Welcome to the show, DL Hall!
The Orioles (59-53) stomped all over the Rays in a 10-3 win last night, even getting to face a position player pitching in the ninth. The bottom of the lineup (Odor, Urías, Mateo) went 10-for-13 with six RBIs. Best of all, with the win, the Orioles leapfrogged the Rays (58-53) for the third and final AL Wild Card spot.
The Orioles went 1-18 against Tampa Bay last season. If the Orioles can take one of the next two games, they’ve guaranteed themselves a winning record against the Rays in 2022. What is going on, people??
As if that wasn’t enough excitement, today marks another big day for the franchise, with O’s No. 4 prospect (MLB’s No. 62) D.L. Hall making his major league debut with a spot start in Tampa. Yes, the 23-year-old lefty has still been walking too many people this year: 45 free passes in 77.2 innings with Triple-A Norfolk. But he’s also striking out 14.6 batters per nine innings—that’s just ridiculous.
Feast or famine, it’ll be exciting as heck to see what Hall, gifted with some of the best stuff in the entire Orioles organization, does on the mound today. After today Hall will likely be working out of the bullpen out of concern for his pitch count, but he’s fully stretched out for today, having thrown 99-100 pitches in his last two Triple-A starts.
It’s never easy to snatch a win at the Trop, and today it’ll be way less easy because Tampa Bay is sending lefty Shane McClanahan to the mound. The Baltimore-born McClanahan (10-5, 2.24 ERA) has lost a little ground in the AL Cy Young race, but he’s still leading the league in WHIP (0.834), hits per nine (5.9) and strike-to-walk ratio (7.00). He’s in the top ranks of pitchers in basically all Statcast categories: this is to say, he whiffs a lot of hitters, he’s stingy with walks, and the contact he allows is mostly weak. McClanahan has a really good fastball, averaging 96.7 mph of velocity, and a killer changeup, curveball, and slider.
Ultimately, the Orioles’ best plan might be to try to outlast him. They successfully did that the last time they faced McClanahan, on July 26, scoring two runs on the lefty in seven innings before managing to scrape out a 5-3 win with three runs against the bullpen.
Orioles lineup
1. Ryan McKenna CF
2. Anthony Santander LF
3. Ryan Mountcastle 1B
4. Adley Rutschman DH
5. Ramón Urías 3B
6. Austin Hays RF
7. Jorge Mateo SS
8. Rougned Odor 2B
9. Robinson Chirinos C
Rays lineup
1. Yu Chang 2B
2. Yandy Díaz DH
3. Randy Arozarena LF
4. Isaac Paredes 3B
5. Francisco Mejía C
6. Christian Bethancourt 1B
7. José Siri CF
8. Roman Quinn RF
9. Taylor Walls SS