Cade Povich put his hands on his head as Colton Cowser scaled the center field fence. A spectacular catch would limit the damage in the fifth inning and make it easier for the Orioles to rally. Having the ball fall on the other side would hasten his departure and complicate a comeback attempt.
Cowser landed on the track without the ball. Spencer Torkelson circled the bases with a 419-foot home run. And Povich was gone after one more batter.
A winning West Coast road trip was followed tonight by a 5-3 loss to the Tigers before an announced crowd of 20,291 at Camden Yards. The Orioles are 13 games below .500 again, with the return of a couple more injured players unable to provide a needed spark against the best team in baseball.
Povich was done after Zach McKinstry’s triple. He allowed five runs and nine hits with one walk and six strikeouts. The start drained him of 98 pitches and raised his ERA to 5.46.
Jordan Westburg marked his return from the injured list with a leadoff homer off Will Vest in the ninth, his first since April 19, but the next three batters were retired.
The Tigers led 1-0 in the second inning on McKinstry’s one-out triple into the right field corner and Wenceel Pérez’s fly ball to right. Povich had four strikeouts through the second.
A rally in the third inning, fueled by singles from Jahmai Jones and Riely Greene, ended with Dillon Dingler’s second strikeout. Povich was up to 58 pitches but keeping the game close.
A tie manufactured in the bottom of the third dissolved in the top of the fourth when Pérez doubled off the left field wall with two outs and scored on Javier Báez’s single to right.
Two-out damage struck again in the fifth on Greene’s double to right-center and Dingler’s fly ball that fell inside the right field line for a 3-1 lead – Detroit’s seventh hit of the night. The eighth followed on Torkelson’s two-run shot.
The Tigers started left-hander Brant Hurter as an opener and he stranded a runner in each of the first two innings after an error and a hit by pitch. Jackson Holliday singled in the third, stole second base with two outs and scored the tying run on Gunnar Henderson’s single.
Chase Lee replaced Hurter, who had a 1.62 ERA in 18 appearances, 17 in relief, before tonight’s game. Sawyer Gipson-Long entered in the fourth and tossed four scoreless innings with one hit before Holliday doubled in the eighth and scored on Adley Rutschman’s fly ball to the left field track.
The Orioles put two runners on base with two outs, but Ryan O’Hearn struck out with the count full against Tommy Kahnle. O’Hearn should have drawn a four-pitch walk, but plate umpire Alex Tosi blew the call on a 3-0 changeup that missed low.
The Orioles are 26-39 this season and 4-14 against left-handers. They’re going to see another one Thursday when Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal closes out the series.
The bullpen keeps doing its job, logging 4 1/3 scoreless innings tonight and allowing one run in the last 28.
The Orioles lost Jorge Mateo earlier this evening with left elbow inflammation but reinstated Westburg and Cedric Mullins from the injured list. They’re creeping closer to the roster that they envisioned, so they’ve got that going for them.
“Looking back on Opening Day and the guys who we started with and just kind of the impact that had on the team early, and to lose a lot of those guys, yeah, definitely affected the team,” Mullins said this afternoon. “Guys coming back healthy, especially this early in the season, we’re hoping for good things out of ourselves.”
But is there enough season left to do it?
“The previous two years I’ve been up in the big leagues, we’ve had ballclubs that are in first and second place at this time, and I haven’t really had to gauge that question,” Westburg said. “I don’t know how to answer that. I hope there is. I really like the way that the team’s playing just from afar the last couple weeks. I’m pretty confident in this group. I’m gonna try to focus on the positives and try to stack one day at a time and we’ll see what happens at the end of the year.
“It’s a long season. I know I’ve said that and I’m sure you all are tired of hearing that, but it is and there’s a lot of things that can change.”
“Overall, it started off slow,” Mullins said. “Good teams do that year after year. It’s a matter of how you respond. We’ve been responding pretty well as of late, so it’s just continuing to keep that momentum going.”
To dig out of this hole, Westburg suggests that the Orioles take the cliched approach of one day at a time.
“That’s certainly what I’m doing now that I’m back and healthy,” he said. “Just try to take one pitch at a time, one day at a time, and stack good performances, stack team wins, stack the positives. Staying positive is a huge thing, I think. It’s easy to get negative, it’s easy to feel negativity from all the outside voices, and I think the guys in here just need to stay positive and stay focused on one day at a time.”
Westburg got a much closer look tonight at what he’s tracked from afar prior to his return. It pained him to count up the losses and know that he couldn’t do anything about them or provide support.
“Really hard,” he said. “These are my guys. I don’t want to say that I could have done anything different, but I want to go through it with them and at least be a part of that group. Just kind of being separate and away was hard. It always is. Everybody on the IL feels that way. To be back in the clubhouse, I hope I can bring something to the table. I don’t know what that is, but maybe a little bit of spark or some help. Something.”
Mullins went 0-for-4 and didn’t get the ball out of the infield. Westburg grounded out twice and was hit by a pitch before lining a 96.4 mph fastball over the left field wall for a last glimmer of hope.
The Orioles will take anything that can revive their season.