Stan ‘The Fan’ Charles: Orioles’ Playoff Candle Flickering … But Not Extinguished Yet

Let me see a show of hands if you have enjoyed the baseball season in Baltimore? Now put your hands down. Now let me see a show of hands from those who have been shocked that the rebuild produced this first iteration of the new and improved Orioles so fast? Now, lastly, raise your hands if you are excited about what the next 7-10 years hold under the leadership of John Angelos and Mike Elias?

OK, I see a great showing of hands up. You folks can continue to read on. All others, I’ll wait until closer to Christmas to hear your “bah, humbug” view of the world.

So, as I put pen to paper on this, the second-place Jays are 79-61, the third-place Rays are 78-61 and the Orioles are 73-67. Baltimore stands six games behind Toronto and 5.5 games behind Tampa Bay. The Jays and Rays are in the midst of five games in four days.

Meanwhile, sandwiched in between off days on Sept. 12 and 15, the Orioles have two “must-wins” against their MASN cousins, the worst-in-baseball Washington Nationals. Any scenario that sees the Orioles’ flickering candle getting brighter is dependent upon the Orioles winning both games against the Nationals.

That would make the Orioles 75-67. Tampa Bay or Toronto will lose at least three of those five games. For the purposes of this column, I am directing our ray of hope at the Blue Jays, because the Orioles play them six more times. The Orioles and Rays have finished their season series, with Tampa Bay narrowly edging Baltimore, 10-9.

The Orioles’ ninth loss to the Rays was the strangely-timed big league debut of DL Hall, and the final loss was Drew Rasmussen’s near-perfect game. Those losses were important because Tampa Bay now holds the head-to-head tiebreaker over Baltimore in the wild-card standings.

Back to our resuscitation scenario: Say the Orioles are 75-67 after two games against the Nationals, and the Jays lose three of five to the Rays. That would put the Jays at 80-64. This scenario would chop a game and a half off of Toronto’s lead over Baltimore.

We know how pesky these Rays are. If they could somehow take four of five from the Jays after losing the series opener Sept. 12, that could make for an interesting series in Toronto Sept. 16-18, with the Orioles entering at 75-67 and the Jays at 79-65.

All of this is contingent on Baltimore beating Washington twice. While the Nationals are 49-92 on the season, they are 11-14 in the past three weeks. During that time, they split series with San Diego (2-2), St. Louis (2-2) and Seattle (1-1) and won series against Oakland (2-1) and the Mets (2-1).

So, while winning both games against Washington is very doable, Brandon Hyde must have his team uber-focused both nights in the District of Columbia.

Being greedy is for suckers, so let’s look at my most reasonable scenario: The Orioles win both in D.C., the Jays drop three of five to the Rays and the Orioles win two of three in Toronto. If that were to all play out, Toronto would be 81-66 with 15 games remaining and Baltimore would be 77-68 with 17 games left.

And those games in hand would be important. In creating a realistic but difficult scenario, give me the license to say the Orioles win those extra two games. That would leave Toronto at 81-66 and Baltimore at 79-68, just a two-game difference.

The Jays’ remaining schedule sends them to Philadelphia for two and Tampa Bay for four before they head back home for three apiece against the Yankees and Red Sox. The Jays finish the season with three in Baltimore.

The Orioles have seven games at home (three against Detroit and four against Houston) before heading on the road for four at Fenway Park and three at Yankee Stadium. Then they return home for that final three-game set against the Jays.

My last hope would be that the Orioles sweep the Tigers and benefit from both the Astros and Yankees looking forward to the playoffs instead of putting their best foot forward in every regular-season game down the stretch.

Look, at my age, I wouldn’t describe my view on reality as naive. The Orioles are just 2-6 since that Sunday game when they could have swept the A’s. They have maxed out their margin for error. With 22 games left to play, I know the Orioles aren’t going to magically go 19-3 the rest of the way. But they have enough games against Toronto, and the Jays still have eight more games against the awfully feisty Rays.

The Orioles need to play much better down the stretch … and a good bit of help from Kevin Cash and maybe a two-game sweep in Philadelphia by Bryce Harper and the boys.

When describing September pennant race baseball, Earl Weaver always told the fans and his players that there were going to be peaks and valleys. You’ll think you have no chance when you hit a 2-6 valley, but if you keep plugging away, you just may take advantage of the closest team to you going through a very similar valley.

That’s why they play the games.

Photo Credit: Colin Murphy/PressBox

Stan Charles

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