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Baltimore Orioles: Chris Davis Regains AL Home Run Lead

By Randy Buchman

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Sep 30, 2015; Baltimore, MD, USA; Baltimore Orioles designated hitter Chris Davis (19) hits a solo home run during the seventh inning against the Toronto Blue Jays at Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Mandatory Credit: Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports

For the second consecutive year, Camden Yards was the location for celebrating the clinching of the American League East title. Except that this time it was not the Baltimore Orioles doing the celebrating, but rather the Toronto Blue Jays.

There was truly nothing to celebrate about the O’s absolutely embarrassing performance in game one of the doubleheader. Toronto won 15-2, but it really was as close as that sounds! The Orioles allowed 18 base hits and gave up 10 walks!  Just to make sure the Jays had plenty of baserunners, the Birds also committed four errors (including Machado’s 21st).

Pretty much every Orioles pitcher was dreadful, beginning with Miguel Gonzalez who allowed three earned runs on four hits and three walks in 3.2 innings.  Though I had not written this in any articles, I internally wondered where there really was wisdom in getting Gonzalez back to a start again before the end of the year. The thinking was that it would be good for him to have a positive to take into the offseason; but was not just the opposite as likely to happen? And it did.

But as bad as the Orioles were in the first game, they were that good in game number two of the day … not that it matters greatly at this point. Kevin Gausman pitched eight great innings, allowing just one run with great pitch efficiency. It was against the “B” lineup of the Jays, but his stuff was good by any measure.

Back-to-back homers by Manny Machado and Chris Davis broke a scoreless tie in the bottom of the seventh inning. For Manny, the homer was #31 on the season. He is just out of the top 10 in the American League with that number.

In the top 10 are three Jays hitters — Josh Donaldson with 41, Jose Bautista with 40, and Edwin Encarnacion at 37.  The latter two hit homers in game one.

The Davis home run drove Jays reliever and losing pitcher Ryan Terpera from the game. The ball just barely made it over the wall (without someone making a highlight reel play on it). But Davis would come back in his next at-bat against Steve Delabar to hit a truly massive monster shot to the base of the scoreboard.

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The two homers put Davis in the lead in the AL with a total of 45. He entered the doubleheader tied at 43 with Nelson Cruz, who would later hit his 44th off Scott Kazmir of the Astros. The home runs were also numbers 200 and 201 of his career. It was the third time he has homered off Delabar; but interestingly, Davis has never hit more than three off any individual pitcher.

Matt Wieters also had a milestone home run in the eighth inning, the 100th of his career. Enjoy these homers while you can.

The Orioles are now 77-81 and therefore have to win the final four games to make it to .500.  Sketchy weather forecasts have Thursday’s game moved up to noon, and one has to wonder what is going to happen this weekend with a hurricane possibly coming up the coast. But honestly, that would be a fitting ending to this very strange Baltimore Orioles season.

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