Orioles, Red Sox get back to baseball ... until June 1

BOSTON — After beanballs, brushbacks, purpose pitches, racist slurs, ejections, a profanity-laced postgame rant, a league-mandated conference call, and much consternation on both sides, it was back to baseball.

The Orioles and Red Sox played an incident-free game at Fenway Park on Thursday with Baltimore winning 8-3 in the finale of a heated four-game series.

“Seemed like we played a baseball game tonight instead of all the drama, so we’re looking forward to getting back in that flow again," Orioles manager Buck Showalter said. "Time to get home and get in front of some friendly faces. I know our guys are looking forward to getting back home."

The Orioles and Red Sox don’t meet again until June 1 at Camden Yards. Will the bad blood have settled down by then?

The closest thing to an issue in this game came when Orioles third baseman Manny Machado blasted a mammoth 466-foot home run over the Green Monster and onto Lansdowne Street and did another slow trot around the bases to a chorus of boos from they fans.

“Go look at my home runs,” he said. “I’m not a rookie. I’ve got 100-plus home runs in the show and I do the same trot every time, wherever it is. I do the same thing every time.”

Machado had been at the center of much of the animosity between the clubs — injuring second baseman Dustin Pedroia while sliding into second last month at Camden Yards, the attempted target of several Red Sox pitchers’ offerings, and the author of a rather slow trot around the bases after his home run on Monday.

Machado’s home run on Thursday was his third of the series and fourth of the season against Boston. He is the first Baltimore batter with at least three homers in a series at Fenway since B.J. Surhoff had four in 1998. Nine of Machado’s 19 RBI this season are against the Red Sox.

Machado become the latest villain for the Fenway faithful, with robust booing every time his name was announced.

“It doesn’t bother me,” he said. “I try to zone in. I’ve got to face a guy throwing 98, 92, with nasty stuff up there. That’s where my concentrations lay, always.”

After Chris Sale threw a 97-mph fastball behind his knees on Tuesday, Machado launched an epic postgame rant, explicitly stating he had lost respect for the Red Sox organization. Asked if his feelings had changed two days later, Machado replied:

“This is my team. I play for Baltimore. I bleed for this time. I’m going to die out there, I’m going to do whatever I’ve got to do to keep this team going."

With the win, the Orioles (17-10) closed their deficit to the American League East-leading Yankees (17-9) to a half game while Boston (15-13) falls three games behind. The Orioles open a five-game homestand on Friday.

“There’s a lot of drama that you deal with,” Showalter said. “Sometimes, you have to wonder if it’s inflicted or self-inflicted. I don’t dwell on it too much. We’re looking forward to getting on with the rest of the season.”

https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2017/05/05/orioles-red-sox-heated-series-incident-free/101320928/