The offense slept for most of the game and Dean Kremer gave up all of the damage in one pitch.
The reappearance of the Orioles offense lasted for all of two games. After a flurry of hitting put the O’s with the chance to pull off the sweep on Sunday afternoon, they couldn’t make it happen again. The team finished with just five hits and only Anthony Santander’s eighth inning homer saved them from a shutout. Dean Kremer is not a pitcher who’s built to succeed with such little margin for error, and in this finale, he didn’t. The Orioles lost, 3-2.
The Orioles were not far off from having the kind of game where they were raining down dingers on an overmatched opponent. This near-miss was apparent from the very top of the first inning. After Gunnar Henderson drew a leadoff walk, the next three Orioles to face Rangers starter Andrew Heaney all put a charge into a fly ball that would have gone over the fence in a different direction. Regrettably for the O’s, the deepest part of the yard held all three of these fly balls.
There are games where a beginning like this heralds some powerful contact coming later on. That’s not how it worked out. Heaney was able to work around some second inning traffic and then he settled in for a while, not allowing another hit until Henderson hit an automatic double in the fifth. Adley Rutschman could not make Heaney pay and cash in on that two-out scoring chance.
By the time Henderson strode into second base, the Orioles were trailing, 3-0. Kremer’s one bad inning was the fourth inning, when his command suddenly abandoned him. He handed out a one-out walk to Wyatt Langford, who only snapped an 0-27 skid in last night’s game, and then with two outs delivered a free pass to Nathaniel Lowe. After getting himself in this trouble, all that he had to do was retire relatively light-hitting catcher Jonah Heim.
Kremer picked the wrong time to actually throw a pitch in the strike zone. (Snark aside, he had two strikes on the count before both of these walks.) A first pitch splitter hung out in the middle of the zone and Heim took it into the bullpen. This one swing accounted for the entire Rangers run output for the day. The three-run shot was all they would need.
Texas threatened against Kremer again in the sixth and the Orioles righty was pulled from the game after allowing consecutive one-out singles. Bryan Baker was summoned from the bullpen. Historically, it’s been concerning to see Baker enter with inherited runners. In this case, Baker got the next batter, Heim, to ground into an inning-ending double play. Hey, good job this one time.
That closed the book on Kremer with this pitching line: 5.1 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, 3 BB, 2 K, 1 HR
It’s not a good outing. It’s not a disaster. Some days, that could be good enough to win, especially when Baker, Keegan Akin, and Burch Smith combined to get through the eighth without allowing any runs.
On this occasion, it was not enough to win. The offense of Friday and Saturday was largely not to be found, except for Santander’s eighth-inning homer. If the break convinced Santander that it’s June again and he can resume hitting homers in bulk, that will be mighty interesting. For now, he’s up to 27 homers on the season, having collected an additional five in July, so far. That’s All-Star stuff.
Santander’s homer came off of a frequent trade rumor reliever, David Robertson. Drive down the price for the Orioles to get him and then have him improve here. Right? The O’s just pulled the same move on Friday’s starter Nathan Eovaldi, another likely trade candidate if the Rangers don’t have a huge reversal between now and July 30.
Kremer turning in this kind of start after the team lined him up as the apparent #3 starter coming out of the All-Star break is illustrative of the need to trade for somebody. You don’t want Kremer as your #3 starter because he is this. He’s going to be a “five and dive” kind of pitcher who gives up too many dingers. Any hypothetical Orioles postseason rotation is better without him in it.
After the game was over, manager Brandon Hyde revealed that the reason for Henderson’s late insertion into the lineup is that Ramón Urías is managing neck soreness. If an injured list stint ends up being required, I have a strong idea of who Orioles fans would prefer to see get the callup in Urías’s absence.
On the topic of injured Orioles, there was at least one encouraging sign during the loss. Ryan O’Hearn, who was hit in the kneecap by a pitch on Saturday and appeared to be in a good bit of pain afterwards, turned out to be healed enough by Sunday to pinch hit and play an inning of left field. O’Hearn was one of three lefties on the O’s bench on Sunday and they ended up using them all. Heston Kjerstad and Cedric Mullins each pinch hit in the ninth with the platoon advantage against Rangers closer Kirby Yates. None of the pinch hitters got on base. Good try, though.
Will the offense show back up in Miami on Tuesday? The Marlins are not good and the Orioles need to make them look like it. That’s a problem for the Orioles to deal with on Tuesday, after they’ve had another day to rest some more. For now, they continue on with a two-game lead in the AL East despite Sunday’s loss, because the Yankees also lost. New York has lost 20 of its last 29 games. That’s the good stuff.