Orioles clinch the AL East title with their 100th win of the season

By | Niranjan Bhargav 29 Sep, 2023

The Baltimore Orioles flocked to the field for a celebration near the mound after Ramón Uras collected a grounder and threw to first for the final out.

They weren’t running all out. While some players skipped or jogged, others walked. It could have been an indication of how difficult and occasionally draining this contest of winning the AL East was.

Now that pursuit is done. The Orioles defeated the Boston Red Sox 2-0 on Thursday night to capture the division title. Anthony Santander hit a home run, DL Hall got out of a sixth-inning jam, and the Orioles won the game.

Austin Hays, an outfielder, stated, “It was the AL Beast again this year, and we knew it.” We had to fight to get here, but we did. We succeeded.

The Orioles surpassed 100 victories for the sixth time in their history and for the first time since 1980, thanks to Dean Kremer’s (13-5) five-and-a-third innings of two hits, a walk, and eight strikeouts. Baltimore won in a very competitive division as the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees were passed over.

The Orioles will now enter the postseason as the top seed in the American League, two years after losing 110 games.

Manager Brandon Hyde remarked, “There were so many rough nights in ’19 and ’21.” “Many of the guys who were in that clubhouse are now celebrating,” said the speaker.

At Camden Yards, there was a good deal of enthusiasm before the team sealed the victory. After the third inning, the team announced on the scoreboard that it had achieved an agreement with the state that would keep the Orioles in Baltimore for at least the next 30 years. The final year of the team’s tenure at Camden Yards was 2023.

Another thrill for Baltimore fans during the seventh-inning stretch was the appearance of legendary Orioles player Cal Ripken on the scoreboard.

After divisional play started in 1969, Baltimore won the AL East five times in six seasons. However, this is the Orioles’ fifth division title overall and first since 2014. In 1983, Baltimore won both the World Series and the pennant.

The Orioles had to fight hard to win the AL East. After winning at Camden Yards on May 8, Tampa Bay led Baltimore by 6 1/2 games and had won 13 straight games to start the season. However, the Orioles won the final two games of that series, kept up with the Rays, and eventually overtook them just after the All-Star break.

I was trying to figure out what our club was when they got out to such a good start,” Hyde said. “I believed that we made a solid squad. Many things needed to be clarified for me, and I hoped we would compete for six months despite the fact that the season was lengthy.

Baltimore has not lost a sweep in 91 games with at least two decisions.

The Orioles led 1-0 after Santander’s home run off Chris Sale (6-5) in the first. In the sixth inning, with one out and runners on first and third for the Red Sox, Hall relieved Kremer and retired pinch-hitters Adam Duvall and Alex Verdugo by striking out and grounding out, respectively.

With each scoreless Boston frame, the crowd’s enthusiasm appeared to increase. Hall also labored on the sixth. In the eighth inning, Yennier Cano recorded two outs, and Cionel Pérez recorded the third out by retiring Rafael Devers on a groundout with a runner on second.

Heston Kjerstad’s RBI double as a pinch-hitter in the eighth inning gave the Orioles a second run. After Tyler Wells threw a 1-2-3 ninth inning to win his first save of the year, the celebration really got going.

Adley Rutschman, the top catcher who served as Baltimore’s designated hitter on Thursday, said that he was feeling anxious. “I was so nervous and excited watching Wellsie go out there and do his thing” in the dugout.

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