Last night at Camden Yards, pitcher Chris Jakubauskas was thrown into a spot start and honestly few people knew what to expect. In his time with the organization, he has been and up down between the majors and minors, and when he pitched on the mound as an Oriole, the results were mediocre at best.
However, last night, he stepped up in a big way, throwing five shutout innings and helping the Orioles coast to a 4-0 victory over the Oakland Athletics. Jakubauskas was decent, allowing only three hits on the night; sadly, he got drilled in the leg during the fifth inning, but finished up the frame in order to get the decision.
The improved Baltimore bullpen pitched four masterful innings to keep Oakland off the scoreboard. The offense came through as three solo homers – from J.J. Hardy, Luke Scott and Adam Jones – powered the Orioles to a win.
The good news from yesterday is that Luke Scott came through huge with a homer – that landed on hit Eutaw Street and makes him all the time leader with shots that approached that area with six – and a double. Luke has had issues with his shoulder for weeks now, and it should be little wonder that has been a leading cause of his struggles. However, let’s hope with the treatment he has been getting, Scott can now be a valuable part of the offense again.
In other news, it looks like Brian Roberts is still a few weeks away from baseball activities due thanks to his concussion issues. I’ll say that the team is doing the right thing in holding him back, despite Roberts playing an integral part of the offense.
It is hard to say what is entirely wrong with him; however, based on what we as the public have learned about post-concussion syndrome, Roberts would be well served in taking his time from coming back from that injury.
Finally, yesterday at Camden Yard, MASN held their annual blogger event in conjunction with the Orioles. At the event, were by with members from Camden Chat, Camden Crazies and Camden Depot.
We’ll have some stuff from the event appearing later on today and Thursday on the blog.
