If you thought what happened on Thursday night when the Orioles played the New York Yankees, Friday’s game against the Nationals was even worse.
I don’t know how to quite articulate what I saw on Friday, but I will try — very quickly.
In one of the worst losses I’ve seen at Camden Yards in a very long time, the Baltimore Orioles got manhandled by the Washington Nationals, 17-5.
You all know what happened. It was just incredibly frustrating as a fan to watch.
Not to disparage the Nationals; however, you would expect this kind of thrashing from the Yankees or Red Sox — not a team that is pretty much at the bottom of every offensive stat in the sport of baseball.
The Nationals broke a franchise record for the most runs scored in a ball game since they moved from Montreal. In addition, they scored *more* runs on Friday than they had done in nearly a week. Crazy.
As for the Orioles, they were just plain awful. That may be an understatement as pitcher Jake Arrieta struggled; however, the bullpen got hammered badly, players — notably Felix Pie — made some costly errors on the basepaths and on defense, and as the game went on the Orioles just looked listless.
It was almost like they had fallen and they could not find a way to get up. The Orioles were competitive for the first third of the game and then everything went to crap.
To make matters worse, both Jason Berken, Mike Gonzalez and Kevin Gregg struggled in their relief outings. Well, Berken has been sent down to Triple-A Norfolk (this was announced after the game) and Gonzalez may be on borrowed time with the Orioles unless something happens quickly with him. One would think that pitcher Alfredo Simon is on his way back to the Orioles.
Nationals’ starting pitcher Jason Maqruis was just nearly as bad as Jake Arrieta — only lasting until the fourth inning; however, unlike the Orioles, his bullpen was able to do the job. They kept the Orioles scoreless for the rest of the game, making a contest that was 6-5 after the fourth inning into a massacre.
Ever since Baltimore imploded against the Boston Red Sox on Monday, things have gone from bad to worse.
The Orioles have been outscored an astounding 30-7 in their last two games, and once again, they have fallen into a real bad funk. Now, they have lost four games in a row and need a way to climb out of this hole.
Well, Saturday is a new day. That’s a positive.
