Here's why today's loss SUCKED

[Uli2001]

Give credit to the other team. The Red Sox are hot. They will cool down but for now, it may have been a good deal to have taken one game yesterday after the Sunday and Monday debacles. This team is tired right now but they will be fresh for the weekend series.

[LookitsPuck]

Need to sweep or win the series against the Royals. Chen and Hammel need to rebound like woah.

[wildcard]

I'm not upset with the hitting. They scored 5. That should be enough to win a nine inning game.

However the O's had three pitchers that gave up runs today. Arrieta, Ayala and O'Day. When that happens the O's are probably going to lose. If one pitchers has a bad day then the O's may over come it. But three is probably a loss. Ayala and O'Day both gave up one run in about one inning. That is a 9.00 ERA. That is just not going to cut it when your starter is marginal that day.

Right now Arrieta is rivaling Hunter for the worst starter on the team. He is talented. I hope he finds his groove and soon.

[OFFNY]

Need to sweep or win the series against the Royals. Chen and Hammel need to rebound like woah.

I think we need to 1-0 in the Royals series by late Friday night. One game at a time, Puck.

P.S. Enjoy that victory on Friday night. We'll be 29-17 by then.

.

[El Gordo]

I'm not upset with the hitting. They scored 5. That should be enough to win a nine inning game.

However the O's had three pitchers that gave up runs today. Arrieta, Ayala and O'Day. When that happens the O's are probably going to lose. If one pitchers has a bad day then the O's may over come it. But three is probably a loss. Ayala and O'Day both gave up one run in about one inning. That is a 9.00 ERA. That is just not going to cut it when your starter is marginal that day.

Right now Arrieta is rivaling Hunter for the worst starter on the team. He is talented. I hope he finds his groove and soon.

As good as Ayala and O'Day have been I can cut them some slack. Just like with the wild pitch Wieters should have blocked. Nobody's prefect for ever. Arrieta on the other hand has no excuse. Somethings not right with him between the ears. I am predicting he goes to Norfolk when Britton is ready. Buck likes Hunter.

[wildcard]

As good as Ayala and O'Day have been I can cut them some slack. Just like the wild ppitch Wieters should have blocke. Nobody's prefect for ever. Arrieta on the other hand has no excuse. Somethings not right with him between the ears. I am predicting he goes to Norfolk when Britton is ready. Buck likes Hunter.

I think Buck likes both Hunter and Arrieta, but he is not going to stand for either one of them messing up his team.

I think Ayala and O'Day have been good pitchers for the O's this year. But when they both give up runs the O's are likely to lose. Especially when the starter didn't do his job.

[ledzepp8]

Well I'm glad the OH ombudsman is here to put all of us that have "lost perspective" in our place.

This was an insanely winnable game, against a division rival, with a chance to win a series and start another winning streak. These are the games that good teams win, particularly when your opponent's best players ALL have bad games. Bard was also awful and we let him off the hook a few times.

Maybe you can write off losing at the hands of Daniel Nava, Kelly Shoppach and Scott Podsednik, but I can't.

And the Orioles have been winning these games this season. Losing one of them isn't cause for panic.

[O's84]

I'm really disgusted with how they played today. I think alot of things have already been hashed.

In addition, the fact that the pitching match ups were favorable in the series

(ie. Bucholz, Bard) hurts yet we lose both games.

Too bad and wasted opportunity to push back a division rival. I really wish we could scores runs without having to hit Hr's, and cut down on the DP's, I know today 2 of them were off lineouts but I was talking in general how the season has been.

We need to go out and bounce back. Hopefully Britton will be back soon and Hunter can be moved to the pen. Our pitchers (in particular Matusz, Arrieta and Britton when he comes back [though I give him leeway since he is coming back from injury])have to start showing some consistency otherwise were in a lot of trouble. Some of them have been in the league for awhile already so its time to show what your made of.

[NewMarketSean]

I don't think there is anything wrong mentally with Jake. In fact I think he has a great mentality. He just doesn't have good control of his stuff on half the days he takes the mound. Many a pitcher in this league had all the intangibles needed to be successful except the ability to control your stuff consistently. Maybe he is one of those guys...maybe he can overcome it. Until he does we have to suffer through it.

[Todd-O]

^^^ good one.

Look, at the end of the day, he's a young guy that doesn't possess raw overpowering stuff. He looked pretty good in his last outing. Not so hot today. He will work it out.

[section18]

When is Palmer coming back? It seems whenever he takes a week or two off the starters fall apart. I don't know if he gives them a pre-game pep talk or it's just a coincidence. Arrieta seems to lack concentration at times. When he had a bad game a week or so ago there were comments that Buck made saying he needed to maintain his composure and not totally lose it in some innings or words to that effect and we needed him to eat innings and keep us in games. He always seems to have a couple of big innings each game where he gives up 2-3 runs in one inning. If he has one more bad game this week he may benefit from a short stint in Norfolk. Did he pitch better when his arm hurt?

It's also obvious Exposito seems to catch the games where the other team scores more than 5 runs. Why hasn't Paulino been called up?

[DallasOsFan]

I agree with Roy Firestone (whether it's the real Roy or not ? I don't know): all Orioles losses suck.

Buck was out managed ...

By Bobby Valentine? OUCH. That's like saying he played pick-up basketball and got posted up by a five-year-old. Nobody should EVER get out-managed by that guy.

[Va Beach O's fan]

I don't get these guys' approach at the plate sometimes. Whenever the opponent pitcher is struggling to find the plate or it's late and we need baserunners, they're swinging at borderline pitches. Make the guy throw the ball over the plate.

This has been my biggest pet peeve for years. Bard clearly had little to no control tonight and we were swinging at first and second pitches in an at-bat. Just bad baseball to help a guy out who was all over the place. I've never understood why we can't just take a strike or two when the guy can't throw any of his pitches for strikes consistently.

[Dr. FLK]

To me, the worst part was just the wasted chances off of Bard. He gave us every opportunity to blow the game open, and we couldn't capitalize. But, that's baseball. If Jake pitches more effectively, it's a moot point. He has to get more consistent. The rotation is regressing now - as most expected it to. Let's just hope it doesn't regress too far.

[Tony-OH]

Yup. The only thing that happened today that I'm upset about is that once again Jake Arrieta loses his command mid-game. The rest was just baseball with the exception of the two Avery mistakes on the basepaths which I'll attribute to him being a very young player. Shoppach hit a really good pitch. What are you gonna do? Nava hit a decent pitch. Again, it happens.

The loss of perspective is in full swing now IMHO. Heck, NMS has posted like 6-8 negative things in the last three days. For God's sake, he started a thread about how disappointing it is that we are only a few games OVER 500 at home. Talk about no perspective. For years I've seen folks question whether he could even be happy if the Orioles were winning. The answer: No.

Jake frustrated the crap out of me. You could argue we got a bit unlucky with the LD double plays (though we're due for some bad luck). I'm unhappy we lost and it was frustrating, but the rest of this "you've got to do this" and "good teams do that" and blah, blah, blah is just emotional nonsense IMHO.

[Pet Peeve alert] There is nothing I dislike more than attributing poor fundamental baseball on being a "young player" in the major leagues. Avery has played in 483 minor leagues games, probably hundred or so high school games, and maybe another hundred or so little league and high school showcase events combined. One of things I was told and saw a few times myself is that Avery will have mental lapses on the base paths. He's fast, but he's not necessarily a good base runner out there. I didn't see the game yesterday so I don't know what happened, but the last thing we should blame it on is Avery being "a young player or a rookie." I'm 42-years old and have played baseball pretty much my whole life, and I bet I don't have 450 games combined experience, yet I don't make dumb decisions on the bases. Some guys are good instinctual base runners and others are not, but let's not base it on being a "young player".[/Pet Peeve alert]

As for Arrieta I completely agree and it was one of the reasons why I've been saying since I saw him in Frederick that his best role will be as a closer. I completely understand the Orioles attempt and desire to see Arrieta start, but he's always been inconsistent with his command and that hurts him as a starter. Jake can have Verlander-type stuff for 4-5 innings and then implode. Right now he's no better than a 4th starter because he just can't be counted on to give you a solid 6-7 innings consistently and when you watch Arrieta's stuff, that's got to be frustrating for everyone because he clearly has the capability stuff wise.