Orioles beat White Sox, 6-4, behind Adley Rutschman’s clutch hit, Colton Cowser’s home run robbery

CHICAGO — Even on days he’s not in the lineup, Adley Rutschman is finding ways to win games for the Orioles.

Rutschman entered Friday night’s game as a pinch hitter with the score tied at 4 and came through with a two-run single to help lift the Orioles to a 6-4 win over the Chicago White Sox. Corbin Burnes delivered his sixth straight quality start — an outing of at least six innings with three earned runs or fewer — and Colton Cowser, who also entered the game as a pinch hitter before taking over in center field, made a leaping catch to rob a home run over the wall for the final out.

“That’s not an easy spot to hit,” manager Brandon Hyde said of Rutschman’s single after the game. Reliever Michael Kopech was throwing “100-101 [mph] in the rain, and to be able to get on time and be on top of a fastball like that shows you how special of a player he is.”

Burnes and White Sox starter Chris Flexen traded zeros over the first two innings before Gunnar Henderson and Jordan Westburg hit back-to-back doubles with two outs in the third to take an early 1-0 lead. The Orioles stretched that lead to 4-0 in the fifth when Henderson came back up and crushed a 411-foot, two-run homer to left-center — his 17th of the year to tie the MLB lead — and Ryan Mountcastle followed with an RBI double three batters later.

The White Sox found some life offensively in the bottom half of the frame, scoring three runs against Burnes. First baseman Andrew Vaughn, who was called for interference on the final out of the Orioles’ 8-6 win Thursday night, hit an RBI double off the wall in left field to put two runners in scoring position. Paul DeJong came through with two outs, hitting a ground ball up the middle to bring both home.

“We did a good job of limiting hard contact and making pitches when we needed to,” Burnes said. “Unfortunately, in the fifth inning we just kind of got a little too predictable and a couple of knocks led to the runs there.”

That was all Chicago would manage against Burnes as the right-hander worked around a throwing error by catcher James McCann to post a scoreless sixth inning. Burnes pounded the zone all evening, throwing 64 of his 92 pitches (69.6%) for strikes and walking only two with six strikeouts to become the first Orioles pitcher with six quality starts in a row since Alex Cobb in 2018.

“That’s what I’m always trying to do when I’m out there,” Burnes said of staying within the strike zone as often as he did. “Just try to get ahead and execute as many pitches as they can. We knew these guys were going to try to swing early and get some early contact to try to get away from the strikeout and that’s what they did.”

Hyde decided not to send his ace back out for the seventh after he grinded through his last two innings, instead handing the ball to Yennier Cano. The right-hander has struggled of late, allowing three earned runs and letting several inherited runners score over his previous four innings.

Those struggles continued Friday when Vaughn hit his second extra-base hit of the day for a game-tying solo home run. Cano, even amid his recent struggles, had allowed only one home run over his previous 12 appearances and three all season.