Baltimore Orioles Facing Issue in MLB Playoff Chase

Heading into Thursday’s game against the St. Louis Cardinals with a chance to complete a three-game sweep, the Baltimore Orioles were looking to break their spell of dropping four consecutive series finales. 

With Trevor Rogers on the mound, the Orioles can consistently expect that he will give them enough innings in a start and put them in position to win. However, some recent struggles continued to bite Rogers in a six-run outing on Thursday.

Rogers had himself a discouraging day on the mound, as he allowed six earned runs in five innings of work. Though the strikeout stuff remained, it was the long ball that Rogers had trouble limiting against the Cardinals.

A pair of homers — a three-run bomb off the bat of Blaze Jordan and a two-run shot by former Oriole Ramón Urías — put Baltimore in an early hole that it ended up not climbing out of.

When addressing what went wrong on the mound in the outing, Rogers could not label the specifics as to why the homers have been such a recent bother on the mound.

“Honestly, it’s kind of hard to say. I thought I pitched really well,” Rogers said, according to Jacob Calvin Meyer of The Baltimore Sun. “I was attacking the zone the way I wanted to. Just lately, the homers have been killing me.”

Thursday’s outing marked the fifth straight start in which Rogers allowed a home run, which was a consistent trend of his early-season struggles before he began to turn things around in June. Although he has recently struggled with keeping the ball in the yard, Rogers has continued to pitch efficiently for the Orioles.

Prior to his past five starts, Rogers had allowed just one home run across eight starts from June 14 to July 29. 

“I’m going to give up base-hits, that’s baseball. The damage lately has just been the homers,” Rogers said. “Try to figure out how to get the ball on the ground more consistently. I wouldn’t change a whole lot other than that.”

Even in Rogers’ recent stretch of allowing homers, which is now a total of six home runs in his last five games, Rogers has still found a way to give the Orioles what they need. Three of his past five starts have been quality starts, as his command has remained sharp.

However, adjustments will need to be made to hold off the long ball, as Rogers noted himself that he will work on trying to keep the ball on the ground.

For Baltimore, this is part of a broader issue that has followed the team all season: starting pitching inconsistency. The team currently owns a bottom five starter ERA in the AL, which could be a real deterrent in this late-season playoff push.