For all the momentum Thursday night built for the Orioles — and it felt sizable, considering Tomoyuki Sugano provided a harried rotation its best start of the season — momentum can hit a wall just as quickly.

In this sense, the wall was in center field, and Elly De La Cruz’s homer didn’t hit it particularly quickly. The Reds shortstop blasted a towering shot that hit off the top of the wall. Upon review, it was determined that it really was a three-run homer, and, from there, left-hander Cade Povich never seemed to recover.

Povich produced the worst start of any Orioles starter one day after the best start, and behind his poor appearance, Baltimore dropped its series opener against Cincinnati in resounding fashion, 8-3.

With the allure of a hockey jersey giveaway, there were 42,587 at Camden Yards to see that lopsided loss. That marked the largest non-opening day crowd for an April home game since April 26, 2015.

The baseball season is too long to pull sweeping observations from one game, of course. On the whole, Povich had performed well enough in his previous three outings. But Friday showcased another side of Povich — one that was apparent more frequently in the early goings of his rookie year. The southpaw tied his career high with five walks. He set a career high with three homers against him.

“A lot of the misses were kind of up and arm-side,” Povich said. “Probably a little bit of a timing issue. But something that, obviously, needs to be corrected a lot sooner.”

The De La Cruz blast in the third inning was the beginning of an unraveling, and it came when Povich hung a first-pitch curveball in the heart of the strike zone. The 23-year-old star tagged it with just enough power to creep over the center field wall.

From there, Jeimer Candelario led off the fourth with a solo homer. Then Matt McLain throttled a three-run shot to give the Reds a commanding lead and force Povich into an early exit.

“Felt, honestly, really good coming into the game, pregame bullpen,” Povich said. “It was the first couple innings then, just honestly lost it and never made the adjustment I needed to.”

The ERA for Baltimore’s starting pitchers rose to 5.57 — the worst in the American League and ahead of only the bottom-feeding Colorado Rockies (5.73). That continues to be a problem for the Orioles, and there’s little clarity in how the rotation can improve without external additions.

Baltimore will call up right-hander Brandon Young on Saturday for his major league debut. On Sunday, right-hander Charlie Morton and his 8.84 ERA are scheduled to take the mound. Meanwhile, a host of injured pitchers are still a way off returning. Right-hander Grayson Rodriguez, for instance, is headed for additional opinions after receiving the results of imaging on his shoulder.

The Orioles struck first through Cedric Mullins’ second-inning homer. Apart from the outfielder, however, there was little production against left-hander Andrew Abbott, who retired 11 batters in a row until Heston Kjerstad recorded an infield single.

Baltimore managed two hits and struck out 11 times against Abbott, and it continued a trend. The Orioles are hitting .186 against left-handed pitchers this year.

The issues were widespread among the Orioles’ stars. The top four in the lineup — Adley Rutschman, Gunnar Henderson, Tyler O’Neill and Ryan Mountcastle — were 0-for-15 with nine strikeouts.

“Definitely not handling lefties,” manager Brandon Hyde said. ”Tonight, I thought we had too big of swings, didn’t take our walks. It was a tough night for us offensively. A lot of punchouts.”

And, although Hyde said Jordan Westburg’s unspecified upper-body injuries don’t warrant an injured list stint, at least at this moment, Westburg is hitless in his last 27 at-bats.

“He’s really trying hard and he’s just out in front, getting in bad counts and all those things when someone is going through a tough time,” Hyde said. “He’s getting in bad counts and he’s expanding and it looks like he’s trying to catch everything way out in front and not trusting his hands.”

The Orioles were quiet until Kjerstad continued his hot streak, throttling a two-run homer to right-center field. Kjerstad, who has six hits and three homers in his last six games, is making a push for more playing time. He earned a start against a lefty despite Hyde often shying away from left-on-left matchups, and Kjerstad returned that faith with two of Baltimore’s four hits.

The largest positive came via the bullpen, when Scott Blewett, Matt Bowman and Cionel Pérez combined to cover the final 5 2/3 innings. Blewett handled 2 2/3 on his own. That helped keep the majority of the relievers fresh for the remainder of the series.

The way the Orioles played during their two-game winning streak was promising. They won their first series by posting 15 combined runs while holding the Cleveland Guardians to three. Their lineup performed to expectations; Dean Kremer and Sugano posted strong starts.

Friday was a return to the disjointed efforts that have frequented the first 19 games of the season, and it left Baltimore on the losing end once again.

“Every team is going to go through ups and downs,” Rutschman said. “I think, for our guys right now, we just got to continue to get back to who we are and I don’t think we need to reinvent anything. Our team knows how to win.”

This story has been updated.