Steve Webb
BALTIMORE, MD — The Orioles and Dodgers came into their three-game set in Camden Yards both on serious hot streaks. The Orioles had won eight in a row, and the Dodgers had just had a six-game winning streak snapped by a walk-off in extra innings the day before. Clearly something had to give. In the end, it was the Dodgers who emerged victorious, riding a 5-run sixth inning to a 6-4 victory over Baltimore. In that inning, a clutch grand slam from Chris Taylor flipped the scoreboard and gave the Dodgers their margin of victory.
For a good bit of the game, it looked like the Orioles were going to be on the winning end of this one. Dodger starter Emmet Sheehan pitched okay, but the Orioles were barreling up the ball pretty good on him in the early going. A lot of traffic in the first and second inning resulted in three runs, and a solo jack from Adley Ruschman added another, so that by the fateful sixth inning, the Dodgers were looking at a 4-1 deficit.
Oriole starter Grayson Rodriguez had been cruising up until this point, surrendering only one run on five hits in the first five frames. But then things got mighty interesting mighty fast. Freddie Freeman led off the inning with a triple, and was promptly knocked in by a Will Smith single. Rodriguez then uncorked a wild pitch and walked Max Muncy to put runners at first and second. That ended Rodriguez’s night and Oriole skipper Brendan Hyde called on righty Bryan Baker to get the Birds out of the jam. A couple of flyouts seemed to right the ship, but another walk to Jason Heyward set the stage for Chris Taylor.
Taylor fouled off four straight pitches to fall into an 0-2 hole. Three of the four had been four-seamers, so Taylor was sitting fastball.
“Yeah, he was really spotting that fastball up in the zone,” Taylor said after the game. “He threw four or five up there. There was one I missed that I probably should’ve hit that was more middle-middle. But he’s got a good heater.”
Taylor got what he was looking for, a high fastball on the outer edge of the strike zone. WHAP! He connected and the ball flew deep into the Mid-Atlantic night. It cleared the centerfield fence and cleared the bases. With one mighty swing, the Dodgers had gone from down 4-2 to up 6-4.
“I was just trying to stay more line-drive approach on him,” he explained. “He threw me a bunch of them in a row and I was able to get to that one.”
“He’s a dependable player,” manager Dave Roberts said of his utility man. “Offensively, he just keeps coming up with big hits. That’s just kind of his hallmark. I thought actually the first couple were decent at-bats. But when we need him most, he always finds a way to come through.”
After the Taylor blast, they only needed the pen to seal the deal, and they did just that. Yency Almonte, Alex Vesia, Caleb Ferguson, and Ryan Brasier were all solid in relief and gave the Dodgers four more innings of shut-out relief work. This much maligned pen has been sneaky good in July, and if this continues, the Dodgers’ fortunes are sure to rise.
The series continues with another rookie on the mound on Tuesday. Michael Grove will get the start against righty Tyler Wells (7-4, 3.18). It promises to be another good game against these two teams. 4:10 first pitch.
