Jackson Holliday’s late swing kept Baltimore’s season from slipping a little farther away.
At Citi Field, the Orioles shortstop broke a 1-1 tie in the eighth inning with a go-ahead solo home run, and Baltimore held on for a 2-1 win over the Mets in the opener of the series. It was Henderson’s 23rd homer of the season and his first since he went deep twice against the A’s on Aug. 30 in West Sacramento.
The blast came in a spot that felt familiar to the version of Henderson Baltimore has been waiting for all year. He was down 1-0 in the count, with two outs and the game hanging in the balance, when he jumped a slider from right-hander Dedniel Núñez and drove it 397 feet over the right-center-field wall, according to Statcast.
Henderson’s season has been a grind. He entered the night hitting .223 with a .710 OPS in 149 games. Still, there are nights when the 25-year-old flashes the kind of talent that made him one of the sport’s best young players after arriving in the majors in 2022, and this was one of them.
Baltimore got on the board first in the second inning on Heston Kjerstad’s RBI double. From there, the pitching staff did the rest. Brandon Young worked five innings and allowed one run, then Josh Walker, Yennier Cano, Grant Wolfram and Rico Garcia finished off four scoreless innings of relief.
The game also brought Pete Alonso back to Citi Field, where he spent his first seven big league seasons with the Mets. Now with the Orioles after signing a five-year, $155 million deal last December, the 31-year-old first baseman went 0-for-3 with a walk.
The win was only Baltimore’s fourth in its last 13 games, following a two-of-three loss to the Blue Jays. Even so, the Orioles picked up a little ground in the American League Wild Card race, moving to three games back of the third spot with 11 games left. Baltimore is 73-78.
In Other News...
Orioles Have One Huge Samuel Basallo Question This Offseason
Samuel Basallo gave the Orioles a glimpse of what their future behind the plate could look like in the first half of the season, but the year did not stay on that track for long. A right shoulder injury sent the young catcher to the injured list starting July 22, interrupting a promising stretch and adding to a season already marked by left knee discomfort and a left shoulder issue.
When Basallo returned on Aug. 19, the results were harder to square with the early progress. His average, slugging and exit velocity all dropped sharply as the Orioles slipped further out of playoff contention, leaving the club to weigh what the next step should look like for one of its most important young players. The talent is still there, but the bigger question now is how Baltimore manages his health and development going into the offseason. [Read more 🡒]
Orioles Just Reached A Painful Point In Their Season
The Orioles have reached the point in a long, frustrating season where the standings no longer leave much room for denial. Even before the latest trip to Toronto exposed more of the same problems, Baltimores mix of inconsistent offense and shaky defense had pushed the club into a corner, with the math and the tiebreakers both working against any real hope of a postseason push.
Now the focus has to shift toward what comes next. Baltimore can use the final stretch to give younger players more meaningful looks and keep an eye on pitcher health, because the better play is no longer to chase a distant playoff path but to make sure the organization gets something useful out of the months ahead. [Read more 🡒]
Orioles Prospects Are Moving In Opposite Directions Right Now
The Orioles farm system had a split night as Norfolk and Chesapeake headed in different directions. At Triple-A, the Tides fell 3-2 to the Memphis Redbirds even after Juaron Watts-Brown gave them five innings on the mound, and the offense finally stirred in the sixth when Creed Willems launched a home run as part of a two-run frame. It was enough to make the game interesting, but not enough to erase a slow start or turn the result.
Chesapeake, meanwhile, found its late-inning answer at Double-A. The Baysox trailed the Richmond Flying Squirrels before putting together a three-run comeback in the eighth inning to win 3-1, a rally backed by strong work from Patrick Reilly and the bullpen behind him. For an Orioles system trying to sort out which prospects are gaining traction and which ones are still searching, the contrast between those two games was hard to miss. [Read more 🡒]