By: Kyle J. Andrews
The Orioles used an opener for the first time in team history with Nate Karns taking the hill against the New York Yankees and it was successful. Baltimore came away victorious in Brandon Hyde's first ever victory as a Major League manager.
Though Karns still has a flawless ERA, his outing wasn't that completely clean. He had three walks in those two innings, though he just allowed one hit. For the most part, Karns' pitches were scattered -- 15 of his 33 pitches were for a strike. He would induce three groundouts and one flyout in his outing.
Baltimore struck gold in the top of the sixth with Dwight Smith Jr. singling to right field for Jesus Sucre to score. Richie Martin would move to second on the hit and then stole third on the next play and stole on the same play from Yankees catcher Gary Sanchez's throwing error. Then Baltimore would get their third run in the top of the seventh on stinging drive to right field by Sucre. He would tack on two more runs with a double in the top of the ninth, scoring Joey Rickard and Cedric Mullins.
New York's first run came from D.J. LeMahieu single of Jimmy Yacabonis on a groundball to Orioles second baseman Jonathan Villar that had deflected off of shortstop Richie Martin's glove. It allowed Gleyber Torres to score to give New York a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the fourth. Yacabonis went three innings allowing three hits and walking two batters.
Third baseman Rio Ruiz constantly showed that he has a Major League glove throughout the game. Ruiz made multiple plays from the hot corner with Miguel Castro pitching in the seventh inning, stopping Aaron Judge from inducing damage.
After four scoreless by Baltimore's pitchers, Brandon Hyde called on Richard Bleier to get the job done in the ninth inning. Troy Tulowitzki would homer on an 0-2 pitch to right field, cutting the Orioles lead to 5-2. LeMahieu would then double and Brett Gardner would line out to center field. Unfortunately for Bleier, Judge would single and he would advance LeMahieu to third base -- it was his last batter.
With Mike Wright Jr. coming on to face off against Giancarlo Stanton, who he'd strike out. However, Wright Jr. gave up a single to Luke Voit that landed in the Bermuda Triangle in right field -- scoring LeMahieu. Wright Jr. would close it with a strikeout of Miguel Andujar to end the game.
Baltimore (1-1) will close out their series against New York (1-1) on Sunday with a 1:05 start time.
Notes:
Baltimore used six pitchers in Saturday's game with pitchers Pedro Araujo, John Means, David Hess and Paul Fry being the only not being used. Fry did come to warm up with Bleier reeling, but was sat down.
Karns, Miguel Castro, Mychal Givens and Wright Jr. all combined for 5.2 innings of scoreless baseball.
Sucre had three hits and three RBI on the day and scored one run.
