To O's, that was yesterday, and yesterday's gone

NEW YORK -- It started as soon as the madness of Game 1 was over Wednesday night.

"We came into the clubhouse and immediately started saying, 'That one is over. Put it behind us,' " Jesse Orosco said after Game 2 yesterday.

Easier said than done with The Kid Who Saved the Yankees rubbing it in their faces yesterday on the morning shows and the front pages of the tabloids.

"He was even on 'Regis and Kathie Lee,' " someone said to Brady Anderson yesterday.

"Ah," Anderson said, feigning interest. "As usual, I managed not to watch 'Regis and Kathie Lee.' "

The baseball world was shaking yesterday in the aftermath of the Yankees' victory in Game 1 of the American League Championship Series, but the Orioles, as usual, were indifferent to any and all commotion.

They won Game 2 yesterday with a typically impassive performance that suggested they had either forgotten about the Kid or didn't care.

They're a big-money, veteran team that is so adept at the essential baseball art of burying the previous day's game that some in the organization, even now, wonder about their motivation.

"Do you sometimes wonder if this team has a pulse?" bullpen coach Elrod Hendricks was asked yesterday.

L "Yeah, many times," Hendricks said. "And I still do wonder."

Hendricks shook his head and continued: "This is a veteran team. Sometimes, you'd like them to think about things a little more when they lose, like what they could have done differently. You know, just don't take it so darn nonchalant. They go, 'OK, it's just a game, forget about it.' It's 'just a game' in high school, not in the major leagues. But they are who they are, a laid-back club that puts things behind them. And it works for them."

Indeed, it does. The Orioles have made it their habit to recover from calamitous losses this season. You can look it up.

After Mark Whiten hit a ninth-inning grand slam to beat them in Seattle on Aug. 29, they came back and won the next day.

After they lost the first two games of their September showdown with the Yankees, they fell five runs down in the third game and came back to win, 10-9.

After David Wells was shelled in Boston on the last Tuesday of the season and their wild-card hopes were flagging, spot starter Rick Krivda pitched them to the biggest win of the season the next night at Fenway.

"We've been doing it all year," Anderson said, "and the suggestion that it's because we don't care or whatever is completely inaccurate. I resent it. This team has been misrepresented all year. We lost early [in the season] because we had problems with the rotation and lineup and whatever, not because we didn't play hard. We always played hard."

Whatever quality it is that has enabled them to bounce back this season, it was never more valuable than it was yesterday.

Dismissing a bad regular-season loss is one thing, but a playoff game lost on a brutally bad interference non-call? That's different.

"It didn't go away immediately," third baseman Todd Zeile said. "It's still on our minds. It was something that happened, and it was unfortunate. But there was another game to play."

Said Cal Ripken: "That's the beauty of baseball. There is always a new day. Momentum from a situation like [Game 1] can carry over, but pitching is always the most important factor. No matter what happened the day before, you're in good shape if you get a well-pitched game."

The Orioles got one from Wells when they desperately needed it. He yielded singles to the Yankees' first three batters, but Cecil Fielder grounded into a double play and Wells escaped the first inning having allowed just two runs.

He would not allow another until the bullpen was protecting a two-run lead in the seventh.

"A lot of people thought we would be so devastated by the first game," Zeile said, "but I think the opposite was true. Losing that game motivated us. We felt like we'd had one taken away from us. We wanted to get it back."

Zeile's two-run homer in the third tied the score, and Rafael Palmeiro's two-run homer in the seventh gave the Orioles the lead. Armando Benitez closed out the 5-3 win.

"The first inning was tough, but we've been behind the eight-ball all season," Chris Hoiles said. "The first game was the last thing on our minds, except that we didn't want to fall behind 2-0 in the series."

It's part of the ballplayers' credo: Never let yesterday affect today.

The Kid Who Saved the Yankees? He was an overnight sensation to the rest of the world yesterday, but just fish wrap to the Orioles.

"You learn that in this game," Anderson said. "You can't luxuriate in your successes or cry about your failures. You just forget and start over."

Welcome to the Oriole Way, circa 1996.

"That's the way this team does it," Hendricks said. "I don't really like it. And since we traded for Eddie [Murray], we're getting better at sitting around after a game and talking about what happened. But this team isn't going to carry much from day to day."

Whatever works.

"And," Orosco said, "did anyone really think we would just give up after one game?"

Pub Date: 10/11/96