out until giving up a lead off walk in the sixth. Jimenez would be charged for 2 runs int hat inning.
In my opinion this is another case of Buck Showalter leaving a pitcher in too long, but that is something for another post.
Nelson Cruz is the best part of the Orioles lineup right now. He had an RBI in every game this week, and he had a 7 game RBI streak totaling 16 RBI. That means in seven games, Cruz drove in 35% of the Orioles runs during that stretch.
Matt Wieters also continues to produce. Wieters managed to go 7/15 (.467) with five RBI in a three game stretch against Boston and Toronto.
Chris Davis got his second home run of the season against Toronto. Davis launched the ball to straight away center. However, Davis left the game Friday night with a strained left oblique. Maybe a couple days of will be good for Davis. Hopefully he will be only gone a few games.
As I write this, Manny Machado is 3-4 with two doubles a triple a strikeout in Fredrick. He could join the team as early as next week.
As for the Sunday night game, I’m not too worried about that. Schoop and Flaherty made some big defensive errors in positions they do not usually play, so we should not see that too much anymore. Also. the Flaherty “error” is no longer an error.
Beginning with tonight's games, umpires will enforce the transfer rule according to these standards: pic.twitter.com/NI4IVuTSH2
— MLB (@MLB) April 25, 2014
As John Kruk said after the Flaherty play sunday, I do not know how you can change the rule in the middle of the season. The definitely needed to be changed, but what about all the teams that were affected by the rule. Do they gen an extra win? Of course that will not happen, but if a team is one game out of the playoffs at the end of the season, this could come into the conversation.
