This game looked nothing like the opener for a while. Baltimore jumped out fast and appeared to be cruising toward another laugher, before Oli Marmol's club put together its best inning of the week and forced a ninth to be necessary.
Baltimore's 5-run first and 2-run second staked Bradish to a 7-1 cushion that felt like it might get out of hand again. Instead, St. Louis answered with a 6-run fifth to flip the whole game and tie it at 7-7, turning a laugher into a dogfight. Baltimore collected 13 hits, St. Louis had 11 of its own, and it took a run in the ninth for the Orioles to finally put it away.
Zoom out and both of these clubs are treading water. Baltimore, at 65-68 entering the day, has still won 4 of its last 5 and takes the first two meetings of this set. St. Louis, at 66-68, dropped its fifth straight and has now been out-hit and out-scored in back-to-back games against the O's after getting run off the field in the opener.
Neither team is playing for October at this point, but nights like this one are exactly why these two kept selling tickets down the stretch — a laugher that turned into a nail-biter, with both bullpens taxed and neither offense willing to go quietly.