BALTIMORE — This loss felt different.
Oh, there were plenty of similarities to the other 72 times that the Baltimore Orioles had come up short this season. The not-good-enough starting pitching. The less-productive-than-expected bats. Some head-scratching behavior on the base paths. But this one, an otherwise anonymous 5-3 defeat to the Boston Red Sox, felt different. Because, well, it was different: It was the first home game of the post-Manny Machado era.
It started in the clubhouse, where Machado’s corner locker has been taken over by Jonathan Schoop. Gone was the jersey with the No. 13 on it. Gone were his shoes. Gone was the larger-than-life presence that had occupied the back right vertex of the home clubhouse until late last week, when Machado was ceremoniously traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers.
All that remained — the only evidence that there even was a Machado era in Baltimore — was a laminated sign hanging on the wall next to the corner locker that reads, “I don’t do small talk.”
On the one hand, there was a certain poetry to the fact that Schoop, who has been Machado’s best friend on the team ever since the pair came up through the minors together, had taken over his pal’s locker. A certain symmetry.
On the other hand, there was a certain awkwardness to it. Regardless of who moved into Machado’s old digs, the void left by his departure — a vacuum that’s already four days old and that had seemed inevitable for going on four months — was all the more palpable back at home, both on and off the field.
“Probably a clubhouse thing more than anything,” said Buck Showalter, who has been the Orioles’ manager for every one of Machado’s 860 games in black and orange, as well as the three games since he started wearing Dodger blue, all Baltimore losses. “You just know the presence that’s been there. Throw out how good a player he is, that part of it. Our guys, it’s like something you know more than likely is coming, but when it actually happens, there’s still a different feeling.”
Even the rains, which fell from the skies on several different occasions and caused two separate delays in the first three innings, couldn’t wash away the odd sensation.
“It’s a little different, obviously,” said starter Kevin Gausman, who took the mound for the first time since the Machado trade and whose locker is just a few stalls away, at the back left corner of the home clubhouse. “You notice it. But more than anything, just miss him as a person and as a teammate. Happy for him, and wish nothing but the best for him, but you’ve got to turn the page now.”
On Monday, though, the Orioles looked as if they were stuck on the same page of the same script they’ve been reading all season. After a leadoff single to start the bottom of the first, Tim Beckham — the shortstop turned third baseman who has turned shortstop again following Machado’s exodus — got himself picked off to end the inning.
In the third, Jace Peterson was thrown out at home on a play where the outcome was so painfully obvious that he didn’t even bother to try sliding. Gausman, who’s battled inconsistency from game-to-game as well as within contests, lost the feel for his splitter and walked the bases loaded during a four-run fifth inning. And the lineup, which outhit the Red Sox 11 to 7, couldn’t cash in when it counted.
After the defeat, reporters gathered around the corner locker in the back right section of the Orioles’ clubhouse, just as they’ve done on so many nights over the past four months. Just as they’ve done on so many nights over the past few years. Only now, there was somebody else occupying the area.
“Any loss is frustrating,” Schoop said. “Boston’s a good team. We hope we’re a good team, but things don’t go our way. We’ve got to find a way.”
On Monday, Schoop did his best to help Baltimore find a way, going 2-for-4 with a double, a homer and two RBIs. But as has been the case most of the time for the Birds this year, it wasn’t enough. Afterward, Schoop was hardly comforted by inhabiting the locker that Machado used to call home, the space that his best buddy insisted he take if and when the time came.
“That’s why I’m here,” said Schoop, his eyes glassing over ever so slightly. “It’s different, but I’m trying to pass through it. It’s hard. It’s hard without him. But like I said, I’ve got to find a way to ignore it and compete and help my team win.”
Instead, in their first home game of the post-Manny era, the Orioles experienced loss — in more ways than one.