The visiting Baltimore Orioles will look to bounce back from a close loss when they face the Milwaukee Brewers on Wednesday night.
Baltimore’s Dean Kremer (6-2, 4.43 ERA) is set to oppose Corbin Burnes (4-4, 3.75) in a matchup of right-handers.
The Brewers took the opener of the three-game series 4-3 on Tuesday thanks to rookie Joey Wiemer’s walk-off single with two outs in the 10th inning.
Aaron Hicks hit a two-run homer and Ryan O’Hearn added a solo shot to account for all of the Orioles’ scoring.
Baltimore fell to 11-7 in one-run games, while Milwaukee improved to 10-3 in one-run contests.
“That’s a good team over there,” said Orioles starter Kyle Gibson, who gave up two runs inning in the first but no more in his five-plus-inning outing. “They pitch the ball really well, they play good defense, and they make pitching staffs work. So I expect the next two games to be similar to this.”
Hicks, signed by the Orioles on May 30 after being released by the New York Yankees, is hitting .400 (6-for-15) in five games for Baltimore. He has a homer, a triple, three RBIs, three walks and five runs for his new club.
Kremer went 3-1 with a 2.45 ERA over five starts in May, then followed that with a win in his latest outing, vs. the San Francisco Giants on Friday. He allowed two runs in six innings in his team’s 3-2 victory.
Kremer, who has never faced the Brewers, is 3-1 with a 3.94 ERA in six road starts this season.
Wiemer is on a seven-game hitting streak, batting .391 (9-for-23) over that stretch with a homer, four doubles, four RBIs and five walks. He also took an extra-base hit away from Hicks on Tuesday, making a running grab in the gap in right-center with two on base.
“Joey, he’s a competitor,” Brewers manager Craig Counsell said. “It’s a really clean way he competes. He doesn’t get distracted by much.
“The play he made in the third inning was incredible, one of the best catches I’ve seen. That was a double off the bat. I don’t think any of us thought anybody had a chance to catch that. So, he’s impacting the team and he’s playing well, and he’s been swinging the bat pretty well.”
Another rookie, Brice Turang, who entered Tuesday night with one hit in his past 40 at-bats and hitless in his past 20, contributed a triple in the fourth inning and the game-tying single in the eighth.
Milwaukee, 4-0 in extra innings games, is 29-4 when scoring four or more runs and 4-24 when held to three or less.
Burnes allowed three runs on two hits in six innings during his latest start, against Cincinnati on Friday. He struck out seven and walked four but did not get a decision in the Brewers’ 5-4, 11-inning win.
Burnes, the 2021 National League Cy Young Award winner, has won just once in his past six starts, pitching to a 3.50 ERA over that span.
His strikeout rate per nine innings has dropped this season to 8.5, compared with his career average of 11.3. He is walking 3.6 per nine innings this season, above his career mark of 2.6.
Burnes has faced the Orioles once in his career, scattering three hits over seven scoreless innings in a no-decision on April 13, 2022.
–Field Level Media
