BOWIE - Two days removed from the must-win game that saved their season and got them to tonight, Bowie opens the Double-A Northeast Championship Series tonight, hosting Akron in Game 1 of a best-of-five series. Bowie's three-run rally in the eighth inning on Sunday gave the Baysox a 7-5 win over Altoona and sent Bowie to the playoffs, where tonight they begin a series seeking their second league championship after winning the 2015 Eastern League title. With the game tied 5-5 on Sunday, catcher...

With rookie Chris EIlis unavailable to make tonight's start due to some arm fatigue, the Orioles are going with Conner Greene in a bullpen game against the Phillies. Greene is making his first major league start after 18 relief appearances this season. He hasn't gone more than two innings or thrown more than 37 pitches, which happened in his debut on July 27 against the Marlins. Until allowing three runs Sunday in one-third of an inning at Fenway Park, Greene had strung together six scoreless...

After they had allowed 24 runs in the Boston series, losing all three games, the Orioles pitched a shutout Monday night as they beat the Philadelphia Phillies 2-0. It was a damaging loss to the Phillies' playoff chances. Lefty John Means and two relievers teamed on a four-hitter. It was the fourth shutout of the year for a Baltimore staff that had allowed 81 runs the previous nine games. * April 2: Means goes seven innings as O's blank Boston 3-0 on opening day.* May 5: Means pitches a...

You would think by now the Nationals wouldn't find themselves in the middle of yet another argument over the interpretation of Rule 5.09a(11). Not after it was used against Trea Turner twice, including most famously in Game 6 of the 2019 World Series. Yet there was Josh Bell, pleading his case after being struck in the back by a throw just as he reached first base in the top of the 10th Monday night in Miami, and there was Davey Martinez, giving an umpire an earful in the Nats dugout before...

BOWIE - He is a rarity at Double-A Bowie. He has been with that team all year, from start to finish, and will be a key cog in their lineup tonight as the Double-A Northeast Championship Series begins with Bowie hosting Akron in a best-of-five series for the league championship. Patrick Dorrian, 25, has had a strong year on the Orioles farm. One that can fly under the radar when your name is among the organization's home run leaders with players like Adley Rutschman and Kyle Stowers. Stowers...

There is little sense at this point judging a Nationals-Marlins game on the performance of the two clubs after five or six innings. As much as they've faced each other in the last month, everyone should understand by now every game is going to be decided late, either by the bullpens or by some other manner of back-and-forth chaos. So it was again tonight in Miami, where the two teams at the bottom of the National League East standings engaged in another high-scoring affair that went right down...

At times tonight, Orioles ace lefty John Means looked like the 2021 early season version. The Means who had an ERA of 1.21 after his first eight starts. That is always big for the Orioles and Means was tonight. He threw 6 2/3 scoreless innings - his fifth start this year allowing no runs - as the Orioles blanked the Philadelphia Phillies 2-0 to start a three-game road series. The Orioles (48-102) won for just the second time in 10 games and put a damaging loss on the Phillies record....

The 2021 season is down to a dozen games, and egging on the Orioles to keep playing won't do you any good. They'll be scrambling to make their flights home or to get back to Baltimore. Perhaps they'll also get some satisfaction from influencing a couple of pennant races. The schedule has set them up for it. They left Boston on Sunday afternoon and flew into Philadelphia, facing another team desperate for wins that can get it into the playoffs. A four-game series against the Rangers won't...

If the Orioles thought playing an interleague series this late in the season would provide an opponent just playing out the string - well, that was not an accurate thought. Tonight, the Orioles begin a three-game series at Philadelphia and the Phillies desperately need wins. Philadelphia (76-73) began play Sunday just one game behind Atlanta for the National League East lead. But they lost 3-2 to the Mets while the Braves (77-70) blanked San Francisco 3-0. So the Phillies begin this series two...

Josh Bell starts in left field for the Nationals tonight, and while this is not a new development, it is notable that manager Davey Martinez felt comfortable enough in his slugging first baseman's ability to handle himself out there that he was willing to do this for a game inside spacious loanDepot Park. The Marlins' home stadium features one of the largest outfields in baseball, so this is perhaps not as easy an assignment for Bell as it was the three previous times he started in left field...