It’s a battle for first place as the O’s take on the MLB-best Yankees in a pivotal June series.
Divisions aren’t won or lost in June. But you can’t escape the feeling that there’s a whole lot on the line as the Orioles and Yankees face off for the next three games.
The O’s, the second-best team in the American League, have the misfortune of sharing a division with the best team, the Yankees. The Birds, despite playing exceptionally well pretty much all season, still find themselves looking up in the AL East standings at the Yanks, who took over first place on May 15 and haven’t loosened their grip since. They just keep winning, those jerks.
Now the Orioles get the chance to take care of business themselves, just as they did when these two teams met in Baltimore from April 29-May 2. The O’s won three of four games in that set, holding the high-octane Yankees offense to just six runs the entire series. That was before Aaron Judge really got going. At the end of that series, in which he went 1-for-13, Judge was batting just .197 with a .725 OPS. Literally the next day, he began the scorching hot streak that has continued ever since, one in which he’s batted .387 with a 1.439 OPS and 20 home runs in 40 games. It would be asking a lot for the Orioles to cool down Judge again, and the one-two punch of Juan Soto and Judge is likely going to be a problem. It would behoove O’s pitchers to negotiate the rest of the lineup without incident.
Both teams know what’s at stake in this series. An O’s sweep would vault them into first place, and at the very least a series win would keep them well within striking distance of the Yankees. Anything less and their AL East deficit will become a little bit larger, though by no means insurmountable with three months to play.
Albert Suárez takes the mound for the opener as an unknown commodity to most of the Yankees. Having last pitched in the majors in 2017 before this year, Suárez has faced only DJ LeMahieu (1-for-7) and Giancarlo Stanton (0-for-1) of the currently active Yankees roster. The Yankees counter with former Oriole Nestor Cortes, who faced the Birds in Baltimore earlier this season and took the loss, giving up four runs in six innings. Eight of the nine Orioles who were in that previous lineup will face Cortes again tonight, with Austin Hays (instead of Cedric Mullins) the only change.
Orioles lineup:
3B Jordan Westburg
DH Adley Rutschman
1B Ryan Mountcastle
SS Gunnar Henderson
RF Anthony Santander
LF Austin Hays
2B Jorge Mateo
CF Colton Cowser
C James McCann
RHP Albert Suárez