Orioles' Pat Valaika pitches scoreless inning with 5 pitches originally appeared on NBC Sports Washington
Position players don't pitch often, but when they do it's riveting baseball.
Baltimore infielder Pat Valaika came off the bench in the Orioles' 11-6 loss to Boston on Saturday night to pitch a scoreless ninth inning in five pitches.
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The 1-2-3 inning would have been a three-pitch, three-outs inning had it not been for an error committed by shortstop Ramon Urías on the first pitch.
All five pitches were lobbed across home plate in the 65-69 miles per hour range, giving the Red Sox plenty of opportunity to continue running up the score. Instead, Valaika's change of pace helped the Orioles limit their scoring to 11 runs.
After Urías made the initial error, he came back to get his foot on the base to get that runner out as second baseman Rio Ruiz corralled it and flipped it to him. Right fielder DJ Stewart then caught a fly ball hit directly at him before Trey Mancini made the play at first to retire the inning.
Valaika became the first position player to pitch for the O's since catcher Bryan Holaday pitched against the Nationals on Aug. 14, 2020.
