Orioles allow 10 runs in third inning, get only one hit in loss to Oakland

BALTIMORE—It was hard to watch. For just the second time this decade, a team’s first 11 batters of an inning reached base on a hit, walk or hit by pitch before making an out.

And that team wasn’t the Orioles.

The first 11 Oakland Athletics reached base, and 10 of them scored in a dizzying third inning. Andrew Cashner allowed eight of those runs. By the time the inning was over, 15 batters came to the plate.

No further scoring took place, but the 10-0 loss to the Athletics was the Orioles’ sixth straight. They’ve had eight losing streaks of six or more, and their record is 41-104.

It was Cashner’s second shortest start of the season. On Aug. 2, he allowed a career-high 10 runs in a loss at Texas. His record is 4-15, and the 15 losses ties him with Alex Cobb for the team lead.

“He came out, I thought, looked pretty sharp the first couple innings,” manager Buck Showalter said of Cashner. “He just couldn’t stop the bleeding there. Of course, not only him. He was getting behind in the count. Looked like he was going to have a real good command night, throwing the ball where he wanted to, but just couldn’t get out of rut he got in. I know he complained about something, we’ll talk about it tomorrow, see if that had something to do with it.”

Cashner declined to comment on a possible injury. When pressed, he said: “I don’t know. We’ll wait and see.”

Not only did the Orioles suffer that embarrassing third, they also failed to produce any offense. Trey Mancini’s single off Liam Hendriks with two outs in the first inning was their only hit. It’s the fewest hits they’ve had since they were no-hit by Seattle’s Hisashi Iwakuma on Aug. 12, 2015.

Jace Peterson walked against Daniel Mengden, who followed Hendriks and pitched five no-hit innings. Oakland pitching retired the final 20 Orioles hitters.

The Orioles were shut out for the 13^th time this season.

“I wouldn’t say I’m frustrated with the effort, but the execution is clearly not there,” Mancini said. “Since the start of the road trip, the one game in Seattle is the only one we’ve won. That’s not going to cut it, even if you’re going through a rebuild. You don’t want to go out and lose every day, like we have been, so we definitely need to step up our execution.”

With 17 games left, Mancini said the Orioles will try to make something positive out of what’s left.

“You just kind of try and take a step back and use the rest of the season as a time to just lay it all on the line out there, and you can do that,” Mancini said. “We’re not going to make the playoffs, obviously, so you just want to go out there and play  your heart out every night and show everybody, show Baltimore, show the organization what you can do and hopefully we can do that the rest of the year.”

Juggling starters again

Showalter said that Cobb, who left Tuesday’s game after two innings with a cut on his right middle finger, will miss his next scheduled start on Sunday. Luis Ortiz will get his first major league start Friday against Chicago. Yefry Ramirez starts Saturday, and it’s possible the Orioles could add another pitcher to start Sunday.

David Hess, who has been starting, is available in the bullpen, and Showalter said that he’d like to see Josh Rogers pitch once or twice in relief to see how he handles that.

Stewart’s debut

DJ Stewart was hitless in three at-bats in his major league debut. Stewart played left field for the first five innings, and moved to right when Adam Jones was removed.

Showalter wasn’t concerned that a difficult loss in his debut would affect Stewart.

“He’s getting ready to meet his family outside of the locker room,” Showalter said. “He’s getting ready to get his tickets ready for tomorrow. Cedric [Mullins] is going through a little tough time right now, and he needs to be exposed to this and you need to watch it. I don’t think they look at it like that. You can look at it two ways — that way … or a great time to really evaluate the inner core of people. I know that’s what I’m doing right now.”

Stewart was the 55^th player used by the Orioles, a club record. He was the 14^th player to make his major league debut with the Orioles, matching the 1955 club record.

Hays to have surgery

Austin Hays, who missed much of the season because of an ankle injury, will have surgery Thursday. Hays announced the surgery on Twitter. Expected to spend at least part of the season with the Orioles, Hays hit .242 in 66 games for Bowie.