Make That 3 In A Row

Three straight quality starts, three straight wins. Left for dead not to long ago, the Orioles remain a half game out of the wild card race, and dare I say it, Miguel Gonzalez looks in the rotation to stay. Gonzalez had another terrific performance last night. Gonzalez pitched 6 2/3 and only gave up 2 runs to the Indians. He improved to (2-1) with the 10-2 victory. Now that is how I like to win the game. For once the O's hammered somebody. Miguel also had 5 strikeouts in his terrific performance. His ERA now sits at 2.61.

Gonzalez was replaced by Lindstrom. Matt Lindstrom was dealing, but unfortunately ran into some bad luck. Lindstrom got through a full inning and lowered his ERA to 2.42. The unfortunate part was that Johnny Damon hit a shot off of Lindstrom and injured the pitcher. I must say though that Damon checked on Lindstrom in a very classy move. Nice job by Damon there. All of us Orioles fans hope Lindstrom is ok. We definitely missed him the 1st time he got hurt.

Lindstrom was replaced by Kevin Gregg. I have to say that Gregg has certainly increased his trade value recently. Perhaps somebody actually wants this guy now. He finished the game pitching 1 1/3 scoreless innings. His ERA now sits at 3.72. To top it off, he had 2 strikeouts and didn't allow a baserunner. I sure hope we trade him now that his value is at an all-time high.

As for our hitters, everyone pretty much was on point because we scored 10 runs. However, three of them stood out from the rest in my opinion. First, Chris Davis went 2-4 with an RBI and a run scored. Davis improved his batting average to .264. The next person is Ryan Flaherty. No joke. Flaherty was awesome with the bat last night and has started improving of late. It will be interesting to see who stays up with a new 2nd baseman coming to town. Flaherty certainly has a stronger case after hitting a huge home run last night. He also had 3 RBIs. However, Flaherty is still just hitting .196. I still prefer Tolleson to Flaherty.

Finally, Jim Thome had an awesome night. Thome was 3-5 raising his batting average to .277 and his OBP to .370. Thome now has the highest on base percentage on the team. He also managed to pick up his 1st Oriole HR last night. That homer moved him past Sammy Sosa for sole possession of 7th place on the all time list. Great job by Thome hitting the shot. I still think we have too many 1B/DH types, but Thome is my favorite of that group. Great job last night Jim!

-Noland