Orioles End 19 Game Losing Streak

The Baltimore Orioles last playoff appearance was in 2016. They were 89-73 in the regular season and lost the Wild Card playoff to the Toronto Blue Jays. Since that time, the Orioles have been bad to abysmally bad, finishing 5th (last) in the A.L. East, except for last year, when they were 4th with a record of 25-35 in the Covid shortened season. They hit bottom in 2018 with a record of 47-115, finishing a staggering 61 games behind the division winning Boston Red Sox.

They have been abysmally bad again this year, and will finish in last place again by a country mile. Earlier this season, Baltimore lost 23 of 27 games, including 14 in a row. They lost 19 in row before finally breaking that string of futility with a 10-6 win over the Los Angeles Angels in front of 15,867 die hard fans in Baltimore on August 25th.

A few things had to go right for the Orioles to get the win. Angels’ starter Shohei Ohtani had one of his worst career starts, allowing three home runs for the first time in his career. He allowed four runs in five innings pitched, and was 0-4 at the plate. The loss went to reliever Jake Petricka, who allowed four runs in just 2/3 of an inning, blowing a save on the way to the loss. Baltimore improved to 39-86 on the year, 39 games behind front running Tampa Bay, and 27 games behind 4th place Toronto. At this point, Baltimore sports fans are probably looking forward to the Ravens opening their NFL season in a couple of weeks.