O's use early homers, Gausman's solid outing to beat Nats

Coming into his start against the Orioles tonight, Washington Nationals lefty Gio Gonzalez led the National League with an ERA of 1.64. He had allowed seven earned runs and four homers all year through six starts.

gausman-pitching-white-sidebar.jpgThen the Orioles unloaded for three home runs in the first inning in taking a 4-0 lead. Behind right-hander Kevin Gausman's solid outing they went on to beat the Nationals 6-4 at Camden Yards.

With their fifth win in a row, the Orioles improved to 21-10 and 12-3 at home. Washington is 21-11. The O's are 18-7 versus the Nats since the 2012 season.

Matt Wieters' RBI double off Brad Brach brought Washington within 6-4 in the ninth and the Nats had runners on second and third with one out. But pinch-hitter Brian Goodwin bounced out to first and two Nats runners were hung up on the bases with J.J. Hardy making a tag between third and home for the final out.

Joey Rickard hit a leadoff homer off Gonzalez on a 2-1 fastball. It was the Orioles' first leadoff homer of the year and the second of Rickard's career. Two outs followed before Mark Trumbo blasted a 417-foot homer to left for the 2-0 lead. He hit No. 3 on a 1-2 fastball.

After a walk to Chris Davis, Trey Mancini's two-run homer was the third of the inning to make it 4-0. Mancini crushed a first-pitch 88 mph fastball for his seventh of the year. It traveled 433 feet to left center. That homer gave Mancini nine hits over his last 14 at-bats and at least one RBI in six consecutive games.

Maybe the Orioles noticed that of the four homers allowed by Gonzalez this year, three had come in the first inning. Now make that six of seven.

The lead grew to 6-0 in the fourth. Jonathan Schoop doubled with one out. Schoop has reached base in a career-best 23 straight games. After Hardy walked, a Caleb Joseph single made it 5-0. An error by third baseman Anthony Rendon on Rickard's grounder made it 6-0 and gave Rickard his second RBI.

Joseph went 4-for-4 tonight with four singles, raising his average from .174 to .240. The four hits ties his career high from Aug. 31, 2014 against Minnesota. Mancini went 2-for-3 and is 10-for-16 over his past five games.

Gausman took the mound tonight with a record of 1-3 and ERA of 7.55 along with a 1.935 WHIP. Then he retired the first nine Nationals in order with four strikeouts on 34 pitches. Later he allowed an RBI double by Michael A. Taylor in the fifth and Bryce Harper's RBI infield single an inning later.

Gausman went a season-high seven innings and gave up five hits and two runs for his second quality start. He walked one and fanned a season-high eight on 116 pitches. The Orioles had lost his previous four starts. Gausman is now 2-3 with an ERA of 6.63.

He began tonight ranked 47th and last among qualifying American League pitchers in ERA and WHIP. So this outing could be huge as he tries to get his season turned around. He did this against the majors' highest scoring team, one averaging 6.26 runs per game with a .285 team batting average and 50 home runs.

Gonzalez gave the Nats six innings, throwing 108 pitches. He allowed seven hits and six runs as his ERA grew by one run, going from 1.64 to 2.64. Harper's solo homer off Darren O'Day in the eighth was the game's last run.

In the second game of this series Tuesday night, Ubaldo Jiménez (1-1, 6.58 ERA) pitches against right-hander Max Scherzer (4-2, 2.66 ERA) at 7:05 p.m.

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