And then there were seven. The Baltimore Orioles beat the Detroit Tigers 2-1 on Sunday to complete a three-game sweep of Detroit and advance to the ALCS for the first time since 1997.
All it took was one big hit for the Orioles to advance, and that hit was a two-run homer by Nelson Cruz in the sixth inning off of David Price that barely cleared the right field wall.
Following Cruz’s blast, it was up to Baltimore’s pitching staff to hold down the fort, and they did. Bud Norris tossed 6 1/3 shutout innings, and Andrew Miller set down five in a row in relief of him.
But in the ninth, Detroit nearly tied the game. Victor Martinez led off with a double under the glove of David Lough in left, and J.D. Martinez followed up with a double to right, making it a 2-1 game. But Zach Britton bore down after that, striking out Bryan Holaday, intentionally walking Nick Castellanos, and forcing pinch hitter Hernan Perez to hit into a game-ending double play.
The game wasn’t without controversy, though. In the second inning, Romine bunted into an inning-ending force out at first on a bang-bang play that would have resulted in Alex Avila scoring if Romine were ruled safe.
In the third, Don Kelly was thrown out at second base by J.J. Hardy after straying too far following a routine ground ball, but he got entangled with Jonathan Schoop at the bag before being tagged out. Hardy followed that up by throwing a grounder by Miguel Cabrera away, which would have resulted in another runner scoring.
The Orioles will await the winner of the Royals-Angels series in the ALCS, which begins on Friday.
