The Baltimore Orioles took two of three from the Detroit Tigers much to the delight of the home crowd at Oriole Park at Camden Yards.
It was the struggling Birds (8-20) first home series win of the season.
After splitting the first two games of the series the Orioles won the finale 5-3 behind the bat of Pedro Alvarez. He went two for four with two homeruns and three RBI.
Starter Kevin Gausman pitched a fine game. He allowed five hits, struck out four and walked three while surrendering one run in 5.2 innings of work. He improved to (2-2) and lowered his ERA to 4.15.
Baltimore’s Trey Mancini hit his first lead-off home run of the season to give the Birds a quick 1-0 lead in the first inning. Alvarez followed that with a two-run homer in the second inning to give Baltimore a 3-0 lead.
Detroit countered with a homerun by John Hicks in the fifth to make the score 3-1. Baltimore responded with and RBI single from Craig Gentry in the bottom of the sixth to take a 4-1 lead.
the Tigers added two more runs to make the score 4-3 but the Oriole’s got an insurance run on the second Alvarez homer, his sixth of the season, giving them an 8-5 eighth inning advantage.
Baltimore reliever Brad Brach gave up two runs but teammate Mychal Givens picked him up with a solid eighth inning and closer Darren O’Day came in to record his second save of the season.
Baltimore won the first game of the series 6-0 behind a rare pitching gem from starter Chris Tillman. After struggling in all of his other starts this season he responded with seven shutout innings while winning his first game of the season and snapping a personal 22-game winless streak.
Amazingly, it was Alvarez again who led the offense while going two for three with two homers and three RBI. Manny Machado, who is off to a blistering start, also went two for three with two RBI while hitting his nine home run in the month of April.
Detroit took the middle game of the series 9-5. Baltimore starter Andrew Cashner was not on his game. He surrendered seven hits and seven runs while striking out four and walking three in four innings of work. Machado went two for five with two RBI.
The Tigers were led by their superstar Miguel Cabrera who went three for four with five RBI.
