Rob Long: Orioles Lacking Defensive Focus
The Baltimore Orioles were regarded as one of, if not the best defensive teams in Major League Baseball. At least that was the case before the 2015 season.
The O's were also regarded as one of the top pitching staffs in the American League. The staff was outstanding down the stretch in 2014 and put together an impressive run. The starters put together quality starts and the bullpen was rock solid. Sure you had a team that could hit home runs but the key to this team's success was pitching and defense. If there's any doubt in that, just take a look at what's going on right now.
On Tuesday, the Birds continued to play 180 degrees from where they were when they were at their best. Not only is staff ace Chris Tillman not pitching like the staff ace, the defense is in disarray, led by the man who once won a Platinum Glove, Manny Machado.
If the Baltimore Orioles were losing games 2-1 or 3-2 with solid pitching and great defense, I don't think the frustration would be the same. However, the reason, more often than not, has been either poor pitching or bad defense or both. That's not what anyone expected.
Yes, the team has played the majority of its games without Gold Glove shortstop J.J. Hardy and Gold Glove catcher Matt Wieters, but Machado played an entire season in 2013 with 13 errors has eight already so far this season and we are only in mid-May.
Can they correct the problem? We can only hope so. From my standpoint they look like a bunch of guys wearing the same uniform coming out of the same dugout. This team doesn't look to be playing as a unit.
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