Means finds his groove as O's keep surging

Exactly three weeks from Tuesday, baseball’s new-look and expanded postseason is scheduled to begin with this year’s best-of-three Wild Card Series. The Orioles -- yes, the rebuilding Orioles -- could very well be a part of it, now residing just a half-game out of the AL’s final playoff spot after their emphatic 11-2 win over the Mets on Tuesday at Citi Field. They are streaking, having won four straight and six of their last eight to push within a game of .500 with 19 to play.

The strange, puzzling truth is the Orioles have gotten to this point basically without John Means. If they are going to get further, they are going to need Means to be the Means they leaned on so heavily last summer. Earning his first win of the year, Means looked like that pitcher Tuesday for the first time this season.

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“This,” Means said afterwards, “was the first time I’ve felt like myself.”

Cruising through six solid innings at Citi Field, Means struck out five and retired 11 straight at one point in what was, objectively, his best start since last August. Meanwhile, his teammates collectively pummelled Mets pitching. They built an early lead off Michael Wacha with homers from DJ Stewart and Ryan Mountcastle and Cedric Mullins’ RBI triple, then poured it on against Robert Gsellman later with Pat Valaika and Rio Ruiz going deep.

It was all in support of Means, who emerged as an unlikely All-Star last summer but lugged an 8.10 ERA into Flushing this week. His 2020 problems had been multiple, from missing time to arm fatigue and family tragedy to a frustrating lack of feel for, at various points, every pitch in his arsenal. After losing to this same Mets lineup last time out in Baltimore, Means bemoaned the “worst fastball command I’ve ever had,” before vowing to fix it.

Then this past weekend, Orioles manager Brandon Hyde called Means into his office for what the left-hander called “a tough talk.” The result was “a slight mentality change,” according to Means. He then went out and held the Mets to four baserunners, threw 64 of 97 pitches for strikes and flashed elite versions of all four pitches as well as, for the first time in weeks, a smile on his postgame Zoom with the media.

“I was trying to force a lot of things -- trying to get strikeouts, trying to blow it by everybody, and that’s not me,” Means said. “[Hyde] told me that isn’t how I pitch or who I should be. I was getting upset and angry with myself, and to be able to relax and just be myself really helped me.“

Said Hyde: “I believe in communication and in being honest. I wanted to discuss the last few of his outings and I was sensitive to what he’s been through this year as well. But we had a conversation about what he did well last year, who he is … and I felt like he was getting away from that a little bit. I thought he looked discouraged a lot and I didn’t like his mound presence. It felt like he was pitching out of frustration instead of pitching to win. Those were things he did really well last year, and I wanted to remind him of that.”

Should Means pitch like even a less dominant version of that down the stretch, it would further bolster a rotation that’s gone through a total transformation in recent weeks, really since the Orioles began winning again. Tuesday’s offensive outbreak aside, they’ve climbed back into the hunt on the strength of those arms, from newcomers Keegan Akin and Dean Kremer to Means and others. The rotation owns a 2.52 ERA since the final day of August -- accounting for arguably the best stretch of starting pitching Hyde has gotten during his tenure at the helm.

“The energy is up,” Ruiz said. “It started the first day of September. These guys come up, bring more energy and it’s fun to build on.”