Orioles' ninth-inning meltdown highlights just how far in over his head Craig Albernaz really is

Last night, the Baltimore Orioles snatched defeat from the jaws of victory as they blew a two-run lead in the ninth inning to the Los Angeles Dodgers. As good as the Dodgers are, this loss had a lot more to do with what the Orioles did wrong than what the Dodgers did right, as a series of questionable managerial decisions by Orioles rookie skipper Craig Albernaz paved the way for one of the oddest walkoffs imaginable.

The bad decisions actually started before the game began when the Orioles' lineup was posted and featured Jeremiah Jackson in left field, a position he had never played at the big league level. The Orioles are hopeful that they can convert Jackson into a utility man, so it makes sense to test him in the corner outfield, but having Jackson make his left field debut on a day where you have a rookie starter with the lowest K% on the team on the mound is asking for trouble.

The Orioles asked, and they received. In the second inning, Jackson stumbled on the outfield grass while fielding a ball hit towards him, which led to a runner scoring from first.

Jackson redeemed himself later in the game by poking an RBI single through the right side of the infield to give the Orioles the lead, which led to the Orioles next mistake, which was after that inning, replacing Jackson in the outfield with Tyler O'Neill.

Craig Albernaz's managerial decision making has cost the Orioles many times this season

On the surface, this seems like the Orioles correcting a previous mistake by putting an actual outfielder in the outfield to finish the game, but if the Orioles were going to replace Jackson in the outfield with someone on their bench, O'Neill was the wrong person to use when they have Blaze Alexander available.

O'Neill has a pair of gold gloves, but those are many years and many injuries away. It's been five seasons since O'Neill last rated out as a positive defender. Especially since coming to Baltimore, his range has been poor, and his arm has been inaccurate. He's even goofed routine pop-ups that you'd expect a little leaguer to squeeze. Even with Jackson making his first career start in left, it's questionable if O'Neill is even a defensive upgrade from him. It's undeniable, however, that O'Neill is a much worse defender than Alexander, who is younger, faster, and has a better arm.

The only stat that would tell you to play O'Neill over Alexander is their salaries. O'Neill is the Orioles ' second-highest-paid player, and because he's been one of the worst players in baseball ever since he came to Baltimore, the Orioles have understandably leaned away from playing him as much as they can.

It's hard to leave $15 million dollars wasting away on the bench, and so with a two-run lead, Albernaz decided that this was a good time to get the Orioles' worst player some playing time. After all, how much damage could he do in two and a half innings?

The ninth inning is where everything fell apart. Closer Ryan Helsley was making just his second appearance since coming back off the IL. In his first appearance, he gave up home runs to the first two batters he faced. Needless to say, he didn't look especially sharp.

When Helsley gave up a home run to Mookie Betts to cut the lead to one with just one out in the ninth, a smart manager might have gotten someone in the bullpen up stretching. Nobody even flinched in the Orioles bullpen. Against the next batter, Max Muncy, Helsley was spraying the ball all over. After a first pitch strike, he threw four straight borderline wild pitches, and on the last one, he was lucky that in Muncy's effort to avoid being struck, he accidentally hit the ball with the knob of the bat, which made what should have been ball four strike two.

The Dodgers challenged the foul ball ruling, hoping to get the call overturned and ruled a HBP. Muncy was the third batter Helsley had faced, so the Orioles had the option to remove him from the game as soon as the AB was over. The challenge gave the Orioles bullpen extra time to get a different reliever warmed up, but nobody did.

The ruling was upheld, but it didn't matter as Helsley walked Muncy a pitch later. Helsley got his fourth batter of the inning to pop out before issuing a four-pitch walk to the fifth batter he faced.

At this point, it was clear to everyone watching except the Orioles manager that Helsley didn't have it. He had no command of the fastball, the splitter wasn't fooling anyone, and he'd already hung a slider that left the park.

The next batter ripped the fourth pitch he saw into right field, where it was played on a hop by defensive replacement Tyler O'Neill, who fired a throw over the cutoff man's head to home even though he had no shot at getting the runner. The ball bounced away from Samuel Basallo, allowing the game-winning run to scamper home from third. Game over, Dodgers win.

It was a managerial disaster class where all the mistakes came home to roost. The infielder starting in the outfield costs you a run, the bad defender used as a defensive replacement makes a bad decision and worse throw in a key moment, and the struggling reliever you left out there on the mound  despite having every opportunity to pull him blows the game.

All of the players involved in these plays have fault here, but with all the mistakes made in this game, Albernaz is more at fault than any one player.

Did Craig Albernaz take any of his signature accountability after the game? Well, the first name out of his mouth was Samuel Basallo, and when asked about not having anyone come in for Helsley, he was completely confident in his decision to leave him out there to lose the game.

Losing this winnable game pushed the Orioles to seven games under .500, and even in the incredibly weak American League, it feels like they've now officially dug too deep a hole to climb out of.

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