Orioles beat Diamondbacks, 4-2, behind splash hits, Cole Irvin’s left arm and a shuffled bullpen
Cole Irvin had another solid start and Yennier Cano closed the door in the ninth in the Orioles' 4-2 win over the Diamondbacks on Friday.
Jordan Westburg kept his hands inside on a fastball, drove it to left-center field and slid into second for an RBI double to give the Orioles an early lead.
As if it was second nature, he looked toward Baltimore’s dugout at Camden Yards and hit the sprinkler — the club’s signature doubles celebration. His teammates on the top step leaned over the railing and squirted water from their mouths to complete the players’ half of the celebration. And with hose in hand as Mr. Splash on the chilly Friday night, Orioles owner David Rubenstein did his duty by soaking fans in the Bird Bath Splash Zone.
There weren’t too many more opportunities for spraying, but it was too cold for that anyway and Cole Irvin and Baltimore’s bullpen didn’t need the help. Irvin delivered another solid start, closer Craig Kimbrel pitched well after being demoted to the seventh inning and setup man Yennier Cano filled in to slam the door in the ninth to lead Baltimore to a 4-2 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks.
“The crowd went crazy,” manager Brandon Hyde said about Rubenstein’s debut as Mr. Splash. “We could hear it. It’s a direct line for us in front of our dugout. You could see the energy up on the Jumbotron. I just think it’s awesome.”
Westburg’s double in the second inning put him one RBI behind Gunnar Henderson for the team lead. The Orioles wouldn’t smack another extra-base hit and get the fans in Section 86 wet until the seventh inning — after Rubenstein handed the reigns back to Mr. Splash on his bobblehead night — when Henderson doubled home Jorge Mateo. In between, Cedric Mullins hit an RBI groundout after Westburg’s double and Ryan O’Hearn singled home Henderson in the fifth.
Irvin’s scoreless streak ended at 22 2/3 innings when he allowed a solo homer to Ketel Marte in the third, but he pitched into the sixth to maintain his surprise standing as one of Baltimore’s most reliable starting pitchers this season. The veteran left-hander worked around five hits and one walk while striking out six in 5 2/3 innings of two-run ball. Irvin (4-1) has a 2.90 ERA this season, and the Orioles are 6-1 when he starts.
“Mentally, physically, this is probably the best I’ve felt in my career,” Irvin said.
Kimbrel said before the game he expected to continue serving as Baltimore’s closer despite his recent struggles. Manager Brandon Hyde said after Kimbrel’s most recent outing Wednesday — in which the veteran right-hander failed to close out a game for the fourth time in his past five outings — that he was “going to stick with him.” Instead, at least for one night, Kimbrel didn’t get the chance to record the final three outs. He entered to boos from Baltimore fans and exited mere minutes later to cheers from those same fans after he retired the side in order.
“It’s just trying to give him a little bit different situation and trying to match up the best we possibly can,” Hyde said on his decision to bump Kimbrel out of the ninth. “But I just wanted to give him a little bit of a different look, and I thought he threw the ball really, really well, so really happy with pitching a big inning there for us in the seventh inning.”
Jacob Webb, Cionel Pérez and Cano combined to cover the final two innings without giving up a run. Cano, who has struggled in the ninth compared with his normal dominance, worked around a leadoff double for his second save of the season.
It’s unclear what the back end of Baltimore’s bullpen will look like moving forward, and it might be to Hyde, too.
“It’s a day-to-day thing for me right now,” he said.
The Orioles are 25-12 and have won six of their past seven and nine of 12. The victory keeps them a half-game above the New York Yankees for the best record in the American League. It also extends the club’s AL-record streak without being swept in the regular season to 103 series. The stretch, which dates to mid-May 2022, is the longest in MLB since World War II.
Westburg’s double in the second drove in Ryan Mountcastle after he singled, advanced to second on Anthony Santander’s single and went to third on Colton Cowser’s fly out. Mullins, who is engrossed in a 5-for-52 slump, drove in Santander on a weak groundout.
After Marte’s home run, Irvin didn’t allow another hit until the sixth. The southpaw mixed his six-pitch arsenal to keep the Diamondbacks, who entered as MLB’s best team against lefties with an .866 OPS, at bay. He gave up two singles in the sixth and was pulled with two outs in favor of converted starter Albert Suárez, who surrendered one of Irvin’s runners on an RBI single to Eugenio Suárez.
“I thought Cole threw the ball great, once again,” Hyde said. “He’s got his pitches working, and he’s pitching with a ton of confidence.”
It’s not just Irvin, though. The entire Orioles rotation has been stellar the past two weeks with a 1.66 ERA and 0.905 WHIP over the past 10 games. Baltimore’s starting corps ranks fifth in the majors this year with a 3.18 ERA.
“We’re just getting our job done,” Irvin said. “When you can have a group of guys that work for each other and go out and have the same goal in mind — which is to get deep into the ballgame, take a load off the bullpen and be in a position to win baseball games — of course you notice it and it motivates you to be just as good.”
In the fifth, O’Hearn received two straight changeups from Brandon Pfaadt, who started a game in the World Series last year for the Diamondbacks, and smacked the second one into right field for an RBI single to boost his team-leading OPS to .930. Baltimore’s middle infield then generated an insurance run in the seventh off left-handed reliever Logan Allen after Mateo hit an infield single and used his elite speed to score from first on Henderson’s double.
After Kimbrel’s shutdown seventh, Webb got the first two outs of the eighth and Pérez stranded two runners to bridge the game to Cano. The sinkerballer has been lights-out in nearly all situations, but his worst outings have come in the ninth inning. He’s surrendered multiple runs in just four appearances since the beginning of last year, and each has come in the ninth with a lead, including earlier this season versus Pittsburgh.
But the 2023 All-Star pitched like one, retiring the final three batters he faced after Gabriel Moreno’s leadoff double. Cano took a comebacker off his leg but recovered to grab the ball and fling it to first, setting off fireworks and sending the 27,703 announced fans at Oriole Park home happy.
“It’s an extremely difficult inning,” Cano said through team interpreter Brandon Quinones. “There always seems to be something that goes sideways. What I tried to learn last year is to approach it as any other inning. Same thing if it was the seventh or the eighth, I’m just gonna go out there and do my job.”
The win also ends Baltimore’s five-game losing streak in its City Connect uniforms, which they normally wear Friday nights at home. The Orioles are now 6-9 in the threads that debuted last May with a run differential of minus-39.
Hyde said Rubenstein’s antics were “fantastic” with the way he interacted with fans to “show his personality.” After the win, does Hyde hope the 74-year-old billionaire will serve as Mr. Splash every game?
“Maybe only City Connect nights,” Hyde quipped.
Around the horn
• Hyde said before Friday’s series opener — the first contest of a nine-game homestand — that Austin Hays (left calf strain) would play another minor league rehabilitation game Saturday for Double-A Bowie before the team decides the next step for the left fielder.
• Grayson Rodriguez (shoulder inflammation) is expected to return to the Orioles’ rotation later this month, and the club isn’t ruling out a six-man rotation. The Orioles have only a few days off through the end of June, and Hyde said having the extra starter late last season helped keep the rotation fresh down the stretch. “I think it’s a possibility once we kind of get into certain stretches during the season,” Hyde said. “There’s actually one coming up in June if you look at our schedule, it’s not a ton of off days.”
• Connor Norby, who Baseball America ranks as Baltimore’s fifth-best prospect, was removed from Triple-A Norfolk’s game Friday afternoon as a precaution with a left wrist injury, the Orioles announced. The Tides won the game — the 400th of manager Buck Britton’s career — behind Nick Maton’s five hits, Billy Cook’s three knocks and top-100 prospect Coby Mayo’s 437-foot home run. Mayo leads the International League with 12 homers and 36 RBIs.
Diamondbacks at Orioles
Saturday, 4:05 p.m.
TV: MASN2
Radio: 97.9 FM, 101.5 FM, 1090 AM