Jonathan Schoop And The Orioles Have An INSANE Comeback Vs The Giants

Now that is how you wrap up a road trip, what a god damn comeback.

It looked like the O’s were headed towards a 4-6 trip, but that is why you have to get all 27 outs in a baseball game. Yesterday’s game obviously looked like it was over with the Orioles down 7-1 after Wade Miley gave up all seven runs in 4.1 innings, his shortest outing as an Oriole, and that now brings his ERA to over 7. I did what any other Orioles fan who woke up at 4 am to take his puppy out would do, changed the channel to Chopped Junior and watched little Aaron fuck up his dish and then fell asleep. Woke up to text messages about big swinging D Johnny Schoop making a late game visit to Dong City. I turned it on in time to watch the best pitcher in baseball and Cy Young front runner, Zach Britton, shut it down for his 37th save of the year.

Adam Jones got them on the board first with a single that drove in Wieters (who went 5-5 in the game) in the fifth to bring the Orioles within two runs at 3-1. It seemed to get out of hand from there as the Giants went up 7-1. That’s when Chopped Junior came on and my eyes got heavy. Jones drove in Wieters again to cut the Giants lead to five, and that is when the O’s bullpen stepped up and the offense really turned it on. They got RBIs from Kim and Hardy, and also got a major league leading 34th home run from Mark Trumbo.

Flash forward to top 9 with one out and there Orioles down 7-5, Hyun-Soo Kim lined out, Manny Machado singled and got to second on an error, Chris Davis struck out looking AGAIN (fourth time of the game he went down with the bat on his shoulder), Mark Trumbo walked and Nolan Reimold ran for Trumbo. So with two outs in the top of the ninth, Jonathan Schoop comes up and Santiago Casilla hangs a curveball to Schoop. Bad news for Casilla, is that Schoop was batting .366 vs curveballs, you hang em and he bangs em. The game-winning three-run was the 18th homer for Schoop this season, who is enjoying his breakout campaign.

Zach Britton came in, got Brandon Crawford on strikes, gave up a single to Trevor Brown, got Joe Panik to ground to first which moved Brown to second, and then Britton intentionally walked pinch-hitter Buster Posey, putting the winning run on first, something that Buck has done quite a few times, and it has worked out in his teams favor every time. Britton then got Denard Span to ground to J.J. Hardy, game over. It is also fitting that the Orioles hit a game-winning three-run home run on what would have been Earl Weaver’s 86th birthday.

 

 

I mean how often does an opposing team win a game when a backup catcher goes 3-5 with 3 driven in, and the opposing starter goes 2-3 with a run driven in? Before this win, they were 1-47 when they were trailing after the 8th inning, per MASN’s Roch Kubatko. Odds were stacked against them.

This game was one of the best comebacks in recent years for the Orioles, a game that they had no business winning, but like we’ve seem them do before this season, they don’t quit and they came from behind to get the win. Just look at the graph from Fangraphs up there, after Chris Davis struck out for the second out in the 9th, the Giants had a 96.8% of winning, that dropped to 93.5% with the Trumbo walk. Last game of a 10 game road trip with a day off tomorrow, some teams would have just said fuck it down 7-1, not this club under Buck.

The win brings them to 66-51 and a half game back of the Blue Jays as the Red Sox come to town on Tuesday for a quick two game series. The road trip started out with the Birds taking two of three from the White Sox, and losing three of four to Oakland before they took two of three from the Giants with this great comeback. It has become all too normal of the O’s and this up-and-down trend, but here we are again. This win will not mean much if they can’t get at least one win from the Red Sox who are right on their tails, and with a tough schedule coming up, 8 straight home games vs Boston, Houston, and Washington, all teams in the playoff picture, this is a big home stand.

PS. This was a hilarious reaction from Manny Machado after Schoop’s bomb yesterday. Textbook hit in the NFL, shoulder right in the sternum, head to the side, not leading with the helmet. Not the safest celebration, and you can tell by Buck’s reaction in the back.

PPS. Watch that clip again and tell me Manny doesn’t care about winning. I’ve had people tell me they know guys in the clubhouse who think Manny only cares about himself, doesn’t care about winning and doesn’t really love baseball. That’s BS and you can tell by his reaction there.

 

PPPS: Zach Britton for Cy Young.