When the Orioles last swept a series, at the end of August 2018, it seemed that competitive baseball in what normally counts as baseball’s dog days might never come back.
Two years of abundant losing since make it hard to believe this Orioles team, which just swept the Tampa Bay Rays over three games at Camden Yards thanks to a 5-1 win Sunday, is going to change that ahead of schedule.
But the way the Orioles (5-3) are playing in the first week-plus of their season, with the coronavirus pandemic serving as an ominous background to the proceedings, at least make it tempting to think otherwise.