The doubtful record of O with 259th HR allowed

BALTIMORE – Somewhere, the Cincinnati Reds are grilling.

On Thursday, at Camden Yards, the Baltimore Orioles made their 259th circuit in 2019, breaking the tie with the 2016 Reds for most of the circuits allowed by a team in a single season.

The bomb that broke the record came in the top of the third round of the Baltimore match against the Tampa Bay Rays, when Austin Meadows sent a 1-2-yard ball from Asher Wojciechowski, leaving O, just down the road. side of the outdoor billboard his 22nd singer of the season.

A first-round choice for the Toronto Blue Jays in 2010, Wojciechowski took part in the competition after allocating 12 homers in 49 innings. He made another solo hit to the fifth, to Willy Adames.

The teams were tied 2-2 when a downpour sent the opening game of the four-game series in a late rain late in the heat. The match resumed after 2 hours and 16 minutes and the Rays won a 5-2 victory that ended shortly before 1 am Friday.

There were about 200 fans for the final.

Entering Thursday, the Orioles were about to give 329 homers. They still have 34 games to play.

"I'm a broken record with respect to the circuits we have abandoned," said Brandon Hyde, director of the first year at Orioles. "I do not know what to say except we have a lot of work to do with our launchers."

"And to compete in this division and in the major leagues, you have to be able to keep the ball in the stadium and we had trouble doing it this year," he said.

Baltimore will probably not be the only club to have spent the 2016 Reds in a historic season. By entering on Thursday, the The Seattle Mariners, Los Angeles Angels, New York Yankees and Philadelphia Phillies were on track to allow at least 259 homers. The league as a whole is on the verge of easily exceeding the record of 6,105 draws in 2017.

Nearly a quarter of Baltimore's 2019 total was produced against the Yankees, rivals of the division. In 19 games against New York, the Orioles pitchers made 61 home runs, flying the mark of the maximum allowed to a single team in one season.

This season, 3.7% of all appearances on the MLB plate resulted in home runs, up from 3.0% a year ago. Compared to 2014, where the league's overall rate was 2.3%, home shopping rose by about 60%. If the current rate remains unchanged for the rest of the season, it would beat the record 3.3% recorded in one season during the 2017 campaign.

The rebuilding Orioles are in last place in the East American League, with a record of 41-87, the second-worst among the majors. Their ERA team of 5.89 is the highest in baseball by almost half a race.

Associated Press contributed to this report.