The Tampa Bay Rays have been stellar on the mound this week, while the Baltimore Orioles have been miserable at the plate.
The teams meet in the opener of a three-game series on Friday night in Baltimore.
The Rays are coming off a three-game sweep of the Royals, and they have won five of their past six games. They posted shutouts in the past two games, including a 4-0 victory at Kansas City on Thursday afternoon, improving to 19-12 in road games.
Tampa Bay is the first team in the majors to earn three road sweeps this year.
“I think our momentum has been building now for really about a month,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said.
The Orioles have lost four of five games, and they were shutout victims twice during that stretch. They dropped the decisive contest of a three-game set against the visiting Texas Rangers 7-0 on Wednesday.
“If you look at it that way, it’s frustrating,” Baltimore infielder Jordan Westburg said. “Grand scheme of things, I thought we’ve been playing some pretty good baseball the last couple weeks.”
The Rays have been receiving all sorts of production at the plate, including 20 home runs from Junior Caminero. His solo shot capped the scoring on Thursday.
“He’s putting himself in good company, no doubt,” Cash said.
Tomoyuki Sugano (5-4, 3.55 ERA) is listed as Baltimore’s starter for Friday. The right-hander coming off a season-low 3 2/3-inning outing on Friday against the New York Yankees, and he has gone three consecutive starts without completing five innings.
Control issues tend to be the biggest challenge for Sugano, a 35-year-old rookie from Japan. He walked four batters total in both April and May, making five starts in each month, but he already has issued seven free passes in 19 2/3 innings in June.
His start this week was pushed back to give him a slight break before heading to the mound again.
“We’re just trying to give him as much rest as we can,” Orioles interim manager Tony Mansolino said. “It does take a little bit of a toll.”
Sugano will be opposing Tampa Bay for the first time.
The Rays have right-hander Ryan Pepiot (5-6, 3.04 ERA) lined up as their starting pitcher. He was the winning pitcher on June 16 against Baltimore, working a season-high eight innings and giving up one run while striking out a season-best 11.
Pepiot followed up with five innings of one-run ball against the Detroit Tigers on Saturday, giving him victories in back-to-back decisions for the only time this year.
In three career meetings against the Orioles, all starts, Pepiot is 2-1 with a 2.79 ERA.
Baltimore’s bats need to get going. The Orioles didn’t manage a hit across the first six innings in either of their past two games and in three different games over the past week.
“I wouldn’t look too deep into it,” Mansolino said. “It’s a really strange week. I think as you guys watch baseball on a nightly basis over the course of the year, really weird things happen all the time, and I probably attribute three days like this to that.”
Outfielder Colton Cowser believes the Orioles need to stick to the proper approach.
“I think that every day we’re just trying to go out there and execute a plan and approach,” he said. “Sometimes if a pitcher is able to get us outside of that approach, we’re not going to have as much success.”
In the final two games of Texas series, the Orioles scored in only one inning.
“I think there’s a little bit of fatigue right now,” Mansolino said. “This has been a grind. I think you can attribute a little bit of that to that.”
The Rays and Orioles split four games from June 16-19 in Tampa.
–Field Level Media
