Verlander Pitches Tigers Past Orioles 5-1

BALTIMORE (AP) - Tigers manager Jim Leyland can be sparing with his compliments.

But he used adjectives like "unbelievable" and "tremendous" to describe Justin Verlander's performance against Baltimore.

The 2006 AL Rookie of the Year, who was 2-9 as recently as June 6, improved to 8-9 with Detroit's 5-1 victory over the Orioles in Baltimore.

Magglio Ordonez and Marcus Thames hit solo homers and Ryan Raburn had two RBIs yesterday for the Tigers, who came away with a split of the four-game series.

Verlander retired 16 straight batters between a second-inning double by Luke Scott and a seventh-inning double by Kevin Millar.

He gave up only one other hit.