BALTIMORE, Maryland April 10, 2014 - His contract - $155 million over seven years - drew attention even in New York. His fastball drew the attention of Oriole hitters; he struck out ten in seven innings of work. But none of it meant much to the bottom line, because the Orioles struck for two runs in the ninth, which were added to a tremendous three run homer off Masahiro Tanaka in the second inning by Jonathan Schoop, to give the visitors a 5-4 win over the Yankees, enabling them to win the series and return home just one game under .500. The Birds opened the season 1-4, buy have now won two straight and three of four.
Schoop's blast down the left field line was so close to the foul pole that the umpires took a look at it on the instant replay screen, landed well up in the second deck in left field. Schoop, who is playing third base while Manny Machado and J.J.Hardy recover from injuries, also contributed a clutch hit to the Orioles two-run ninth inning uprising. In that inning, which started with the Orioles and Yankees tied at three run apiece, Ryan Flaherty doubled to leadoff, and he advanced to third on Schoop's solid single to center. Nick Markakis scored Flaherty and sent Schoop to second with another single. Delmon Young got the Birds' fourth straight hit to load the bases, and Chris Davis got Schoop home on a sacrifice fly. Brian Matusz, who stranded a go-ahead runner who was at third base with one out in the eighth inning, picked up the win. Tommy Hunter allowed the Yankees to score one run in the ninth before inducing a game-ending double play ground ball to Flaherty at shortstop, gathered his third save. The Orioles have the day off Thursday before opening a three game home series with the Toronto Blue Jays on Friday. Here are the American League East Standings:
American League East
1. Toronto Blue Jays: 5 wins, 4 losses, .556 pct
2. Tampa Bay Rays: 5 wins, 5 losses, .500 pct, 0.5 games behind
3. Baltimore Orioles: 4 wins, 5 losses, .444 pct, 1 game behind
3. Boston Red Sox: 4 wins, 5 losses, .444 pct, 1 game behind
3. New York Yankees: 4 wins, 5 losses, .444 pct, 1 game behind
Mount St. Mary's Stuns Maryland, 3-2 In baseball, there will be games like this. But knowing that doesn't make a loss like this one bit easier. Maryland stranded 17 runners, left the bases loaded four times, including in the seventh, eighth and ninth innings, and dropped a 3-2 decision to Mount Saint Mary's. It was the Terp's first non-ACC loss since they lost at powerful Florida on the opening weekend of the season in the middle of February. Five Mount pitchers combined to keep the Terps at bay. Scott Nickerson threw five shut-out innings to get the win, after entering the game 0-2 with an ERA over 9. Taylor Stiles, one of six Maryland hurlers, took the loss to fall to 2-1. He surrendered three singles in the Mount sixth, with the third scoring the first run of the game. Mt. St. Mary's moved ahead 3-0 in the seventh when, after loading the bases on an infield single, a walk and a hit batsman, catcher Andrew Clow took a 1-2 from Ben Brewster and singled to right field, scoring two runs.
Maryland played like a good car completely out of tune over their last three at bats. Like the Mount, the Terps loaded the bases without doing much with their bats. Mike Montville started the inning with a walk. Charlie White followed by reaching on an error. Then Brandon Lowe walked to load the bases with nobody out. Lamont Wade worked the count full then flied to center field, too shallow to allow the runners to advance. After a pitching change, Kyle Convissar also walked, forcing in the Terps' first run. But the Mount got a huge out when Blake Schmitt struck out. The Mount got out of the inning when Jose Cuas flied out for the third out. Again in the eighth the Terps loaded the bases, but this time they did not score. They had also loaded the sacks in the fifth without scoring. The eighth started off with back-to-back walks to Nick Cieri and Kevin Martir. Andrew Amaro pinch ran for Cieri, but while Krystian Leal was batting, Amaro got himself picked off of second base. Leal then walked, which would have loaded the bases with none out, but instead there was one out and runners at first and second. Charlie White popped up to first base, but then Brandon Lowe was hit by the pitch to load them up again. The Mount escaped again when Lamont Wade flew out to right field. Bobby Ruse, who started for the Terps and threw three shutout innings while giving up one hit, and Kevin Mooney, who finished, throwing two shut out innings and striking out four of the six hitters he faced, pitched well for Maryland. But they came to bat in the bottom of the ninth needing two to tie. After the leadoff man was retired, Maryland again loaded the bases on a single by Schmitt, a walk to Cuas, and a hit batsmen (Tim Lewis). Kevin Martir hit a sacrifice fly to right field, scoring Schmitt, and allowing Cuas to tag and move to third, but bring the Mount within one out of victory. Anthony Papio walked to again load the bases. On an 0-2 pitch, Charlie White ended the game by grounding back to the mound. The Mount improved to 9-11. Maryland fell to 20-11. They open a three game set at struggling Virginia Tech on Friday.
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