Wizards down 1-0 and the Orioles lose

So the Orioles have been tearing things up lately. That is always a good thing for this lifelong O's fan. Not only are the O's in 2nd place in the AL East, and third in the AL, but they have done it against 3 out of the 4 playoff teams from last year, NY, Min, and Detroit. This weekend they just swept the Blue Jays who were the 2nd place team in the AL East last year. While I expect the O's to beat the Royals and D-Rays, they have also done exceptionally against some great teams if you ignore their first series against the Twins.
Today was a promising game with Erik Bedard on the mound. He looked great through the first three innings. However, after pitching a perfect game through the first third of the game, he stunk in the 4th. The A's scored 5 of their 6 runs in that inning. Dan Haren is a tough pitcher, so I was pretty frustrated thinking that the O's were going to stop their win streak at 4 games. During my frustration I took a break to grill some chicken for dinner with my wife. After a good meal I cam back to the TV to see the O's still down 5-1. However, a big homerun by Aubrey Huff put them back in the game going into the ninth.
Nick Swisher's homerun in the top of the ninth proved to be a big pain in the ass. The difference between one run and two was enough for the O's to lose this game. The 9th started out well with Payton drawing a walk and continuing his hot start in his second game of the year. Corey Patterson's double to put runners at first and third with no outs seemed to atleast guarantee an extra inning game. However, the O's made 2 dumb mistakes. First Corey Patterson hesitates on the basepaths and is held up at third after a Brian Roberts single. Last time I checked Nick Swisher isn't really known for his arm, so its a shame that Patterson actually headed back towards 2nd before breaking for third. The fastest guy on your team should score from 2nd on a hit to CF.
Things were still good for the O's at this point though. They had 1 out but a runner on 3rd with their best RBI guy coming up. Melvin Mora has been great at producing runs this year, but he made some sort of mistake when he bunted the ball back to the pitcher and kept Patterson at 3rd, instead of working the count for a walk or a sac fly. After a Markakis intentional walk it all came down to Miguel Tejada. He took a good swing in his at bat, but unfortunately the ball headed right towards Mark Ellis at 2nd base. Ball game over.

The good news from tonight is that the Red Sox and Yankees both lost. The O's didn't lose ground in the AL East, and are still safe in 2nd for a few more days atleast. I hope the O's have a good outing against some kid for Oakland making his Major League debut. It will also be exciting to see what Jeremy Guthrie can do in his first start for the Orioles.

Quickly...on to the Wizards. I watched bits and pieces of their opening playoff game. It was hard to stay tuned with how the game was going. Cleveland doesn't strike me as a dominating team, but the Wizards are not the same team they were a month ago. They stunk...as expected. Cleveland can afford to F around, and still win this series easily. I expect the Cavs to struggle in their next series, because I don't think they are being tested by the Wizards.