ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. _ The Orioles carried leads into the bottom of the seventh inning for three straight nights this week at Tropicana Field, but return home from their three-game series against the Tampa Bay Rays with just one win.
The club's growing pains are obvious: A patchwork batting order, a struggling defense and a bullpen in flux. All of that was clear in the Orioles' series against the Rays.
On Thursday night, the new-look bullpen took the loss, 5-4, and the Orioles ended their nine-game road trip to face the New York Yankees, Texas Rangers and Rays with a 3-6 record.
Reliever Cody Carroll (0-1), making his third major league appearance after coming to the Orioles from the Yankees in the Zach Britton trade, allowed two runs in the seventh.
Carroll, who had allowed one hit and one run over his two previous one-inning relief appearances, loaded the bases by issuing back-to-back two-out walks to Mallex Smith and Matt Duffy, then allowed a two-run single to Jake Bauers, turning a 4-3 Orioles lead into a one-run deficit.
With the Orioles (35-80) dropping two of three at Tropicana Field, they are 3-14-2 in road series this season, haven't won a series on the road since June 22-24 at the Atlanta Braves, and have won only one road series against an American League team _ April 5-8 when they took three of four at Yankee Stadium on their first road trip of the season.
It doesn't get easier for the Orioles, who return home to play four games in three days against a Boston Red Sox team with the best record in the major leagues.
Third baseman Renato Nunez's seventh-inning solo homer broke a 3-3 tie, a blast off right-hander Yonny Chirinos that went an estimated 425 feet onto Tropicana Field's left-field walkway.
Right-hander David Hess came one out short of his first quality start since June 7 at the Toronto Blue Jays, allowing three runs on four hits and three walks over 5 2/3 innings. Hess couldn't hold a one-run lead in the sixth.
After striking out the side in the fifth, Hess allowed back-to-back leadoff singles in the sixth to Smith and Duffy, then a sacrifice fly to Bauers that Trey Mancini flagged down in the left-field corner.
Center fielder Joey Rickard _ a former Rule 5 draft pick taken from the Rays (58-57) _ continued to cause headaches for his old team, putting the Orioles up 2-0 with a two-run triple in the second inning off Rays opener Hunter Wood.
Rickard roped an 0-2 slider into the left-center-field gap, scoring both Mancini and Chris Davis, who both singled, sliding into third with his first career major league triple. Fifteen of Rickard's 20 RBIs this season have come against the Rays.
Rookie Austin Wynns then followed with an opposite-field RBI bloop single to right field to score Rickard, a hit that came with the Rays playing three infielders on the left side of second base.
After issuing a walk to Ji-Man Choi in the sixth, Hess left the game with two on and two outs in the inning, and Donnie Hart retired the only hitter he faced to keep the game tied.
Hess was helped by his defense in the third when second baseman Jonathan Villar's relay throw home cut down Smith at the plate, preventing a run from scoring on Duffy's RBI double.
Choi's fourth-inning solo homer off Hess cut the Orioles' lead to 3-2.
Chirinos, who entered the game in the third inning, allowed just one run _ Nunez's homer in the seventh _ over five innings, yielding just three hits while striking out four.
