CHICAGO — Playing before the backdrop of a near-empty ballpark, on a quiet Tuesday night in a game between two last-place teams, the inevitable became reality for the Orioles.
They won, beating the White Sox, 8-7, but it was nothing more than a moral victory. Wins by the Seattle Mariners and Houston Astros cemented the Orioles’ disaster of a campaign by mathematically eliminating them from playoff contention for the first time since 2022.
Baltimore (71-80) wasn’t a team that ran out of time. The club got off to a 15-28 start, fired manager Brandon Hyde, dealt with injury after injury and traded nine players to teams with better fortunes in a fire sale at the deadline. While the Mariners’ and Astros’ wins were the final blows that knocked them out of the American League wild-card race, the Orioles’ trudge toward an early offseason began long before the dog days even arrived.
The Orioles reached their nadir in the most unceremonious of circumstances. Chicago, in danger of losing 100 games for the third straight season, drew a meager announced crowd of 12,428 that was doing the wave by the seventh inning. The game neither mattered in the standings nor the dramatic MLB playoff picture unfolding with the regular season approaching its end.
No, the attention of the baseball world was directed elsewhere. But there was still drama on the field as the Orioles nearly coughed up a six-run lead in the final two innings.
The offense tallied 13 hits, including a pair of two-run home runs by rookies Samuel Basallo and Dylan Beavers, to end a skid of 10 straight games scoring four runs or fewer. Beavers (2-for-5), Jeremiah Jackson (2-for-3), Gunnar Henderson (3-for-5), Coby Mayo (3-for-5) and Dylan Carlson (2-for-4) all enjoyed multi-hit performances to help Baltimore jump out in front 8-2.
Dean Kremer pitched for the first time in 11 days after skipping his previous outing because of forearm discomfort and overcame a rough first inning to finish one out short of a quality start with two runs in 5 2/3 innings. White Sox catcher Kyle Teel took him deep for a two-run homer two batters into the game, but that was all the offense Chicago could muster against him.
The Orioles’ bullpen then melted down in the eighth. Former top pitching prospect Chayce McDermott made his first MLB appearance since converting to a reliever and nearly got through the inning cleanly, but a bounced third strike got away from Basallo behind the plate and the White Sox strung together a five-run inning.
Rico García took over for the spiraling McDermott after White Sox first baseman Lenyn Sosa brought two runs home on an RBI single and promptly allowed two more on a home run by left fielder Andrew Benintendi. He finally managed to stop the bleeding before Keegan Akin took over the ninth for the unexpected save.
This article will be updated. Have a news tip? Contact Matt Weyrich at mweyrich@baltsun.com, 410-332-6200 and x.com/ByMattWeyrich and instagram.com/bymattweyrich.
