The Orioles enter today's game against the Reds after dropping a series to the Pirates on the road.  Hopefully coming back to Camden Yards can help bring the O's to a victory to start this 6 game home stand.

Reds:

	Batting	Fielding	fWAR
Chris Heisey	.273/.333/.492	0	0.9
Brandon Phillips	.282/.338/.385	4	2.1
Joey Votto	.318/.440/.489	3	-1.6
Scott Rolen	.260/.301/.420	3	0.5
Jay Bruce	.277/.348/.511	-4	0.5
Jonny Gomes	.222/.338/.421	2	1.2
Drew Stubbs	.257/.329/.405	2	2.6
Ramon Hernandez	.308/.371/.503	0	-1.5
Paul Janish	.234/.263/.278	2	0.4

The Reds come off a series loss to the Yankees in Yankee Stadium.  Tough lineup to pitch around, with good hitters abundant in this lineup.  The reigning NL MVP bats third and the strong lefty Jay Bruce bats only two spots behind him.


Edinson Volquez:

ERA	FIP	xFIP	K/9	BB/9	GB%	fWAR
5.61	4.87	3.86	9.3	5.9	54.2%	0.1

The Good:

• JJ Hardy hit another home run - his 9th - which gives him as many as Nick Markakis and Derrek Lee (combined). He also added a single, taking his season batting average above .300.
• Adam Jones hit his 1th home run of the season a couple batters later, drew a pair of walks, and also made a great running grab in left-center-field on a ball I thought was surely going for extra-bases. It seems to me he's been better with the glove this year, though the defensive metrics (all of them) have him as being pretty terrible. 
• Mark Reynolds had two hits and a walk. He didn't strike out, but he did make an error in the field so we wouldn't forget he was in the game (his bat giveth, his glove taketh away).

The Bad:

• Jeremy Guthrie was allowed to bat for himself to lead off the 6th inning, and ended up striking out. This was pretty clearly not a good move (even though he hadn't thrown too many pitches). An actual hitter is better than Guthrie at the plate, while a middle reliever is going to be about as good if not better than Guthrie on the mound his third and fourth times through the order. Guthrie allowed a walk and a hit in the bottom of the frame, and then a run on two hits and a walk in the 7th. I've been... less than impressed with many of Buck's in-game moves this year.

The Final:

Guthrie gave up a bunch of hits, which'll happen when you don't strike out many batters, but he didn't pitch that poorly overall. Same thing with Bergesen out of the pen, really. O's just couldn't score aside from the longball, despite getting 10 other runners on base.

The Good:

• The O's just BABIP'ed Charlie Morton to death, with 8 hits on (I believe) 10 balls in play in the first couple innings as they put 7 on the board early.
• Every starter but Felix Pie got on base, with JJ Hardy (2, plus a walk), Nick Markakis (3, including a double), Adam Jones (2), Derrek Lee (2), and Robert Andino (2) having multiple hits while Mark Reynolds singled and walked three times.
• Jason Berken did a nice job in relief - 2 IP, 3 K, no baserunners - though the announcers said that he was the team's longman. That's not right, and it's the kind of thinking that resulted in Jeremy Accardo pitching in tied ballgames in the 7th inning. Berken is pretty much the team's 3rd or 4th best reliever, which means he shouldn't be wasted as a longman unless he just needs some work.

The Bad:

• Pie went 0-5 and misplayed a ball in left-field. He had the tools to turn into an average major league outfielder, but he never built on his solid 2009 season.

The Final:

Jake Arrieta wasn't fantastic (nor was he bad), but he got some run support - as usual - and so ended up with the win. That ties Arrieta for the major league lead in victories - pretty impressive company too (Halladay, Sabathia, Hamels, Lester, Verlander, etc.). Of course, Arrieta has the highest ERA, FIP, etc. on the list. But he's a winner!

Brian Matusz coming off the disabled list was supposed to be a happy event. The Orioles were upgrading their rotation by adding perhaps its best member. But so far, that hasn't been how things have worked out at all. Matusz has a 5.60 ERA after four games, and that's pretty consistent with how he's pitched.

While never a huge strike-out guy, Matusz is K'ing just 5.6 per nine this year. His control has been not so good, with a 4.6 BB/9. And when he has thrown strikes, batters have hit them. The fastball, which is now ~87 mph instead of 90, is producing just a 5% whiff rate (over 11% last year). On top of the velocity loss, the pitch isn't moving quite as much as it used to. Given that, it's not surprising that his change-up has been less effective, with the whiff rate falling from 32% to 19% and batters in general being better about laying off the pitch. A healthy Brian Matusz who can spot and mix his pitches might be able to survive in the majors with an 87 mph fastball, but I'm not sure this current version can. His FIP is 6.18. His xFIP is 5.43. And at this point Chris Tillman or Brad Bergesen might put the O's in a better position to win on any given day.

Things may pick up as Matusz gets in more work, but what if they don't? Since 2000, there have been 26 left-handed starters (with at least 500 IP) whose fastballs have averaged 88 mph or below. Their overall stats in that time frame:

K/9	BB/9	ERA	FIP	xFIP
5.7	2.9	4.32	4.47	4.54

Those are not particularly great numbers, and if that's all the O's can get from Matusz then I don't think the team will be all that excited. And keep in mind, most of the included guys got to the big leagues with lower velocities, so there's a bit of selection bias in that they wouldn't have made it with 87 mph fastballs unless they could pitch well enough that way. And they tended to induce groundballs a little more often than Matusz does, which leaves him a bit more vulnerable to the longball. But I think it paints a reasonable picture of what to expect from Matusz if he doesn't turn back into his old self on the mound.

Perhaps Matusz still isn't 100%, but I believe Buck Showalter was previously quoted as saying that maybe his velocity will never come back. Maybe if it won't he'll turn into Mark Buerhle. Or maybe he'll turn into Darrell May. In any case, Matusz's season reminds us of the fragility of pitching prospects, and more specifically why I would have preferred picking Justin Smoak over him in the 2008 draft. In 2009 and 2010 that looked wrong, but suddenly Matusz chances of being a consistently league average starter are looking a little bit longer (though I still think he'll be OK - it's only 17.2 IP afterall) while Smoak is hitting .254/.356/.482 in Seattle - and his 135 wRC+ would lead the Orioles. Predicting the future is hard, and we still don't know what it holds for Matusz - but a 7 K, 0 BB performance while at least touching 90 his next time out would sure make me feel a whole lot better.

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Stats: ERA, FIP, xFIP, K/9 & BB/9, PitchFX

The Orioles snapped a 4-game losing streak with a victory over the Blue Jays yesterday.  They start this edition of the Beltway series in Washington looking to continue their winning streak.

Nationals:

	Batting	Fielding	fWAR
Jayson Werth	.240/.340/.426	-2	1.9
Ian Desmond	.235/.273/.336	2	0.8
Ryan Zimmerman	.302/.404/.442	1	-0.4
Michael Morse	.311/.355/.560	-3	0.1
Danny Espinosa	.233/.321/.463	5	2.1
Wilson Ramos	.248/.319/.406	3	1.0
Jerry Hairston	.233/.298/.326	-4	-1.7
Jason Marquis	.258/.258/.290	0	-0.1
Roger Bernadina	.267/.327/.363	-5	0.6

A decently strong lineup from the Nationals, Michael Morse has been absolutely on fire.  Tough to pitch around him and Zimmerman.

Jason Marquis:

ERA	FIP	xFIP	K/9	BB/9	GB%	fWAR
3.67	3.76	3.86	5.2	2.6	51.5%	1.1

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Allow me some hyperbole for a moment:

JJ Hardy is awesome. Marvelous. Splendid. Spectacular. He's aces. Boss. Brilliant

Really he's just a quality major league shortstop, but after Alex Cintron, Luis Hernandez, Brandon Fahey, Juan Castro, Freddie Bynum, Eider Torres, Julio Lugo, Robert Andino, and Cesar Izturis (who was probably easily the best player here), et al., you can see why he looks so good by comparison.

Hardy missed some time towards the beginning of the season, but he's certainly making up for lost time. Including today's game, he's hitting .299/.366/.514 on the season (162PA) with 7 home runs. He's going deep as frequently as any shortstop in baseball - his home run every 23.1 PA is second to only Troy Tulowitzi's 22.2. His wOBA - now at about .383 - trails only Jose Reyes'. Fielding numbers in small sample sizes don't mean much, but he's 9th in the majors (min. 200 innings) with an UZR/150 of +5.6. Not quite as flashy, but Hardy's also walking more often than in any season since his rookie year (9.3% BB), which places him in the top 10 amongst shortstops (min. 150 PA). He can field, he can hit, he's only 28 years old, and I'd like to have him in Baltimore until Manny Machado is ready.

All that said, Hardy isn't really quite this good. His BABIP is .327, even though his career mark is just .283. Sure he's hitting more line-drives than he has in years, but I'd still expect that to come down closer to .300 - which would make his line more like .278/.348/.486. The home run power isn't actually crazy - his home run per flyball rate of around 14% is more or less in line with what he did in Milwaukee in his first few seasons. The only difference is that he's hitting the ball in the air more than at any point in his career, which is resulting in more of them going over the fence. Slightly dampened flyball tendencies would probably have left Hardy with, say, 6 homers instead of 7. Then his line would be .271/.342/.458 - and if that's what he provides the team going forward, I have to think they'd take it in a heart-beat (even missing some playing time that's around a 4 win player). As high as I was on Hardy coming into the season, my "bounceback" line for him was only .275/.340/.440.

Dude can play, and right now it's neck-and-neck between Hardy and Wieters as to who's the team's MVP for the season. Guys that can get it done on both sides of the ball = win.

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Stats: wOBA, BB% & K%, FB%, HR/FB%, BABIP, UZR, WAR

The Good:

• JJ Hardy... still awesome. A 3-5 day out of the lead-off spot, including a double. The O's may end up costing themselves a fair bit of money for waiting to sign him to an extension. Should have done it before the season - at the moment it might not be cost effective.
• Luke Scott also had three hits - one of which was a bunt down the third-base line with the infield shift on. If he can do that consistently, it'll be a nice bonus.
• Matt Wieters crushed a game-tying two-run as a right-handed* batter, almost appearing to one-arm the ball into the stands. And he threw out a runner trying to advance on a wild pitch.
• Been a while (like, last season), but Nick Markakis had a "Nick Markakis day"**, with a couple single, a double, and a walk.

* I noted earlier in the year that it looked like Wieters had more power in his swing from that side of the plate this season, and the numbers bare it out; 4 HR in 63 PA right-handed, 3 HR in 154 PA left-handed (his wOBA is like 100 points higher versus lefties as well, whereas for his career it goes the other way by 30 points or so).

** A game with a double and a walk. Not really who he his anymore though.
The Bad:

• Chirs Jakubauskas is back to being Chirs Jakubauskas. Maybe he's a decent major league long-man. Maybe. Final line; 5.1 IP, 7 H, 4 R, 4 BB, 2 K.
• Buck brought Jeremy Accardo out for the 7th inning with the O's down 4-3. Why? He isn't good. He shouldn't be pitching in high leverage situations. Down 2-3? Sure. Down 1? I guess on the road their chances aren't that good, but still. Predictably he gave up 3 hits (including a double and a homer), and was only saved from giving up more than 1 run by Wieters' arm. Alfredo Simon should be in in that spot, but he's the long man for some reason.

The Final:

Nice comeback for the O's, but they could only keep the Jays down for so long. They lose in extras and fall to 30-34 on the season.