Game Wrap and Morning Links: May 30, 2011

Oakland 6, Baltimore 4
Box Score / Play-By-Play / AP Recap

Zach Britton was due some regression, after a wonderful start to the season that has also included a fair amount of fortune considering the high number of baserunners he has stranded and relatively low number of bats he has missd. Yesterday, Britton caught too much of the plate way too often, and the balls ended up missing the gloves -- the result, a line of 5.2 IP, 10 H, 6 R, 6 ER, 3 BB, 3 SO and a three-run big fly off the bat of Josh Willingham to give Oakland the lead for good in the 5th.

J.J. Hardy doubled in the 2nd inning, breaking a 19-inning stretch during which no Oriole collected an extra-base hit. We touched on the O's offense in our last game wrap, so this time around we can leave it simply as, "I hope things get better...in a hurry."

One post-game note, the Orioles optioned Chris Tillman to AAA Norfolk, explaining the June schedule limits to utility of a #5 starter and the preference is for Tillman to continue getting regular work. I think it would have been useful to just shift Tillman to the pen and work him in regularly between the scattering of #5 starts over the next four weeks, but it's probably not an issue worth digging in on, one side or the other.

Stat of the game

2.0

The team WHIP for the O's arms yesterday afternoon. WHIP has a fair number of flaws when it comes to evaluating a performance, but I think we can all get behind the idea that it is tough to win if you average allowing two baserunners per inning.

Orioles Game ball

J.J. Hardy (2-4, 2B (6))

MiLB game balls

Norfolk (Box) - John Hester, C (2-5, 2 2B (4))
Bowie (Box - Game 1) - Seven Lerud, C (1-2, BB)
Bowie (Box - Game 2) - Tim Bascom, C (5.2 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 SO)
Frederick (Box) - Steven Bumbry, CF (2-4, 2B (8), BB)
Delmarva (Box) - Justin Dalles, C (1-3, 2B (4))

Three Morning Links

MASN's Roch Kubatko notes in his review of the demotion of Bergesen/Tillman that the open days in June allow Buck Showalter and Andy MacPhail to practice what they preach: "If you're not doing the job, we'll find someone else who will." My own side note -- if the O's powers-that-be think that Chris Jakubauskas, Jason Berken and Alfredo Simon are potential solutions, well...

A collection of some national media chat questions touching on all things Orioles, courtesy of Dempsey's Army.

Kevin Cowherd puts voice to something I've been thinking since early April -- fans/writers need to apologize for the Wieters-bashing.

Up Next

Jake Arrieta (116 ERA-, 109 FIP-, 3.91 xFIP), you're up. O's try to snap slide against Doug Fister (86 ERA-, 88 FIP-, 3.91 xFIP) and the M's.