Are Orioles Capable of Huge ALCS Comeback, 10 Years After 2004 Red Sox?

Nobody wants to be down 3-0 in a best-of-seven series. The only consolation? You're not dead yet.

Tell it to the Baltimore Orioles, who face the ultimate elimination test in Kansas City after Tuesday's dispiriting 2-1 loss to the Royals in Game 3 of the American League Championship Series.

Now, the O's will wage the mother of all uphill battles. Eleven years ago we would have called it unprecedented. Now, we just call it extremely unlikely.

That's because, you'll recall (and if you don't recall, the nearest Boston Red Sox fan will jog your memory), in 2004 a certain American League East squad beat a certain bitter rival in the ALCS—and wrote the most improbable comeback story in baseball history. 

Game 4, Fenway Park, ninth inning. With Boston trailing 3-0 in the series and 4-3 in the game against the hated New York Yankees, pinch-runner Dave Roberts steals second and scores on a single by Bill Mueller. The Red Sox ultimately win on a walk-off home run by David Ortiz in the 12th.

ELISE AMENDOLA/Associated Press

The rest, as they say, is history.

It's a great story—full of drama, pregnant with significance. The kind of story you wouldn't believe if you saw it in a movie. But it happened.

Can it happen again? Well, yeah, though it's not likely.

That's not a knock against Baltimore. The Orioles entered the LCS round looking like the most complete team left standing. Sure, the upstart Royals—and the St. Louis Cardinals and San Francisco Giants in the National League—were plucky and resilient. 

The Orioles, though, were a 96-win club; surely they had the upper hand.

And they haven't been embarrassed. Every game in this series has been decided by two runs or fewer. Kansas City has simply executed when it counts, riding its shutdown bullpen, superlative defense and timely hitting to a commanding advantage.

Charlie Riedel/Associated Press

Still, as the poet Yogi Berra observed, "It ain't over till it's over."

If momentum exists, Kansas City has it. The Royals have won seven straight games to open this postseason, and they'll play the next two, if necessary, at home.

The Orioles simply have to focus on winning the next one. Then they worry about the one after that, and the one after that and so on.

If that sounds simple, that's because it is. 

"Always feel like the momentum can change," Baltimore skipper Buck Showalter told CSNBaltimore's Rich Dubroff. "If we can get one under our belt and get a few things to work our way and make some things [happen] we feel like we can get it spinning the other way."

If you're an O's fan, here's the optimistic take: Close your eyes and imagine the Orioles, the club that waltzed away with the AL East, winning four straight games, two of them at home. Doesn't sound so implausible, right?

That's all they've got to do to make history and join Boston on a rarefied, no-quit list. Former Sox ace Pedro Martinez thinks it's possible:

Don't bet your college tuition on it, obviously, or even your beer money. Chances are, Baltimore's brilliant season will end one step short of the ultimate prize. As Eduardo A. Encina of The Baltimore Sun put it, "The Orioles don’t need magic. They need a miracle."

Miguel Gonzalez, who posted a 2.19 ERA after the All-Star break, will take the hill for the Orioles in Game 4, per Ian Browne of MLB.com. He'll be going on 16 days of rest—Baltimore swept the Detroit Tigers in the ALDS, denying him a turn—but he told Browne he's "focused" and "excited."

Those are the emotions every Orioles player should be channeling. Ultimately, there's something freeing about having your back against the wall.

Everyone expects you to fail, so why not succeed?

Center fielder Adam Jones summed it up to USA Today's John Perrotto: "We gotta win. You can talk about this or that but we gotta win."

Will they? Probably not. Can they? Well...they're not dead yet.

All statistics courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com unless otherwise noted.