The last homestand begins now
Here we go! The Orioles have just two series left in the regular season. Tonight they kick off a two-game series with the Washington Nationals. The Nats are in last place but have played some good stretches of baseball this year, but have been pretty abysmal in September with a 7-15 record, their worst month so far.
Let’s hope they have a few more losses in them.
Kyle Bradish takes the mound for the Orioles, fresh off six shutout innings against Houston last week. The O’s de facto ace has his ERA down to 3.01 on the season. Can he drop it below 3 today? I sure would like to see that.
Pitching for the Nationals is Josiah Gray, who like his team has had his ups and downs this year. His last two starts have been good, especially his 10 strikeouts and zero walks effort against the Pirates. He does walk a lot of batters, averaging 4.6 per nine innings this year.
If the Orioles can win tonight they will drop their magic number to at least two depending on how the Rays fare against the Red Sox in Boston.
Let’s go O’s!
Orioles lineup
- Gunnar Henderson – SS
- Adley Rutschman – C
- Anthony Santander – RF
- Ryan O’Hearn – 1B
- Aaron Hicks – RF
- Cedric Mullins – CF
- Austin Hays – LF
- Adam Frazier – 2B
- Ramón Urías – 3B
SP: Kyle Bradish – RHP
Nationals lineup
- CJ Abrams – SS
- Lane Thomes – RF
- Keibert Ruiz – C
- Joey Meneses – DH
- Luis García – 2B
- Dominic Smith – 1B
- Ildemaro Vargas – 3B
- Jake Alu – LF
- Jacob Young – CF
SP: Josiah Gray – RHP