Orioles end satisfying season with flawed finish

October baseball is competitive, unpredictable, and compelling. He has more than earned that courtesy over the course of his 18-year managerial career, after all. When Jimenez did just that, he did it so quickly (he threw just five pitches) there was no time to get Britton ready to face Encarnacion. Showalter won’t soon live this down.

“He’s getting buried right now, but I tell people all the time how good he was”, Miller said. Because that was some thrilling, exciting playoff baseball.

Campus was set ablaze in a wave of orange, black and white as devout Baltimore fans sported their colors for the game as the Orioles (89-73) were set to take on the Toronto Blue Jays (89-73).

The Orioles posted a 4.22 ERA, 19th among the 30 major league teams. Maybe Showalter or one of this coaches saw something during Britton’s warm-up that gave him pause? The Blue Jays evened up the score in the bottom of the fifth when Ezequiel Carrera singled home Michael Saunders. The old side looking at Showalter as a manager going with his gut over his analytics department.

If Jimenez gets out of the inning, nobody would be second-guessing Showalter, but he didn’t and so what we’re left with is a frustrated Britton having to answer after the game why he didn’t pitch. Josh Donaldson lined an 0-0 flat sinker (91) to left for a single. Another thing those names have in common, is that none of the are Zach Britton, the Orioles closer, who follows the aggressive advice of the Alec Baldwin character in “Glengarry Glenross” to always be closing. Following the game, Britton told the MLB Network that he was available for any situation, specifically mentioning that he thought he might have been brought in to induce a double play. The game was not lost in the bottom of the 11th inning.

Crisis averted, we’re going to extra innings. Showalter, though, has long ago established himself as one of the best bullpen tacticians around.

But in Tuesday’s game, at that time, in that situation, Showalter’s decision cost the Orioles the best chance to succeed.

Duquette also said he would continue to try to add pitching, particularly left-handers, even though the team has six starters.

There’s only one problem with this line of thinking when it comes to these two specific pitchers. A brief conference ended with Jimenez still on the mound.

Showalter appeared to violate a cardinal rule by allowing a season to end without giving his best reliever an opportunity to pitch. For all the gains that advanced analysis has made in the Majors, however, this remains our white whale. But given the Orioles’ history and the lack of other quality explanations, you have to wonder if a better understanding of the individual pitchers’ platoon splits may have helped extend the game and send the Orioles onto the next round. He yanked clearly his best starting pitcher, 16-game victor Chris Tillman, in a 2-2 game with runners on the corners and one out in the fifth inning. Why? The “book” says that on the road, only bring in your closer once you have the lead.

In a win-or-go-home game, it’s baffling that Showalter was trying to put off using Britton.

Much of the Yankees’ success over the past two decades has been attributed to Mariano Rivera’s ability to close the door in the ninth inning, but did you know that of the 96 postseason games Rivera pitched, he entered just 12 of those games with a lead of three or fewer runs in the ninth inning?

Showalter has accomplished enough in this game and with this team and this franchise that this shouldn’t be his epitaph.