CHICAGO -- No matter what the numbers say, Cole Irvin is confident he can pitch deep into games and have success when facing opposing hitters for the third time in a day.

The 29-year-old Orioles left-hander just hasn’t gotten an opportunity to prove it as of late.

For the second straight start since returning to Baltimore’s rotation, Irvin was lifted despite having an economical pitch count at a point in the middle innings. On Friday afternoon, he allowed three runs over four-plus frames in a 10-3 loss to the Cubs at Wrigley Field, throwing only 68 pitches, 44 of which were strikes.

In his previous outing against the Royals last Saturday, Irvin tossed a season-high 5 1/3 innings of one-run ball to earn his first Orioles win, getting removed after throwing 72 pitches, 55 strikes.

“Those decisions aren’t up to me,” Irvin said. “As much as I’d like to stay in that game and somehow, some way, show the team that I can pitch here and provide the team innings, I just wasn’t dealt those cards, I guess.”

But Irvin felt like his latest outing in Chicago had mostly been going well -- outside of three pitches during a challenging third inning.

All three of the Cubs’ runs off Irvin came via solo home runs in the third. Miguel Amaya led off the inning with a blast, then Dansby Swanson and Christopher Morel swatted back-to-back jacks. All three of those pitches were changeups, the first two Irvin thought were poorly located and the other he attributed to less-than-ideal pitch sequencing on his part.

“He just wasn’t fooled by it,” Irvin said of Morel, who connected with a 3-2 change low in the strike zone.

Irvin’s three homers allowed matched a career high, as he gave up that many in four of his previous 69 big league starts. It was the second time he’s yielded three in an inning, with the most recent occurrence coming last Sept. 17, when he was pitching for the A’s against the Astros.

Irvin rebounded to retire four of the next five batters, including three by strikeouts to boost his K total for the day to four. After giving up a leadoff single to No. 9 hitter Nick Madrigal in the fifth, Irvin was pulled and manager Brandon Hyde turned the game over to his bullpen.

“Besides those three homers, I thought he did a nice job, pitched into the fifth inning with an all-right-handed lineup,” Hyde said.

So, why didn’t Irvin get a chance to go a bit deeper then?

With no left-handed hitters in Chicago’s order, Hyde wanted to get a righty pitcher in as the lineup turned over. He was hoping to get two innings from Mike Baumann, but that didn’t work out, as the Cubs later rallied for six runs in the sixth against Baumann, lefty Cionel Pérez and righty Reed Garrett.

It’s possible Baltimore’s reluctance to keep Irvin in for longer has to do with his struggles once he reached the middle innings in April, when he recorded a 10.66 ERA in three starts before getting optioned to Triple-A Norfolk.

Entering Friday, opposing hitters were batting .290 the first time they faced Irvin in a game this season and .258 the second time. That average balloons to .500 (6-for-12) when they’re going up against the southpaw a third time.

This hasn’t been an issue for most of Irvin’s big league career. Over 69 starts before Saturday, the opposing slash line for hitters facing the lefty a third time in a game was .263/.325/.430.

Irvin’s early removals aren’t impacting his mindset as he aims to keep a spot on the O’s staff.

“Just trying to show that I can make the turn in the rotation and do my job, and I felt like I did that [Friday], just outside that one inning,” Irvin said. “Honestly, it was a couple bad pitches. I can look at that outing and see a lot of success in it.”

If Irvin struggles much moving forward, Baltimore could opt to bring back Grayson Rodriguez sooner rather than later. The 23-year-old right-hander (and former top prospect) has been dealing lately in Triple-A, recording a 2.50 ERA and striking out 27 over 18 innings in three starts since being optioned on May 27.

As for Irvin, his focus remains on how he can get better and learn from experiences to try to work deeper into games.

“I know how to pitch three times through the order,” Irvin said, “so we’ll eventually get there.”