Fastball

Highly-Touted Baltimore Orioles' Prospect Hits First Major League Home Run

The Baltimore Orioles lost to the Tampa Bay Rays on Friday night as the two teams are now even in the American League East standings. Despite the loss, it was a memorable night for top Orioles' prospect Heston Kjerstad.
Brady Farkas|
Highly-Touted Baltimore Orioles' Prospect Hits First Major League Home Run
Highly-Touted Baltimore Orioles' Prospect Hits First Major League Home Run

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Baltimore Orioles

The Baltimore Orioles lost to the Tampa Bay Rays on Friday night 7-1 at Camden Yards. The loss was huge for the American League East playoff race, where the O's and Rays are now tied. 

The two teams will play again Saturday and Sunday as they jockey for positioning in the looming American League playoffs.

Despite the Orioles loss, it was a memorable night for rookie Heston Kjerstad. The No. 3 prospect in the organization hit his first major league home run, accounting for the only Orioles run of the night. He was just called up on Thursday for his debut.

He went 1-for-2 with the homer, which came in the sixth inning off of starter Zach Eflin.

The 24-year-old was a first-round pick of the Orioles in the 2020 draft. 

The following comes from his MLB.com prospect profile:

There’s strength and bat speed and even though there’s some swing-and-miss that’s still a part of his game that might always make him more power-over-hit, he showed a willingness to work counts and take walks as well as the ability to punish the baseball. His approach suffered a bit when he moved up to High-A and his K rate went up in the AFL, though he hit the ball consistently hard in Arizona.

The Orioles and Rays will play again on Saturday night in a critical game three of the series. First pitch is set for 7:05 p.m. ET as Rays' flamethrower Tyler Glasnow goes up against O's rookie Grayson Rodriguez.

Glasnow enters the matchup at 9-5 with a 3.15 ERA while Rodriguez is 5-4 with a 4.88.

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Brady Farkas
BRADY FARKAS

Brady Farkas is a baseball writer for Fastball on Sports Illustrated/FanNation and the host of 'The Payoff Pitch' podcast which can be found on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Videos on baseball also posted to YouTube. Brady has spent nearly a decade in sports talk radio and is a graduate of Oswego State University. You can follow him on Twitter @WDEVRadioBrady. 

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