Orioles Bullpen

- The Orioles arrived at Yankee Stadium with a new left-hander in the bullpen on Friday, but not much more relief experience from the left side. It's something that could prove critical in playing left-handed heavy lineups like the Yankees through the season's playoff push. Don't, however, count Orioles manager Buck Showalter among those concerned about the lack of experience. Veteran left-hander Randy Wolf officially joined the team before Friday's game and was available in the bullpen, but Wolf has made just five relief appearances in his major league career.

In the eighth inning of the Orioles' 5-3 victory over the Red Sox on Wednesday night, home plate umpire Mike Everitt looked over to Boston's dugout and ejected Adrian Gonzalez, who had just grounded out to lead off the inning. Everitt didn't like what he heard from the dugout, and Boston manager Bobby Valentine was also forced to leave the game shortly after. But the chirping from the dugout wasn't because of balls and strikes. Rather, it was because of a pitching maneuver O's reliever Pedro Strop had just pulled on Gonzalez.

Following the Orioles' 5-3 win over the Royals on Sunday afternoon, the club optioned right-handed reliever Miguel Socolovich to Triple-A Norfolk. Socolovich has a 6.97 ERA in 10 1/3 relief innings with the Orioles. He allowed three hits and one earned runs in two outings over 3 1/3 innings since his most-recent call up Wednesday, which came after the Orioles bullpen was taxed by a 14-inning game Tuesday. The Orioles will likely recall right-hander Jason Berken, who will be used out of the bullpen in long relief behind a left-handed starter.

SEATTLE - As the clock struck midnight in Baltimore, Orioles  rookie pitcher Wei-Yin Chen flirted with perfection on the West Coast on Tuesday night. The 26-year-old held the Mariners hitless for 6 1/3 innings before giving up a solo homer to Seattle left fielder Casper Wells, a former Towson University standout. But watching Seattle break up Chen's bid for a perfect game couldn't compare to watching the Orioles bullpen nearly give away the game. Despite getting their best outing from a starting pitcher in 10 days, the Orioles nearly wasted Chen's best effort of the season.

Here's a look at what some other media outlets are saying about the Orioles : ** Mike Still of MLB.com says the Orioles bullpen is on a roll following Sunday's 2-1 win over the Washington Nationals: After throwing three scoreless innings Sunday, the Orioles bullpen owns a major league-best 2.27 ERA. They have four relievers with ERA's under two, and closer Jim Johnson has converted 22 of 23 save chances. "We don't have big names, but we have big numbers,"" said veteran Luis Ayala, who owns a 1.89 ERA. Baltimore's bullpen also leads the American League with 15 wins.

Orioles manager Buck Showalter nearly gave Matt Wieters a day off for the team's series finale against the Washington Nationals at Camden Yards. But given the switch-hitting catcher's success against left-handed pitching this season - and the need to find any advantage possible to provide the lineup an offensive spark - Wieters found himself in the cleanup spot on Sunday afternoon. For seven innings, the Orioles dug themselves deeper into an offensive abyss, running their slump with runners in scoring position to 1-for-33.

Maybe it's a little early to start passing around the credit for the Orioles' surprising, uplifting and just plain fun first half of the 2012 season, but this could be a clear case of better early than never. The O's have exceeded expectations, and it's easy to point a couple of fingers in a couple of obvious directions. Buck Showalter clearly has changed the culture both on the field and in the clubhouse, so you can put a big gold star on his photo in the Orioles yearbook. New baseball operations guru Dan Duquette has made a couple of dynamic moves to upgrade the starting rotation, so his impact is easily measurable, even if he tried to acquire just about everybody with a pulse during the offseason.

The Orioles winning their three-game series against the Phillies this weekend at Camden Yards comes down to one number. One. That's the number of runs the Orioles bullpen allowed in 14 innings of work this series. With two extra-inning games, the teams played 31 innings this series. Their starting pitchers went seven innings just once and the pen had to account for five innings in Friday's series opener, something that usually leads to trouble later on. But not with this bullpen.

The Orioles have activated infielder Mark Reynolds off the disabled list and replaced him on the DL with right-handed reliever Stu Pomeranz. Pomeranz, who had begun to provide some long-relief stability to the Orioles bullpen, strained his left oblique while warming up in the bullpen in Sunday's game against Kansas City. Reynolds, who went on the DL with an oblique strain May 12, played two games of a minor league rehab assignment at Double-A Bowie, going 1-for-7 with four strikeouts.

The Orioles are starting to get back some of their key players from the disabled list, but it seems like there's another injury looming at every turn. The good news Monday was that infielder Mark Reynolds (oblique strain) was activated from the disabled list and started the team's series opener against the Blue Jays at Rogers Centre. Outfielder Endy Chavez (intercostal strain) was en route to Toronto to join the club. He's scheduled to be activated Tuesday. Both Reynolds and Chavez were on minor league rehab assignments in Double-A Bowie.