Attention, please. The show starts in...., 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, go. What is going on, Birdland? And Stephen Heckman here for the Final Strike Podcast, brought to you by the Baltimore Battery. We are coming to you after the Baltimore Orioles drop the final game of the series against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays today. 3-1. Seems like the only person who showed up to play any offense today was Colton Cowser. He had both hits for the Baltimore Orioles, both extra base hits. Mind you, on junk pitches, one was a double off a cutter and a home run off a changeup. So good to see that happening. But, uh, Baltimore Orioles, unfortunately did drop the final game of the series today and they did finish their final game of the season against the Rays. It is their fourth seas.., sixth season in a row they've had a winning record against the Rays. So we are glad to see that the Orioles are at least keeping up the tides with them. Um, um. So, the Orioles finished the season series against the Rays 8-5, six consecutive winning seasons against the Rays. Also has the most victories since 2020 against the Rays of any other team. So, good thing the Baltimore Orioles have come to show up against the Rays. Unfortunately, the Orioles went 5-5 over their last 10 games, in which they needed to do better than that, between the Rays and the New York Yankees. This sweep against the New York Yankees definitely was very difficult to endure, and unfortunately, might be a struggle to get things back on track. They are getting ready to head out on a nine-game homestand, or a nine-game road swing, so we'll see what happens there. At worst, they cannot do anything worse than 6-4. They have to do, have to do, at least 7-3, is realistically what we're looking at. So mind you, we're over on TikTok right now while we're recording this live. So everybody in the TikTok universe, thank you for joining in. We will be talking about the Baltimore Orioles here, some things. So if you have any questions pertaining to the Baltimore Orioles, playoff push or anything that you'd like to know about, now's your opportunity to get them in as we are recording the podcast for the final strike that will be going out later on tonight. So get your questions in while we're recording. We'll be glad to answer any questions pertaining to baseball. Okay, so I want to make sure we don't get any of those far out from left field, questions that don't belong here. So, welcome everybody on in. Glad to see you. I know the Orioles have had a rollercoaster of a season, and they still continue to have a rollercoaster of a season. I was talking to a buddy of mine, and we were trying to figure out what Albert is doing with the lineups. Yes, he is a first-year manager, but once again, as we've mentioned many a times here, The pedigree of what Craig Albernez came in with, there are some questionable things that he is doing that leaves us wondering. What in the hell were we getting when we got this guy? Because he's supposed to be so far advanced from other people that we were looking at that we were willing to bypass getting veteran managers to bring this guy in. So what I mean by that, and we've talked about it in the future or down in the past pertaining to this and one of the reasons why the Baltimore Orioles are where they are. You take a look at today, the Baltimore Orioles are 4-7 when it comes to series in which they have an opportunity to sweep the other team. So you're talking about seven losses in those situations that could be the difference of what's going on right now. They at least will be a game back after the end of today. So flip that around with those seven losses and add them as victories, and you're talking about you're sitting pretty for a wild-card spot. That's just there. You know, you take that out elsewhere and, you know, you're looking at other situations where the Baltimore Orioles in one-run games aren't much better. You know, you look at some of the games that the Orioles lead the league in blown saves. And yes, they've won some of those games. But last time when I looked it up, you know, a few weeks ago when we discussed this, the Baltimore Orioles had led the league with 19 blown saves. Even if you convert half of that, you know, you're sitting there talking about eight to nine regular saves that get converted. Those are victories if you convert those. So once again, you're sitting yourself into a playoff position. Now, yes, Albernez can't go out there and play the game himself. We understand that. But the way you're unrolling the bullpen, the way you're putting players in positions, the way you're putting out the lineup is what is causing a lot of this to actually be unfolding the way it is. You look at the sixth inning where the wheels fell off the bus for Shane Boz today and, you know, three ground balls on two strike pitches, you know, the one ground ball just out of the reach of, you know, Jackson holiday, you know, And I saw somebody sitting there saying that his range is not that good. It's not his range. You know, it matters of where you had him lined up defensively. Because, you know, one step too far this way, one step too far that way, and you're talking about the difference between him getting that ball and the ball skirting under his glove like it did. Pete Alonso holding the runner on first. You go and look at that, and the play he dives to try and make the play on the ball, and the ball just misses his glove, you're talking about one step over instead of holding the runner on the bag, and you've got to double play. So these are the situations that I'm talking about that come into play here. Was the runner on first a threat to steal after Samuel Beseo had already thrown out two runners by the sixth inning? I doubt it. But, I mean, everybody has seen Sammy Busseo has a cannon for an arm. You know, he threw out Simpson, who had 35 stolen bases already on the season, and it wasn't even close. So, I'm sorry. Holding the runner on first there I don't think was as big a priority as defensively being lined up to prevent the runner from moving forward. You're not going to pick the guy off. I mean, it's just Shane Boz does not have the greatest of pickoff moves. And right there at the time, his play was designed to get the runner at the plate. I'd rather him be in a situation to turn a double play than play the runner on first. Even if he's just a step off the bag, he makes that play on the dive. And you're talking about a possible double play there. But in that situation Two strikes, two outs On all three of those hits You're out of the inning either way. So you're looking at situations, small, minute details that are the difference between the Orioles winning and losing games. It's like the other night with the Pete Alonzo home run. That was called a foul ball. Anybody who knows anything about baseball, the yellow pole is called a fair pole. It's not a foul pole. It's a fair poll because it indicates the field of play, where the fair play stops. Once it goes across that, it becomes foul territory. So it's the fair poll. That ball, I don't care how you look at it straight down the line. Yeah, it could appear that way. But there are plenty of angles that you look at. You could see that ball was in play. And yes, that one play particularly did not lose the game for us. But in that situation, especially with a team who went 0-for-19 in the series with runners in scoring position, that one play was significant because it changed the whole momentum of the game. Like, the whole team's confidence, the whole team's energy just was deflated on that one play. And you could see it. It just was deflated on that one play. And when you get something like that in the middle of a playoff race, those small plays can be the determining factor that is going to make your team, excel or your team collapse. And like I said, we want five and five on that road trip. You're talking about the team collapsing at the wrong time. You could not afford, let alone at home, to be swept by the New York Yankees. And what's worse is we end the season playing against the New York Yankees in New York. Our best hope at that point with the way the Yankees have been playing is that they've locked up a playoff spot. Now, there was an actual situation the other day, and it only lasted a day, where the Yankees, the Red Sox, and the Orioles all had the top three wildcard spots locked down. And then Tampa Bay had the top seed locked down in the AL. I'd love to see four teams from the AL East go into the playoffs. That would send everybody into a shit fit. But that's here nor there. Back to what I was discussing. Craig Albernez needs to keep consistency right now. You have less than 35 games until the season's over. You cannot be switching around your lineup the way you're doing it. There's no reason that Colton Couser, Dylan Beavers, and Tyler O'Neal are not playing every single day. There's no reason. Unless they're injured or unless they need a break. But this crap of bringing in a lineup one way and then bringing them in halfway through the game, that's not cutting it. You're just putting yourself in a situation where you're going to create an injury because the players aren't warmed up properly or ready to go into the game. So you're over-preparing, and you're also shortening your bench later on in the game. In a 1-0 game, if you've already shortened your bench because you've put people in in the 5th inning because they switched from a right-handed pitcher to a left-handed pitcher or vice versa, if you go into extra innings in the 10th or the 11th inning and one of your players gets hurt and you've already switched players out by that point because they switched to a different reliever, you're talking about shortening your bent or putting a player into a position that they are not used to playing or worst case scenario not having a player be able to play a position. I'm more than like
