Against the Colorado Rockies on Tuesday, Orioles right-hander Chris Tillman turned in an outing that, at least statistically, showed a regression from his previous four. He pitched five innings instead of seven, gave up one run instead of three and surrendered nine hits instead of three, four or five.
Despite the stats, Tillman doesn't think the difference was so vast.
"I think the ball just fell where we weren't," Tillman said. "There were a couple ground balls, even plays that we made, that were tough outs, where I feel like the last couple games those were at guys. They took a lot of good swings on some pitches. I gotta tip my hat to them. That was impressive."
The difference for Tillman might have been five pitches, the ones that created the five two-strike hits that spoiled his outing in the third inning.
He loaded the bases by giving up singles to three of the first four hitters — Daniel Descalso, Charlie Blackmon and DJ LeMahieu — each on 1-2 counts. With one out, Nolan Arenado popped up an 0-2 pitch to hold the runners.
Tillman would have limited the damage, and perhaps even gone on to replicate his previous four outings, if not for a pair of two-strike hits to the ensuing batters — a two-run, ground-rule double by Carlos Gonzalez and a two-run single by Trevor Story.
"We've talked about this before," Tillman said. "When you get in pitcher's counts and not putting guys away, it's frustrating. But you gotta go back and look at the positive — you got to two strikes, you just gotta find a way to put 'em away."
In the rest of the game, and in most of the career year he's having, Tillman has done that. Entering Tuesday, opposing hitters were batting just .186 in two-strike counts. Outside of the third inning Tuesday, the Rockies went 1-for-7 in such situations.
And in the same scenarios in Tillman's previous four starts, opponents went 4-for-40 — including the Yankees' 0-for-11 showing Thursday — and Tillman won all four. Had he retired Gonzalez with the 2-2, two-out pitch in the third, the Rockies might have suffered a similar fate.
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