BALTIMORE _ Leave it to Dylan Bundy, the bright beacon in a so-far dark Orioles season, to power through the malaise that has held the team down all year. He continued his wonderful April and ended a six-game losing streak for the Orioles with a 3-1 win over the Cleveland Indians on Friday night at Camden Yards.
It was a game that began by looking like the kind of bad baseball the Orioles (6-14) hoped to have left in Detroit. Fortunately for them, Bundy (1-2) is the type of pitcher that can now overcome it.
The 25-year-old right-hander was made to do extra work early because, of all things, pop-ups fell without being caught. In the first inning, it was a foul fly near the Orioles dugout that resulted in a long inning and the Indians' only run off him. In the second, another fell between catcher Chance Sisco and third baseman Tim Beckham.
No matter. Bundy has the raw stuff now in his second season as a starter to slice through that, and he did to the tune of six innings pitched with one run in on five hits and nine strikeouts against two walks. His 24 swinging strikes, achieved on 108 pitches, were a career high.
He's pitched at least into the sixth inning in all five of his starts this year, allowing no more than three runs in any of them. His ERA of 1.40 entering the game was fifth best in the majors, and it climbed only to 1.42. He's striking out 11.37 batters per nine innings, has allowed just one home run in 31 2/3 innings, and on Friday, the Orioles finally rewarded him with a victory.
He's been left to watch late-inning dramatics, such as Opening Day, or made a hard-luck loser with seven total runs in his four previous starts. He made what offense he got stand up Friday.
The Indians (9-8) never really threatened off him after that shaky first inning, when second baseman Jason Kipnis singled one pitch after Sisco appeared to lose track of a pop-up in foul territory near the Orioles dugout and never made a play on it. Then Bundy issued a walk, allowed another soft single, and hit Edwin Encarnacion with a breaking ball on his elbow protector to score the only run against him. Encarnacion grinned on his way to first. Bundy remained stoic, and got out of the inning on a flyout and a strikeout.
It was a difficult inning that didn't need to be so, but with seven swinging strikes on 26 pitches, Bundy showed the type of swing-and-miss stuff the Indians would be forced to cope with the rest of the night.
The dropped pop-up in the second inning didn't matter much, though the Orioles were fortunate that ball itself wasn't deemed a hit. It landed fair, but was ruled foul and such a play can't be reversed on review.
Tyler Naquin naturally singled to punish the miscue, but Sisco erased him on a caught-stealing to render it moot. From then on, Bundy yielded a two-out double to Michael Brantley in the third inning and a two-out single to Naquin in the fourth.
That's when the Orioles bats woke up, with shortstop Manny Machado hitting his third home run in two games and his sixth of the season to tie the game at 1. Sisco was hit by a pitch to open the fifth, went to third on a single by Luis Sardinas and both scored on a double by left fielder Trey Mancini.
Bundy made it stand up, striking out all three batters he faced in the sixth inning to make it six of the last 10 batters he faced retired that way.
Left-hander Richard Bleier continued his standout season with two scoreless innings of relief around one hit to lower his ERA to 0.61. Darren O'Day had his first save of the season with two strikeouts in a scoreless ninth.
