The Orioles have brought pitcher Chayce McDermott to Baltimore and put him on the 24-hour medical taxi squad.

McDermott is here in case Dean Kremer’s forearm soreness necessitates a stay on the injured list.

Samuel Basallo is catching again tonight after his walk-off home run with two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning – which also was his first homer at Camden Yards.

Jeremiah Jackson stays in right field, Emmanuel Rivera remains at third base and Coby Mayo stays at first base. Dylan Beavers is the left fielder.

Trevor Rogers has a 1.39 ERA, the lowest by any Orioles starter in his first 14 games. He’s allowed one run in seven innings in each of his last four outings, and one run in each of his last six.

Davey Johnson, one of baseball’s most successful managers who took over the Nationals at a time of unexpected chaos and led them to their first postseason berth, has died at 82, the team confirmed this morning.

Johnson, who had dealt with a number of medical issues later in life, lived outside Orlando with his wife, Susan, since his retirement following the 2013 season.

“On behalf of my family and the entire Washington Nationals organization, I want to extend my condolences to Davey Johnson’s family and loved ones,” managing principal owner Mark Lerner said in a statement. “We are all deeply saddened by his passing and join all of Major League Baseball in honoring his memory.

“Davey was a world-class manager, leading our team to its first NL East title and earning Manager of the Year honors in 2012. But, most importantly, he was an incredible person. I’ll always cherish the memories we made together with the Nationals, and I know his legacy will live on in the hearts and minds of our fans and those across baseball.”

Johnson had long since established his legacy of success as both a four-time All-Star second baseman with the Orioles and Braves in the 1960s and ’70s and as the World Series-winning manager of the Mets in 1986 before joining the Nationals as a consultant to former general manager Jim Bowden in 2006. He became a senior advisor to Mike Rizzo when the latter replaced Bowden as GM in 2009 and seemed content to finish out his career with the off-the-field role.

CHICAGO – It’s another beautiful day at the Friendly Confines, where the Nationals will look to shrug off Friday’s 11-5 loss to the Cubs and get back to the winning ways they previously discovered against the Marlins. To do that, they’re going to need a good start out of Brad Lord.

The rookie right-hander had been on an impressive run for months, but his last three starts have gone sideways (17 earned runs in 12 2/3 innings against the Mets, Yankees and Rays). During that time, his ERA has shot up from 3.26 to 4.34, turning such a promising debut season into something less than that. Lord still has an opportunity to right the ship, though, over the final month and will look to start that process today against a Chicago lineup that launched four homers into the bleachers Friday afternoon.

At the plate, the Nationals will try to get to Cubs starter Matthew Boyd early after going silent the first time through the order against Friday starter Javier Assad before getting hot. The lefty was quite good against the Nats back in June, allowing two runs over 7 1/3 innings. But he took the loss that night because MacKenzie Gore was even better in pitching his team to a 2-0 victory.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at CHICAGO CUBS
Where: Wrigley Field
Gametime: 2:20 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, 87.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Mostly sunny, 65 degrees, wind 14 mph out to right field

NATIONALS
SS CJ Abrams
DH James Wood
C Jorge Alfaro
1B Josh Bell
LF Daylen Lile
RF Dylan Crews
2B Nasim Nuñez
3B Brady House
CF Jacob Young

Davey Johnson never lacked confidence or brought into question who was in charge during his tenure as a major league manager.

Asked one day in Baltimore to predict an outcome involving his team, Johnson grinned and said, “I always bet on me.” It became one of his most famous quotes.

Johnson informed the media in 1996 of his plans to shift future Hall of Famer and baseball Iron Man Cal Ripken Jr. from shortstop to third base. Ripken found out about it after reporters gathered at his locker.

The move lasted six games. Manny Alexander failed his audition, Ripken went back to short – unhappy with the way Johnson handled it but never complaining about it publicly – and the Orioles made the playoffs.

They signed shortstop Mike Bordick as a free agent over the winter, Ripken returned to third and the Orioles went wire-to-wire to win the division.

A record that the baseball world viewed as unbreakable almost stayed intact because of a brawl on June 6, 1993 at Camden Yards – two years and three months before Cal Ripken Jr. played in his 2,131^st consecutive game to pass Lou Gehrig.

The delay lasted 20 minutes after benches and bullpens emptied. Orioles starter Mike Mussina hit Bill Haselman after the Mariners catcher homered earlier in the day, but the trouble really began when Seattle starter Chris Bosio threw behind Mark McLemore and Harold Reynolds. Plate umpire Durwood Merrill didn’t issue any warnings.

Tempers already were getting hot when Mussina drilled Haselman on the shoulder. Catcher Jeff Tackett chased Haselman, trying to get to him before he reached the mound. Tackett was credited with the tackle, which created a dogpile. Bosio fractured his collarbone for a second time. Bullpen coach Elrod Hendricks squared off against Tino Martinez. It was bedlam.

Seven players were ejected and suspended: Haselman, Bosio, Norm Charlton and Mackey Sasser from the Mariners, and Alan Mills, David Segui and Rick Sutcliffe from the Orioles. Mussina was spared, which led to Seattle manager Lou Piniella being tossed.

Tackett suffered a black eye and required stitches to close a gash on his cheek. Reliever Mark Williamson had a swollen, bloody nose after being slammed to the ground.

“Leading off for the Dodgers, pitcher Shohei Ohtani.”

That's where the oddities began. The Orioles prepped for the wrong Dodgers starter. Their starter left with an injury. Their rookie catcher came within a strike of sending the game to extra innings before hitting a walk-off home run that spun the night into something worth celebrating.

And boy, did they celebrate. 

Samuel Basallo went left-on-left against Tanner Scott and cleared the fence in center to give the Orioles a 2-1 win over the Dodgers before an announced crowd of 25,481 at Camden Yards. The count was 1-2 when Basallo barreled a 98.7 mph fastball and drove it 433 feet at 109.3 mph. Teammates mobbed him at home plate.

"He’s gonna be a big-time hitter," said interim manager Tony Mansolino.

Orioles interim manager Tony Mansolino was heading back indoors around 3:30 p.m. when he found out that the Dodgers weren’t starting Tyler Glasnow tonight at Camden Yards.

“My watch just buzzed me when I was walking in from early BP,” he said.

“I thought somebody was messing with me, but apparently not.”

No, it was true. The Dodgers scratched Glasnow with back tightness and are pushing him to early next week.

Mansolino kept the same lineup as the Orioles suddenly had to prepare for Shohei Ohtani. He was scheduled for Monday at home against the Rockies after working a season-high five innings on Aug. 27.

CHICAGO – The only thing more frustrating than Jake Irvin’s recent collapse has been the lack of any concrete answers for what ails the Nationals right-hander.

Irvin has insisted all along he’s healthy, with his on-and-off velocity drops likely a product of mechanics instead of anything physical. His answers after each laborious start include some variation of the sentiment that he’s going to keep working hard and keep taking the mound every five days in search of better results.

The problem: The results aren’t getting any better. They’re getting worse. And today’s performance during the Nats’ 11-5 loss to the Cubs might have represented a new low point.

Tagged for seven runs in 3 1/3 innings, Irvin once again was done in by his two biggest bugaboos: walks and home runs. He issued four free passes during the start, two of them directly leading to runs. (He also hit a batter who later scored.) And he served up two more homers, raising his league-leading total to 33.

"That's been the story of the season, (not) limiting that damage, (not) keeping the ball in the yard," he said. "I've got to find a way to do it. The boys are working way too hard coming off a series sweep. To have a start like that? It's disappointing, man. The guys in this room are just awesome, and to let them down like that stinks. There's no excuse."

The Orioles went from missing Shohei Ohtani to facing him tonight to begin a three-game series against the Dodgers at Camden Yards.

Tyler Glasnow was scratched and Ohtani will make tonight’s start. He was scheduled for Monday.

Ohtani has a 4.18 ERA in 11 starts this season. He’s struck out 44 batters in 32 1/3 innings and surrendered only three home runs.

There's nothing wrong with the bat. Ohtani is hitting .279/.387/.606 with 20 doubles, eight triples, 46 home runs and 87 RBIs in 137 games.

The Orioles have faced Ohtani twice, during his time with the Angels, and scored nine runs over 12 innings.

CHICAGO – Josiah Gray is ready to pitch in a competitive game for the first time since his Tommy John surgery more than a year ago.

The Nationals right-hander has been cleared to depart West Palm Beach, Fla., and will make a rehab start Sunday for Single-A Wilmington, his first game action in more than 14 months. He’s scheduled for two innings and 30-35 pitches.

It’s a long-awaited development for Gray, the Nats’ Opening Day 2024 starter who made only two big league appearances last year before going on the injured list with a flexor strain in his forearm. He made it back to start five minor league games on a rehab assignment early in the summer and appeared on the verge of rejoining the major league staff when he suffered a setback in his June 30 outing for Triple-A Rochester. An MRI revealed a torn ulnar collateral ligament, and he underwent Tommy John surgery and an internal brace procedure July 24, 2024.

Gray knew at that point he would at best have a shot at returning before end of the 2025 season, and he expressed optimism earlier this summer during a stop at Nationals Park he would be able to pitch in the majors sometime in September.

Time is running out for that to happen, but if Gray makes it through Sunday’s two innings with no issues and is able to build up his arm in a couple more rehab starts, it’s possible the Nats would decide to activate him for a cameo appearance during the season’s final week.

CHICAGO – The Nationals proved this week they can beat the Marlins. Three times in a row, to be exact. And with a four-game series coming up next week in Miami, there’s some genuine optimism around this team for the first time in a while. But before that, there are three games to play this weekend at Wrigley Field against a much better Cubs team that remains in the thick of the National League wild card race.

The Nats swept the Marlins by jumping out to early leads and getting solid work from their starters, then lights-out work from their resurgent bullpen. So it’s imperative for Jake Irvin to keep the good rotation vibes going this afternoon. Irvin felt better about his last start against the Rays than any of his other recent outings, but he still allowed two homers in that game, leaving him with a league-leading 31 surrendered for the season. Well, the wind is going to be blowing out to right field today. Irvin has to find a way to keep the ball within the friendly confines and out of the bleachers.

The Nationals face Cubs right-hander Javier Assad, who didn’t make his season debut until Aug. 12 due to an oblique strain. He’s delivered back-to-back quality starts against the Angels and Rockies, and he pitched well in two starts against the Nats last season, allowing three runs each time (once over five innings, once over six).

Reminder: Today’s game is only available on Apple TV+. Bob Carpenter, Kevin Frandsen and Dan Kolko will be back on MASN for Saturday’s game.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at CHICAGO CUBS
Where: Wrigley Field
Gametime: 2:20 p.m. EDT
TV: Apple TV+
Radio: 106.7 FM, 87.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Partly cloudy, 65 degrees, wind 20 mph out to right field

Mike Bielecki was a local guy who needed a favor.

Bielecki grew up in Dundalk and attended Loyola College. He rooted for the Orioles as a kid and a young adult. And right there in front of him, on Sept. 6, 1995, was the chance to throw a pitch in an historic game at Camden Yards.

Cal Ripken Jr. was about to break Lou Gehrig’s consecutive games record, with the milestone becoming official after the top of the fifth inning – known simply as 2,131. The digits do all the explaining.

Bielecki was on the California Angels’ roster, two years before the team changed its name to Anaheim. They were in town to play the Orioles, and Bielecki requested that manager Marcel Lachemann use him in relief behind starter Shawn Boskie. It didn't have to be for long. 

“I had pitched a few days before that,” said Bielecki, who owns a home in Lutherville with his wife and step-daughters, and two others in Ocean City and Bradenton. “That night was supposed to be my side day for a starter, and I asked my manager if there was any way possible he could let me get in the game just for one hitter. I didn’t care. Just let me throw to one hitter so I can get my name in the box score.

The Orioles have made the following roster move:

• RHP Corbin Martin cleared outright waivers and accepted an assignment to Triple-A Norfolk.

From hot dogs’ validity as a sandwich to drawing up the best starting 11 if the Orioles were fielding a soccer team, all bases were covered in Episode 100 of “The Bird’s Nest.” We talked about some baseball, too. 

If you didn’t get the chance to tune in, you can watch the full episode here: https://masn.me/tc1q2qs8 

As we did on the show, let’s start with the fun ones. 

If you both were stranded on an island and could listen to only one album, which one would it be? And is lasagna a casserole?

I have no idea how to pronounce the name of the person that asked this question. Roch? Strange spelling. 

Even when asked about his own home run Wednesday afternoon, Brady House couldn’t help but pivot to teammate Nasim Nunez’s more impressive power display during the Nationals’ 10-5 win over the Marlins.

“It’s a good feeling to put the ball in play, especially whenever I have runners on,” the rookie third baseman said. “And I feel like everyone did that today, especially Nas. Crazy work from Nasim today.”

OK, so House’s fourth-inning homer didn’t steal the show the way Nunez’s pair of homers (the first two of his major league career) did at Nationals Park. But it was plenty significant in its own right, because it had been a long time since the 22-year-old connected on a ball like that.

House made his big league debut June 16. He finally hit his first home run July 12 in Milwaukee, then hit another in that game just for good measure. It seemed like he had turned a corner and was poised to go on a sustained run that would showcase the power he had always owned at every prior level of the sport.

Except it didn’t happen that way. House went more than a month and a half before homering again, a stretch of 116 plate appearances that didn’t even include many close calls. Over that 33-game stretch prior to Wednesday, he hit a paltry .214 and slugged a paltry .259, drawing only one walk while striking out 39 times.

SAN DIEGO – The Orioles are home this weekend for a three-game series against the Dodgers that would generate a lot of buzz if standing alone. However, there’s much more happening Saturday with the club celebrating the 30^th anniversary of Cal Ripken Jr. breaking Lou Gehrig’s supposedly indestructible consecutive games record.

Ripken played his 2,131^st in a row Sept. 6, 1995 against the Angels at Camden Yards. In typical Ripken fashion, he homered on the nights that he tied and surpassed Gehrig.

He always rose to the occasion, an Iron Man filled with helium.

Ben McDonald made his major league debut during the “Why Not?” season in 1989, the same year that the Orioles drafted him first overall out of LSU. He appeared in 14 games in 1995, his final season with the club before signing with the Brewers as a free agent.

As an analyst on MASN broadcasts, McDonald provides a link to a distant past on a young team with players who only know what they’ve read, heard and watched on video.

SAN DIEGO – The Orioles are pulling more players off the injured list, reducing the number to 10 with a little more than three weeks left in the season.

They might need to send out the homer hose for repairs. Maybe chip in to pay the Petco Park water bill.

Jackson Holliday cleared the right-center field fence against former Orioles Rule 5 Draft pick Nestor Cortes to begin today’s game. Colton Cowser, Coby Mayo and Alex Jackson went back-to-back-to-back in the third to send Cortes to the showers, accompanied by a chorus of boos.

The Orioles cleaned up on the Padres, completing the series sweep with a 7-5 victory before an announced crowd of 35,019 at Petco Park.

A 4-2 road trip has left the Orioles with a 64-76 record as they wait for the Dodgers to arrive in Baltimore for a weekend series.

Life was oh so different the last time the Nationals swept a three-game series. Set the wayback machine to May 18 – if your memory banks go that far back – and recall when the Nats won three straight over the Orioles at Camden Yards. They would win their next two over the Braves, as well, for a season-best five-game winning streak that carried some legitimate optimism with it for a franchise attempting to prove it was ready to be a winner again.

The ballclub that put itself in position to sweep the Marlins this afternoon bears little resemblance to that one. The general manager and manager are long gone. A sixth consecutive losing season has already been clinched. Most of the veterans have been traded or released. The entire bullpen has been remade.

The 28 players who dressed for today’s game had no qualms about celebrating a 10-5 victory, one that completed a series sweep over Miami. It may have come before a season-low announced crowd of 11,190, but it was nevertheless meaningful for these young guys, especially the 25-year-old shortstop who enjoyed the greatest game of his life.

Nasim Nuñez, the former Rule 5 Draft pick acquired from the Marlins, launched both the first and second home runs of his major league career in his first major league appearance in three months. Starting in place of CJ Abrams at shortstop, he also delivered a run-scoring single, giving him four RBIs on the afternoon. (He entered the day with six RBIs in 74 career big league games.)

"I see the comments. I see the things people say: 'Can't hit,'" Nuñez said. "And even for myself, it's not about proving to everyone else. It's about proving myself right. I really proved myself right. I have to be the one to believe I can hit. When you go out there and see it, it gives you a little more belief."

SAN DIEGO – A couple of injured Orioles are nearing their returns to the active roster this month. The injured list holds 10 players and can get down to single digits.

Consider it an accomplishment in 2025.

Infielder Jordan Westburg (ankle) is doing full baseball activities and should go on a rehab assignment next week.

Westburg hasn’t played since Aug. 18 in Boston.

“Everything is getting closer and closer,” said interim manager Tony Mansolino.

SAN DIEGO – The rest of baseball also recognizes Trevor Rogers’ brilliance on the mound.

Rogers was named the American League’s Pitcher of the Month for August, while Milwaukee’s Freddy Peralta won the honor in the National League.

Rogers is the 14^th Oriole to earn the distinction and the first since Corbin Burnes last September. Erik Bedard was the last left-hander in 2007.

This is the first time that Rogers has won it.

It was fairly predictable.