Peter Schmuck: On the West Coast, ‘resilience’ may not be enough for Orioles

As if you didn’t notice, the Orioles just took three steps forward and two steps back.

They’ve been doing that kind of thing for a while now.

So what do you think is going to happen while the Orioles spend the next nine days on the West Coast, facing the Mariners, Dodgers and Angels? Will they wake up from this past weekend’s disappointing series against the San Diego Padres and show the resilience they have displayed on similar occasions, or is this going to be the hill their playoff hopes die on?

Yes, of course, there is a lot of baseball left to play as they near the mathematical halfway point in the season, but it’s really not that early anymore. There will come a point when the Orioles and their fans will have to admit that they are what their record says they are instead of a promising group that’s still trying to find their legs.

That doesn’t have to happen on this road trip, but it seems to be setting up that way. The O’s bounced back with a pair of big wins to split the four-game home series against the Mariners and won the first game of the Padres series to inch toward the .500 mark, then couldn’t get out of their own way over the weekend to drop five games under.

Which way will they go next? They don’t have a lot of choice if they want to close that gap before talk turns to whether they’re going to be a buyer or a seller at the midseason trade deadline.

The M’s aren’t exactly invincible – as evidenced by their .507 overall winning percentage – but they’ve got great pitching and have won six of their last seven games at T-Mobile Park. The Orioles, meanwhile, entered Monday’s games tied for the second-fewest wins on the road in the majors.

Then come the Dodgers, who entered Monday night’s game against the Tampa Bay Rays with a chance to tie the Braves for the most wins (46) in either league. And the trip ends in Anaheim, where the O’s can only hope they don’t enter that three-game set talking about how resilient they’ve been in previous downturns.

There are some good things happening, of course, like an upturn in the fortunes of beleaguered rightfielder Tyler O’Neill and the strong performance by struggling starter Trevor Rogers that was undermined by a freak base-bag RBI double that led to the only two runs he allowed. The starting rotation as a whole – and surprising Brandon Young in particular – has been very dependable.

Gunnar Henderson seems to be on an upswing and Pete Alonso has settled into one of his usual highly productive seasons at the plate.

There are also some storm clouds. The bullpen that pitched so well early in the season has become erratic and the Orioles remain a flawed offensive unit that has had far too many games in which it managed one or two hits over the first five innings and let far too many key at-bats go to waste because hitters have not been patient enough to make opposing pitchers sweat when in promising RISP situations.

This past weekend was a not-so-shining example of the often inopportune nature of the O’s attack. Even including Friday night’s 7-3 victory over the Padres, the Orioles finished the series with a total of just two hits in 22 RISP at-bats.

Sorry, but they won’t be able to do that on this road trip and come home without a big dent in their playoff chances.