DENVER _ Having come up on the wrong side of so many games in which they built early leads and watched them evaporate, the Orioles tried a new approach Saturday at Coors Field in an effort to snap their seven-game losing streak.
They kept scoring.
A two-run seventh inning featuring run-scoring singles by Stevie Wilkerson and Dwight Smith Jr. could have been so much more, but was still enough to create the final 9-6 margin as the Orioles out-slugged the Colorado Rockies before an announced crowd of 41,239 Saturday at Coors Field.
The victory was the first for the Orioles (16-36) since May 17, ending a seven-game skid that included some of their most frustrating setbacks.
Combining the setting in Denver and the pitching staffs involved, it should be no surprise that the runs came early and often. The Orioles pulled ahead in the first with run-scoring singles by Renato Nunez and Pedro Severino, only for the Rockies' Nolan Arenado to knock in a run with a double in the home half.
Nunez homered in the third to mark his fourth straight game with a home run, but Arenado matched it with a three-run home run to give Colorado a brief lead.
Hanser Alberto's run-scoring single and a three-run home run by Jonathan Villar gave the Orioles some cushion in the fourth, meaning another run-scoring hit for Arenado only made the score 7-5.
Miguel Castro was throwing 100-mph fastballs against his former club, but had one hit out for a solo home run by Chris Iannetta to make it a one-run game.
It was happening again.
And even as they were scoring, for once, and extending that lead in the seventh, it still felt as if the losing would continue. With one run already in, Richie Martin grounded into a force at home. With the second run already in, Stevie Wilkerson rounded third hard on Smith's single that rolled into short-center field, but shortstop Trevor Story went and got it and was able to get the ball home, forcing Wilkerson back to third. He was out.
But relief pitcher Josh Lucas, the most recent addition to an Orioles bullpen that has struggled badly this week, gave them a second three-inning relief outing in five days to earn his first save.
