BALTIMORE -- For a brief moment, it felt like 2023 or early ‘24 again at Camden Yards on Tuesday night as the Orioles stormed back, seemingly en route to an impressive victory.
After getting no-hit for six innings, Baltimore got back-to-back-to-back home runs from Gary Sánchez, Ramón Urías and Ryan O’Hearn to take a lead over Texas in the seventh. It felt exactly like a game the O’s would win.
The Orioles thought they were going to win.
“It feels like we’re going to steal one there and it’s going to be a great win for us,” O’Hearn said. “And then, unfortunately, you guys saw what happened.”
For those who didn’t, here’s how Baltimore ended up losing, 6-5, after an eventful 10 innings.
The no-hit bid
For the second time in four days, the Orioles were getting no-hit heading to the seventh. On Saturday, Yankees right-hander Clarke Schmidt tossed seven hitless innings and the O’s mustered only one hit over the final two frames in a 9-0 loss at Yankee Stadium.
This time, it was a less probable no-hit bid, as the Rangers sent 29-year-old left-hander Jacob Latz to the mound for only his third start in 67 MLB appearances.
The Orioles couldn’t solve Latz, who gave up a single to Ramón Laureano to open the seventh and then issued a four-pitch walk to Gunnar Henderson that ended the southpaw’s night.
“I thought we got ourselves into trouble a little bit with our right-handed hitters kind of chasing out of the zone. If you kind of go back and look at the game, we probably should have had four or five walks from our right-handed guys,” interim manager Tony Mansolino said. “I think if we keep him on the plate better, it’s a little better night for us.”
The homers
All of Baltimore’s runs came via the only three batters to face right-hander Chris Martin, who relieved Latz. Sánchez greeted the 39-year-old by blasting a Statcast-projected 425-foot, three-run homer to left to cut Texas’ lead to 4-3.
Then, Urías went the opposite way to right for a game-tying homer. And then, O’Hearn jolted a go-ahead blast, continuing his All-Star-worthy campaign with his 11th home run of the year.
It was the first time the Orioles hit back-to-back-to-back homers since Aug. 6, 2017, when Jonathan Schoop, Chris Davis and Trey Mancini achieved the feat in a 12-3 win over the Tigers.
The loss
The rest of the game went the Rangers’ way. They scored a run in the eighth without recording a hit, as pinch-hitter Sam Haggerty led off with a walk before later stealing second and third and scoring on Jonah Heim’s pinch-hit sacrifice fly.
After a scoreless ninth, Texas took a 6-5 lead again without needing a hit in the 10th, as automatic runner Evan Carter came around to score on Haggerty’s fielder’s choice grounder to second.
Finally, the Orioles couldn’t cash in their automatic runner in the bottom of the 10th, leaving the potential tying run on third base to end it.
“We’re going to play every out and every inning until the end of the game,” O’Hearn said. “I’ve said it a million times, I like our chances with our offense, I think we’ve got a great offense. Yeah, very frustrating. That felt good to get that momentum swing, big inning in the [seventh] there, it felt like, ‘All right, here we go, we’re going to steal this one.’ But we didn’t.”
The fallout
Baltimore (34-45) has needed to go on a run to prevent the front office from selling at the July 31 Trade Deadline. Instead, the O’s -- who won 11 of 14 games from May 30-June 15 -- have quickly cooled off a bit, losing five of their past nine.
When the Orioles were a postseason-bound team each of the previous two years, they found ways to win games in improbable fashion. They never seemed out of a contest -- and they rarely were.
That’s what has made a disappointing 2025 all the more frustrating, as even nights with such stark momentum swings like Tuesday aren’t going Baltimore’s way.
“That’s a tough one,” veteran right-hander Charlie Morton said. “This group has really started to gain some footing with games like that. I think they will do that -- they’ll punch back, they’ll fight back. To get where we want to get to, we’re going to have to do that. We’re going to have to go out and bang with somebody. We’re going to have to go out and out-grind somebody. …
“But it was just kind of one of those nights where it was just like, ‘Man, the grind wasn’t enough.’”