The Orioles limped out of Boston on the wrong end of a discouraging four-game sweep and a swing of the emotional pendulum - for both the players and the faithful - that was so dramatic it's almost unfair to throw young Brad Bergesen in front of it in Tuesday night's series opener against the Chicago White Sox at Camden Yards.
How dramatic?
Consider how you were feeling Friday night when the Orioles took an early seven-run lead against Red Sox free-agent acquisition Brad Penny and how, if you're an Orioles fan, you felt while Boston was blowing open Monday's game against relievers Dennis Sarfate, Radhames Liz and Matt Albers. There were a handful of uplifting moments in between, but the Orioles hit the ground about as hard as you can hit the ground when you weren't really expected to spend much time above it in the first place.
They jumped the shark when No. 1 starter Jeremy Guthrie came back out after that seven-run top of the second inning, promptly lost the strike zone and gave back four runs. The Red Sox, who had struggled out of the gate with six losses in their first nine games, were suddenly revived and proceeded to complete an unlikely comeback that would begin the dominoes tumbling toward yesterday's embarrassing 12-1 defeat.
So the team that was 3-6 is now 7-6 and the team that was 6-3 is now 6-7, which means the planets are realigned in a manner better fitting preseason expectations, but that isn't a whole lot of consolation after the Orioles got off to another uplifting - and apparently deceptive - start.
No doubt, most Orioles fans were capable of keeping the first eight games of the season in proper intellectual perspective. It was always knocking around in their brains that Brian Roberts, Adam Jones and Nick Markakis weren't going to combine to hit .400 all year. It was obvious the pitching problems were real, even if they did not fully manifest themselves in those first three uplifting series against the New York Yankees, Tampa Bay Rays and Texas Rangers. Still, there is that place in every fan's heart where hope overcomes reason and, unfortunately, produces that illogical feeling of intense disappointment and anger when things turn in the direction they were always going to go.
