In the quiet of the Orioles clubhouse, after a third straight one-run loss to the Minnesota Twins, a reporter asked Manny Machado what happened on his error in the top of the 12th. Playing shortstop in that inning for the first time in the majors, Machado had a grounder go under his glove for a two-base error. Eduardo Escobar reached on the play and then scored the go-ahead run on a Jimmy Paredes error at third base.

“What do you think happened?,” Machado said. “We lost, plain and simple. Go back out there and play shortstop again and get the opportunity to come back and help the team win again. We lost the game in the ninth inning. Bloop hits, little ground balls. (Expletive) ain’t going our way. Have to keep our head up.”

Machado had not played shortstop since the 2012 season with Double-A Bowie. Did the long time between games playing there hurt him on that play?

“No, I missed the ball, plain and simple,” he said. “There are no excuses here. I missed the (expletive) ball and that’s it. We are not going to give any excuses. We missed those balls and we lost the game there in the last inning. Have to keep your head up. We should have won that game in the ninth inning and they keep hitting those rollovers. Now we have to face K.C., a strong team that is playing well. We have to go there and win games.”

The Orioles have some quick regrouping to do after losing leads and getting swept in four straight by the Twins.

“It’s part of the game,” Machado said. “Three days in a row, four days, I don’t know how many days it’s been, they haven’t even gotten the ball out of the infield against (Zach Britton) and he’s blown a couple of saves that he shouldn’t have. It’s just frustrating to watch. If you lose with homers and hard-hits balls. To lose like that just makes it that much worse.

“Obviously, we are worried about it. We lost four straight after a good start to the homestand. We are bummed out about it. But you know what? We are still in the fight. We have a tough schedule coming up and we have to battle through this.

“This is what is going to make it or break it. This is a time we have to come together, play as a team and shine. Hopefully, this wakes us up a little bit and takes us where we need to go.”

What did Machado think when he was moved to short for the top of the 12th?

“Just go out and play,” he said. “I should have made the play. I didn’t. But, hey, I hope he gives me another opportunity to go out there and win and get back this loss that we had.

“I was just trying to make a play and I missed it. I whiffed on it. I know you guys are going to start writing all the stats and velocity of the ball. Man, this (expletive) is baseball. It’s (expletive) baseball and we have to go out and catch the (expletive) ball and that’s it. Really nothing to it.”

Outfielder Adam Jones was asked how he felt about losing games the Orioles probably should have won.

“It’s not about what I feel like I should, it’s about the reality of it,” he said. “It’s good that it’s happened. It shows how much testicular fortitude these 25 men have. Let’s go on the road and handle our own destiny. It’s in our hands, not no one else’s hands. We just have to execute.”

So what will it take now?

“Win,” Jones said. “That is all this game is about, doesn’t matter how you do it. You think the Twins care about how they won? No. We have 40 games left. We need Ws. You lose, you lose, man. Everyone here is fit to play. When they are inserted in the lineup or in the field, we have the utmost confidence that they will get the job done. We just got beat. It happens.

“A loss is a loss, man. You have a lead with the back end of the bullpen we have, hey, those guys are human. They are human. The Twins make you work. Now let’s go on the road and some of this anger and frustration that we have, let’s take it out on the baseball.”

Jones was asked if it will be a challenge to bounce back for the Orioles after a series of tough losses.

“What else you going to do?” Jones said.

Orioles starter Kevin Gausman left with a 3-2 lead today. He gave up a two-run homer in the first to Miguel Sano and no other hits after the first, retiring 19 of the last 20 batters he faced today.

“I felt like I settled in, especially after the first inning,” Gausman said. “Really one (bad) pitch to a good power hitter and, unfortunately, that has kind of been the story for me this year. Left that pitch way too good and he put a good swing on it. He got me at their place, too, so he was probably sitting dead red fastball. I probably have to be a little smarter there. We could have really gained some momentum these last couple of games. But we have to forget about that. We have a game tomorrow and we have to bounce back.”

Zach Britton allowed three singles and a run in the top of the ninth as Minnesota tied the game 3-3 and forced extra innings. What will it take for the Orioles to come back from this?

“That is hard to say,” Britton said. “I think we are in a tough roll. Just someone coming up big I feel like. But at the same time, you don’t want to put too much pressure on yourself to be that guy. Maybe that is the issue right now. A lot of guys want to be the guy and sometimes you get out of your comfort zone and try to do too much. We’ve got a good enough team that everyone can be themselves and we can start winning some games.

“When you lose four in a row, they start getting pretty important pretty quick. This next month coming up, for every loss, it will take a couple of wins to get you back where you want to be. We understand that. We are in a tough spot. This is going to be a tough road trip that will test us mentally. Hard to lose like this.”