Late rally comes up short in Baltimore's 5-4 loss (updated)

MILWAUKEE – The first two innings haven’t been kind to the Orioles in the Tony Mansolino era. Late deficits haven’t been kind to Baltimore all season. 

In the first game of their new series against the Brewers, the Orioles beat both trends. But they couldn’t beat the Brewers, falling 5-4 in Game 1. 

Yesterday, the ever-reliable Zach Eflin allowed seven earned runs in his first two frames against the Nationals. On Saturday, Kyle Gibson and Charlie Morton combined to do the same. 

The Orioles, on the other hand, found their earliest runs of those two games in the fifth inning. 

Tonight’s deficit of 3-1 after two innings wasn’t quite 7-0, but it still wasn’t the start the Orioles were looking for.

Baltimore's offense couldn’t get anything going against Brewers “starter” Rob Zastryzny in the first inning. Luckily for Baltimore, the lefty was just the opener, lasting only 12 pitches while striking out two. Quinn Priester entered the game for the Brew Crew in the second, and Baltimore took advantage, at least for a short while.

To lead off the frame, Ramón Laureano launched a Priester slider to left-center for a solo home run at 108.2 mph off the bat. His third homer of the month improved his May slash line to .341/.426/.659, good for a 1.085 OPS. 

The bottom of the frame got more sour. 

Dean Kremer looked sharp in his first inning of work, but ran into some trouble in the middle of the order. A Rhys Hoskins walk and Isaac Collins single put runners on first and second with no outs. Kremer nearly tightroped out of things, recording outs of Sal Frelick and Andruw Monasterio, but ran into the O’s worst enemy this season: the opposing team’s ninth hitter. 

Brewers third baseman Caleb Durbin snapped his 0-for-24 streak with a two-out single into left, scoring Hoskins. Then, leadoff hitter Brice Turang mirrored Durbin, lining a base hit into right, scoring Durbin and Collins. 

Once again, the Orioles found themselves in an early hole. This time, it was 3-1 Milwaukee. 

Kremer settled in enough to keep things within reach for the O’s offense. But as has been the case too often this season, the Orioles bats couldn’t get much going in the middle innings. 

More damage came for the Brewers in the fifth inning. Back-to-back doubles in the bottom of the frame from Turang and William Contreras pushed the Crew’s lead to 4-1. Through those at-bats, the duo at the top of Milwaukee’s lineup was a combined 5-for-6 with three doubles and three driven in. Kremer evaded more trouble, though, and kept the O’s deficit at three. 

In the top of the sixth, Frelick lined a triple down the right field line, and with Durbin’s good night threatening to get better in the on-deck circle after a strikeout of Andruw Monasterio, Kremer’s night was complete with 5 ⅓ innings, nine hits, two walks, six strikeouts and four earned runs. 

Seranthony Domínguez entered for Kremer and walked two to load the bases, but danced out of trouble to keep the O’s deficit at three. Bending but not breaking was the theme of Baltimore’s pitching. 

"Limited damage, like you said, and balls are just finding grass right now — for everybody," Kremer said after the game. "Not just myself. For everybody. It’s tough, but we have to keep on moving on. Eventually something will change. We’re all looking forward to that time. But for right now, things are just finding grass.”

"Balls found holes," Mansolino added. "Different than kind of the balls that we hit hard."

The Brewers' pitching wasn’t bending or breaking. That is, until the seventh inning. 

With one away in the frame, Ryan O’Hearn and Ramón Urías walked and doubled to put runners on second and third. That concluded Priester’s night, and in came Nick Mears, who had a 0.51 ERA in 19 appearances on the year. Cedric Mullins didn’t care.

On an 0-1 count, Mullins drove a middle-middle fastball into the right field bleachers. A three-run shot made it a whole new ballgame, tied at 4-4 in the top of the seventh. 

For the first time this season, the Orioles had life after trailing through six innings. 

"He’s the leader of this team and when he goes, we go," Laureano said postgame. "The stats show it.”

That juice carried into the eighth inning, but Baltimore couldn’t cash in with Gunnar Henderson in scoring position. Still, the quality of the at-bats was encouraging. 

"They competed," Mansolino added. "That’s a really good bullpen right there. We had traffic on the bases against the back end of their bullpen. I think we hit the ball really hard tonight."

In the bottom of the frame, Yennier Cano took the mound in dire need of a bounceback. The former All-Star had posted a 13.50 ERA in just 5 ⅓ innings of work in May across seven appearances. 

His appearance tonight didn’t go much better. 

Cano was one out away from getting out of things. But in a full count to Turang, Cano allowed a free pass. Turang ranks towards the bottom of the list of hitters you’d like to walk in a tie game, as he ranks very high on the list of the major leagues' stolen base leaders. Entering the eighth inning, he had nabbed a dozen bags. Ending the night, it was a baker’s dozen. Not Bryan. 

And with a runner in scoring position, Milwaukee came through. Contreras matched a career high with his fourth hit of the night, and this one decided the game. A single that got by a diving Henderson put the Brewers up one entering the ninth inning. 

First base was open for Contreras if Baltimore wanted to intentionally walk him. Mansolino and the dugout opted not to. 

"I think, in this scenario, we thought we had a shot to throw up a point in the bottom half," Mansolino said. "I think there’s probably another scenario where you feel like you might not be able to do that right there, just kind of where we were at. We didn’t want to put him on right there in that situation and risk the possibility of going down two. We also have a ton of faith in Yenni. Yenni’s one of our guys. We really like Yenni, really in any situation. So we bet on our guy, it didn’t work out. We’ll do it again next time.”

The Orioles were comfortable living with that decision and needed to respond with some clutch hitting of their own, down one run in the ninth. 

Mullins walked on four pitches leading off, and after a Dylan Carlson failed bunt attempt, stole second. Pinch-hitter Adley Rutschman was tasked with bringing him home, but lined out to left. Two away. It came down to one of the O's best hitters as of late, Jackson Holliday. 

Holliday's at-bat ended in the same way as Rutschman's: a line out to left, and there was the ballgame. 

The O’s offense fought. After a tough go against Priester, they came through with three runs in the seventh inning, a feat they had seldom accomplished when trailing. Baltimore’s pitching bent just a bit too much. 

The Orioles are still in search of their first win under Mansolino. But things are slowing down for the new skipper. 

"Just in terms of thinking through the game and trying to be a couple of innings ahead," he said. "I think when you’ve been sitting in this seat for a while, I think what a manager does is they’re able to think two or three innings ahead. I’m fortunate to have (pitching coach Drew) French and (bench coach Robinson) Chirinos and (pitching strategy coach Ryan) Klimek and (hitting coach Cody) Asche and all these guys around me to where they’re making sure that we don’t miss something. They’re on top of it, I’m getting closer to being on top of it."

Baltimore will use an opener of their own tomorrow, tossing Keegan Akin before Chayce McDermott enters the game. McDermott is currently on the taxi squad, so the Orioles will need to make a roster move to get him active. 

The Orioles fell to .500 when hitting multiple home runs and 13-7 when scoring four or more. At 15-31, they're still in search of a spark.