The Baltimore Orioles and visiting Oakland A’s each are trying to rebound from being swept, and the two teams hope to fare better when they meet Monday in the opener of a four-game series.
Both teams struggled over the weekend. The Orioles came into a series with the Yankees at 4-2, but New York belted 14 homers — seven in Sunday’s 15-3 route — and swept the three-game set.
Houston swept the A’s in a three-game series, finishing it with a 9-8 victory Sunday after Oakland’s Blake Treinen walked in the winning run with two outs in bottom of the ninth.
The Orioles now have lost four in a row since their 4-1 start. Pitching was a problem throughout the New York series, as Baltimore allowed 29 runs in the three games.
Manager Brandon Hyde even turned to infielder Hanser Alberto to pitch in the ninth on Sunday to save some of his bullpen for the Oakland series.
Hyde said he’s hopeful his team will just come right back and be ready to play against the A’s.
“You hope that you can shake this off and you come back,” Hyde said. “Oakland is coming to town, and I think we’ll be ready to go.”
The Orioles need help on offense and the mound. Trey Mancini and Jonathan Villar are both hitting .333 and lead the regulars, while Alberto has given help off the bench and is at .500 (7-for-14 in seven appearances).
But Baltimore is not getting much production from the second half of its lineup. First baseman Chris Davis’ puzzling slump continued in the New York series. He went 0-for-4 Sunday and is 0-for-23 so far this season.
Going back to last September, Davis is stuck in an 0-for-44 slide, leaving him two away from the record for consecutive hitless at-bats by a position player, per the Elias Sports Bureau. He has also struck out 24 times during the drought.
“I haven’t talked to him about it since, but he’s facing a tough lefty there,” Hyde said of Davis, referring to Yankees starter Domingo German. “I hope that he feels like he’s making progress.”
Despite the issues at the plate, Davis’ defense hasn’t suffered at all. The bullpen, meanwhile, has allowed runs in all nine games.
The A’s had some unusual offensive things happen to them — and for them — during Sunday’s game in Houston.
The roof was closed at Minute Maid Park when Oakland first baseman Chad Pinder’s first-inning fly ball to left hit a beam that was in fair territory and fell to the turf for a two-run double.
Then, in the second inning, Oakland third baseman Matt Chapman had a foul pop-up hit the roof that was caught in foul ground. It was ruled a foul ball, and Chapman later reached on an error.
Oakland’s offense had been struggling before Sunday’s game. The A’s had a .226 team average but then scored eight in the loss. Manager Bob Melvin said after Saturday’s loss that he was optimistic things would change.
“You look up and down the lineup, we have a couple guys that are swinging the bat OK, and then quite a few that aren’t at this point,” Melvin told MLB.com. “We’ll get it going.”
Still, Jurickson Profar’s troubles continued. The infielder went 0-for-3, and his average slipped down to .106. Melvin gave him a day off Saturday, but Profar still had problems Sunday.
Robbie Grossman helped in Sunday’s loss for Oakland, going 3-for-5 with three RBIs, including his first homer this season.
Andrew Cashner (1-1, 5.40) will start for the Orioles versus Oakland’s Marco Estrada (0-0, 2.76).
Cashner is coming off of a solid performance on April 2, when he threw six shutout innings against Toronto and earned his first victory. He has a 1-1 career record against the A’s with a 6.84 ERA.
Estrada has pitched well against Baltimore in his career. He’s posted a 9-3 record with a 3.43 ERA in 19 games (17 starts).
Estrada is looking for his first decision this season, entering his fourth start. He’s been effective in all three but got no-decisions in each.