Orioles Waste Another Shane Baz Gem, Lose 2-1 At Texas To Start Huge Road Trip

It’s a shame that as Shane Baz has settled into Baltimore and emerged as a dependable – and sometimes exceptional – starting pitcher the team has systematically stopped scoring runs for him.

To be fair they don’t score much for anyone and they don’t hit the oppositions starting pitching as a rule, and all of this was far too pronounced in Texas as they fell, 2-1, to the Rangers at Glove Life Field in a critical game between final Wild Card contenders to open a massive 10-game road trip. This was the worst-case for the sleepy O’s, and they couldn’t wake up against this bullpen to fall to 56-60. They'll face more quality starters in this series, so best get better at winning low-scoring games quickly.

It came as no surprise at this point that Baz (sparkling going eight innings and striking out nine while giving up just three hits) was on the receiving end of all of this. He breezed through the 8th to cap off his evening, but the lineup is a joke with men on base and has been all season and baseball czar Mike Elias has been a particular fraud with how he constructs lineups and he can’t develop the prospects he loves to overhype.

“He’s doing a great job of getting his change-up in mix,” manager Craig Albernaz told the Apple TV broadcast of Baz during the game, “and we know the curveball is one of his best pitches … Love how he’s pounding the strike one.”

Hung Out To Dry Again

Baz gets no run support. And he generally gets terrible defense behind him. And, well, sometimes his issues fielding the baseball get in his own head.

All of the above applied Friday night. Baz turned his season around in late May, at Tampa, facing his former team. He’s ramped down his fastball usage – it was flat and getting hammered – since then and it’s now around 34% for the season (44% last year), and he’s ramped up his two-seamer and flashed better command of his knuckle curve and for the last 14 starts (2.86 ERA in that span), Baz has been quite good.

This start was his best yet, yielding just one base hit through five innings and staying out of deep counts. The Rangers couldn’t put a quality at bat together, starting with leadoff hitter Joc Pederson’s ugly sword on a strikeout to open the game.

But Elias Diaz hit a dribbler to the right of the mound to open the sixth that Baz should have fielded but eluded him. A sac bunt moved him over and then Pederson jumped a first-pitch cutter and lined it inside the right-field foul pole to put Texas on the board. Baz seemed a little bewildered, and it snapped an amazing streak of 42 1/3 innings without a homer.

Baz gave up six homers and 23 doubles while walking 22 in his first nine starts, and in 14 since he has surrendered just four homers and 18 doubles and walked 26. Baz has generally gone deep into games – 85 innings logged over those 14 starts. He never wins because he never gets run support. Good on him for regrouping in the seventh but this team just can’t hit with any consistency.

We get sick of writing this every day but Rangers starter Nathan Eovaldi had one of his best outings of the season. He couldn’t provide length but gave up just one run. Albernaz and Elias seem intent on burying former top prospect Coby Mayo but he got a rare start, and against a righty at that, and produced.

Mayo, playing third base (they have to give this kid a run with his bat this hot), drove in former Ranger Leody Taveras (who had doubled) in the second inning. That was the Orioles only extra base hit, and they continue to get no thump or run-production from Gunnar Henderson in his lost season (he’s not long for here and he was torn up speaking about the Adley Rutschman trade when finally addressing it with reporters in Texas after being unable to do so previously).

The O’s tried to pull off the late-game theatrics thing, with Taveras, their most clutch hitter (somehow), singling off All Star closer Jacob Latz. Christian Franklin, just acquired at the deadline, lined his first MLB hit to the right-field corner but an exceptional relay play and lucky tag resulted in Taveras being out at the plate by a hair.

So now the Orioles are 6-17 in Baz's starts for the season, which says much more about the way they hit and field the baseball than how he's pitched.

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