Orioles Give Bradish Early Support As He Goes 8 Innings In 6-1 Win

If the Orioles are to salvage this season, the lineup – even strange derivations of it as featured Monday in Anaheim – must start getting to starting pitchers with more regularity.

They entered this 10-day road trip with just about the worst offense in MLB through the first five innings of games on the road and couldn’t do anything against Seattle’s starters but have been able to score early in games lately and it absolutely must continue. There literally no wait Monday as Taylor Ward homered off his old team to open the game and lefty-crusher Coby Mayo blasted a three-run shot down the left field line in the fourth and Kyle Bradish strung together a second-straight gem in a 6-1 victory at Angels Stadium.

"KB was outstanding tonight," manager Craig Albernaz said of his starter. "It was really impressive for him to carry over what he did in Seattle into this start."

The Orioles (38-42) matched a season high with their third straight win and they are threatening to make this a winning road trip, which honestly didn’t seem possible as recently as their ninth-inning meltdown Friday at Dodgers Stadium. The only draw back to this evening was yet another regular player leaving a game with injury; Blaze Alexander, leading MLB in batting average since April 28, fouled a ball off his leg early on and had to leave (Adley Rutschman – on the concussion Injured List - and Jackson Holliday – groin - have also exited games early on this trip).

"It's a muscle contusion," Albernaz said of Alexander's injury from fouling a ball off his knee, calling him day-to-day.

Alexander is integral to anything positive this ballclub does, bringing the best glove on the team to any position get goes to, and also in the top 10 in the majors in OPS since the end of April. Rookie skipper Craig Albernaz made the quirky decision to put outfielder Leody Taveras – who has never played infield in the minors – at third instead of Ward, who has MLB experience there, but Taveras made an immediate play on a grounder and wasn’t really tested again.

“I yelled out in the dugout. ‘Who wants to play third?’ Albernaz said of negotiating a difficult injury situation.

Mayo, who was playing very sparingly on this trip before the last few days, continues to destroy left-handed pitching; he was top five in MLB among all qualified hitters with an 1.100 OPS entering play and that soared more after he took Sam Aldegheri to deep left. He might be called on more now with the infield short of players (though AAA infielder Luis Velazquez is with the team on the taxi squad).

Pete Alonso drove in a run with a bases-loaded sac fly to make it 5-0 and Bradish, a former Angles draft pick acquired in trade as a minor leaguer, pitched well enough to win even without that much run support.

Bradish Cruises

Bradish got critical strikeouts to get out of a jam and the Angels never had more than one man on base after that. He ramped up the curveball usage in his last start to get out of a rut and leaned heavily on the two-seamer Monday, picking up a slew of called strikes with it early and the leaning on the slider in the latter innings and getting a lot of swing and miss with that (13 whiffs total on the night).

"I love playing behind him," Ward said on the MASN broadcast afrer the game, "just the pace (he pitches with), he pounds the zone and he's got nasty stuff."

He was able to almost shelve his four-seamer entirely, which has been a difficult offering for him, and continued a nice run of starts for the Orioles on this trip. Bradish went eight innings (after going 7 2/3 last time out) and struck out nine and seemed in total control throughout.

If Shane Baz can keep it going Tuesday there is a good chance they will stack winning road series together, a rarity this season. And with the Angels scheduled to start Ryan Johnson, with a career 9.96 ERA, perhaps it’s not too big an ask to stake Baz to some early runs in the process.

Bird Seed

Rico Garcia is a log way from his first 20 innings of the season. He gave up an immediate homer pitching in a mop-up role, now in a run of seven-straight mostly shaky outings, which has to be monitored closely. The lack of impact, swing-and-miss high-leverage arms cannot be overstated in the modern game and especially in the postseason .. Ward, a former 36-homer guy, ahs started to flash more power lately. This homecoming was one he had circled, thanking the Angels in his postgame interview and saying he "teared up" a little bit when Angels Stadium acknowledged him.

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