A day removed from an 11-1 win over the San Francisco Giants (68-69), the Baltimore Orioles fell to those same Giants by a score of 13-2 on Sunday. The game had a little bit of everything, a short start by an Orioles pitcher, three scored errors, defensive misplays, seven hits over the first eight innings, a shutout for eight innings, a catcher pitching the eighth inning and a 121 pitch, 5.0 inning effort by 42 year old Justin Verlander (3-10) in which he struck out 10 Baltimore batters. Will the real Orioles please stand up?
For the second game in a row the Giants greeted the Orioles starter with a first inning homerun. Rafael Devers hit a one out solo balst to center off Tomoyuki Sugano (10-7). In what would be his shortest start to date, Sugano allowed 7 runs on 10 hits with a walk and 4 punchouts over 3.1 innings. Six of the 10 hits Sugano allowed came in the 4 run fourth; a double by Devers was the hit that knocked Sugano out of the game.
Not all of it was on Sugano, however. Colton Cowser made a diving attempt on a Devers flyball that landed in front of him for a RBI-single in the third inning. There was some concern about Cowser after the play as he seemed to be shaken up, compounding how he looked after making a successful, full out diving catch on a Heliot Ramos flyball to center in the first inning.
What a catch by Colton
pic.twitter.com/ncjYNaGTUJ
— Baltimore Orioles (@Orioles) August 31, 2025
Following the game, Sugano had this to say (via interpreter Yuto Sukurai), “There are obviously games that the defense has my back, but today (that) wasn’t so much the case. I wanted to throw a little bit more, making sure I get out of that inning. Yeah, there are games like this. It’s nothing I can control during that inning so I just try to alleviate all the misses from myself and believe in my defense.”
The fourth inning saw a Matt Chapman groundball bound between Jackson Holliday and Luis Vazquez into the outfield for a single. Chapman was erased by a great throw by Samuel Basallo on a steal attempt at second base. Jeremiah Jackson‘s throwing error to first base on a dribbler to third allowed a run to score and Daniel Johnson‘s slip, dive and fall on a Drew Gilbert flyball resulted in a two-run triple. Jackson also committed a fielding error on a Devers groundball in the sixth inning.
Oh look, another Rafael Devers RBI
pic.twitter.com/u394esBzHn
— SF Giants on NBCS (@NBCSGiants) August 31, 2025
The Giants scored a run on a play that was ruled a fielder’s choice and fielding error by Vazquez later in the three-run sixth before tacking on three more runs off of Alex Jackson (3 R, 3 H, 2 BB) in the eighth.
Pitching during that sixth inning, Corbin Martin was the victim of three unearned runs on one hit; he walked two and struck out one in two-thirds of an inning.
Just a little too late
The Orioles waited until the ninth inning when the game was out of reach to finnaly score a pair of runs. Back-to-back doubles by Johnson and Holliday to lead off the inning plated one run and a Gunnar Henderson one-out single plated the other.
J. Jackson’s fifth inning single extended his hitting streak to eleven games.
Holliday reached base four times and stole a base.
Ryan Mountcastle had a pair of hits as did Henderson and Vazquez.
Let’s give out the participation trophies
In another one of his Little League Coach moments, Interim Manager Tony Mansolino had this to say after the game, “I think for me as I’m watching this on a day when we have a chance to win the series against a team that’s been playing good baseball, you see some of the guys make mistakes, the initial reaction is to be frustrated. But then, for me, I look at the guys making the mistakes and it’s guys who are kind of fighting for their careers in a lot of ways, you know? And they’re trying to prove that they’re major league players and they’re not Triple-A guys. So my emotions go from frustration to more empathetic, I guess, for those guys because they don’t want that to happen, because that affects them as much as it does the team in the moment.”
I don’t know about you, the readers, but Mansolino just does not instill much confidence from my perspective.
The Orioles now head down the coast for a reunion with Ryan O’Hearn and Ramon Laureano.
2025 Record: 61-76
Next Game: Mon. 9/1 @ 6:40 pm vs. Padres in San Diego