It is difficult to have a mental mistake keep an inning alive with two outs in a tie ballgame. It hurts more when your team has scored four unanswered runs to tie a game at 4-4 against a team that was reeling in a seven-game losing streak. But to see another mental mistake later in the inning that scored the go-ahead run and opened the door to another run-scoring single? It is too much to handle. The Nationals fell Sunday in Kansas City to the Royals, 6-4. The game was tied heading to the...

The Orioles won their 70th game today, which also produced the 1,000th career victory for Dan Duquette while he's been in charge of a major league team. Duquette's teams were 930-786 coming into the 2013 season, his second as the Orioles' executive vice president of baseball operations. "One of my first wins in Montreal when I got the job to be the GM was in September in 1991, after Dave Dombrowski went to Miami to build the Marlins," Duquette recalled. "I got the opportunity to...

If the Orioles end up going to the postseason, Wednesday's victory over Tampa Bay might be looked back upon as one of the bigger wins of the year. First off, it goes without saying that the entire series was tough on the Orioles and on the fans. Dropping two of three to a team that you're chasing in the standings is never a favorable result. The mere fact that the Orioles salvaged one game was a moral victory. However, that game should be looked upon as one where the Orioles finally stepped...

Orioles manager Buck Showalter considered giving Nick Markakis the afternoon off today, but changed his mind after considering how the sun was going to present challenges in the outfield. Markakis is a plus defender. Showalter wanted him out there in unfavorable conditions, the kind that seemed to bother Oakland's outfielders all afternoon. "I'm glad I talked myself out of that one," Showalter said. Markakis doubled and homered to end two droughts in the Orioles' 10-3 victory over the...

Several minutes after the Orioles had beaten Oakland 10-3, Nick Markakis talked about ending his 31-game drought without an extra-base hit and his 51-game homerless stretch this afternoon. "I'm just glad I hit the ball hard," Markakis said. "Where it goes, sometimes you have no control over it. I just want to go up with a good approach and hit the ball hard. Just continue to look for a good pitch, put a good swing on it, and wherever it goes, it goes." Since 1997, only Julio Lugo had a...

The Orioles got some early offense today and their starting pitcher worked out of some early trouble. It added up to a 10-3 win over the Oakland A's in front of 33,820 at Camden Yards. The Orioles won the series, completed a 5-4 homestand and improved to 70-59 on the season heading into a nine-game road trip that begins Tuesday at Boston. They are 13-6 in finales of three-game sets that decide the series winner and 24-14-4 in 42 series in 2013. Oakland had gone 105 consecutive games without...

The Nationals came back from a 6-0 deficit to the Royals on Friday. They've now come back after trailing 4-0 this afternoon and battled to tie this game 4-4 in the seventh. A three-run seventh inning has knotted things up, with Denard Span getting it started with a solo homer to right-center and Bryce Harper then following with a two-run shot to left-center. The three runs all came with two outs, and they came in the span of three pitches. Span smoked a first-pitch Ervin Santana changeup...

Orioles shortstop J.J. Hardy led off the bottom of the sixth inning with his 23rd home run of the season, increasing the lead to 7-1. The Orioles have hit 173 home runs this season to lead the majors. They've also allowed 163 homers, tying them with the Blue Jays for most in the majors. Interesting, right? Maybe more than you realized. According to STATS, if the Orioles finish in the lead in homers hit and allowed, they will be the first team in either league to do so since the 1950...

Though Nick Markakis continues to wait for his next home run, he's no longer thirsting for an extra-base hit. The drought is over. Markakis lined a double into right-center field off Oakland rookie Sonny Gray with one out in the bottom of the third inning. He hadn't collected an extra-base hit since July 19 in Texas, a span of 31 games. Seattle shortstop Brendan Ryan still has the longest streak this season, going the first 32 games without an extra-base hit. Markakis advanced to third...

Once the major league leader in home runs allowed, Dan Haren had allowed just four homers in 50 innings since coming off the DL. Haren hadn't allowed more than two runs in an outing since July 22. In the first inning of this afternoon's game alone, Haren allowed two homers and four runs, and the Nationals trail 4-0 early. Alex Gordon got things started for the Royals with a solo shot to right leading off the bottom of the first. Emilio Bonifacio then came around to score from first on a...