Last season the Baltimore Orioles and the Detroit Tigers played seven games against each other in which the O’s won four of. In this season series opener between these two teams tonight at Camden Yards the O’s hoped to extend their winning to five in a row. They would do so tonight as a five run 7th inning against a “Wilson” filled Tigers bullpen winning by a score of 7-5. Detroit has now lost nine of their last 10 games.
O’s hot-and-cold starting pitcher Ubaldo Jimenez, who was coming off a win in his last start on Saturday against Oakland, lasted only five plus innings earning the no decision despite struggling in the very beginning and very end of his start tonight. Jimenez ended the night giving up five runs (four earned) on nine hits with four walks and only two strikeouts. Jonathan Schoop went 2-for-4 with three RBI’s including a triple in the 7th inning to give the O’s their first lead of the game when they batted around the lineup. Chris Davis went 2-for-4 with a double and two RBI’s. Adam Jones and Pedro Alvarez both also drove in runs tonight for Baltimore, Alvarez’ RBI would be the one that would tie the game.
Tiger hitters came in tonight with huge numbers against the O’s pitching. Miguel Cabrera came in the all-time leader among active players in batting average against the O’s with an average of .391, he drove in two runs tonight. Victor Martinez was batting .308 against Jimenez the last five years and went 3-for-4 with a walk and two RBI’s. Ian Kinsler came in batting .347 in his career against the O’s as well as .350 at Camden Yards, he went 2-for-4 with two runs scored tonight. Jarrod Saltalamacchia also hit one out of the park for his 7th home run of the season. Starting pitcher Mike Pelfrey pitched five and one-third of an inning giving up two runs on five hits with two walks and five strikeouts, but could only earn a no decision thanks to his bullpen consisting of both Alex and Justin Wilson (who are not related) who gave up a combined five runs.
Earning the win for Baltimore was Vance Worley who improves to 2-0, Justin Wilson earned the loss for Detroit dropping to 0-1 and Zach Britton earned his 9th save of the season for the O’s. Game two of this four game series will be tomorrow at 7:05 PM/ET. Starting Pitchers will be: Justin Verlander (DET 2-3 5.40 ERA) vs. Chris Tillman (BAL 4-1 3.05 ERA).
