Baltimore Orioles: Asher Wojciechowski Falls Back To Earth In Loss To Blue Jays

The Baltimore Orioles opened a four-game series with the Toronto Blue Jays with a loss that saw their hottest pitcher cool down.

After finishing a three-city west coast trip 5-3 the Baltimore Orioles hoped to build off to the momentum built out west and bring home to Camden Yards Thursday where they began a four-game series with the Toronto Blue Jays.

Things would not go as planned however as the Orioles fell 11-2 to the Blue Jays in a game that saw Asher Wojciechowski‘s run of success come to an end.

Wojciechowski entered Thursday’s start fresh off of two outstanding outings. On July 21st he tossed 7.1 scoreless innings of one-hit ball against the defending champion Red Sox. He followed that up with another brilliant outing against the Los Angeles Angels where he tossed seven innings and allowed only two runs to earn a second straight victory.

Thursday however was a little bit of a different story. After getting through the first two innings scoreless Blue Jays rookie sensation, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hit a two-run home run in the top of the third.

The Orioles would have a chance to even the score on the bottom half of the inning as they loaded the bases with nobody out, but in 2019 Orioles fashion the team found a way to lead the bags full without scoring a run.

That would come back to hurt as in the top of the fourth the Jays added another run on a Bo Bichette RBI single to make it a 3-0 game.

In the top of the fifth, it was Randal Grichuk’s turn to damage for the Blue Jays as he hit a solo home run which put Toronto up 4-0 and knocked Wojciechowski out of the game after allowing four runs in just 4.2 innings of work.

Baltimore would get a run back in the bottom half of the fourth, but Toronto broke things open in the top of the fifth off Jimmy Yacabonis as they struck for four runs and then added another in the top of the 8th off of rookie Dillon Tate as Guerrero Jr. hit his second home run of the night to complete a 3/5 four RBI game to give the Jays a 9-1 lead.

Orioles fans still in attendance at least got one thing to smile about as in the bottom of the eighth Trey Mancini hit his 25th home run of the season to cut the Blue Jays lead to 9-2.

The Blue Jays would not allow the home run to mean much however as Billy McKinney ripped a two-run homer off Tate in the top of the 9th to put Toronto ahead 11-2 which would end up being the final score.

With the loss, Baltimore (36-72) is now 5-5 against the Blue Jays (44-67) this year and are now 6.5 behind Toronto for fourth place in the AL East. The Orioles will look to retake the season series lead tomorrow when they send Aaron Brooks to the mound.