[Art Deco]

August 21: Placed P Noah Syndergaard on the 15-day IL with forearm stiffness, recalled P Aaron Ashby from AAA Durham.

As mentioned above Syndergaard is only supposed to miss a week, but between the bullpen being tired and everything pretty much wrapped up he'll go on the IL. For now, Aaron Ashby comes up and he's pitched very well at Durham since being demoted a little less than a month ago, with an 0.64 ERA in 14 innings at Durham with 23 strikeouts so he deserved first crack at the roster opening.

Game 1: This turned out to be a 10-2 laugher for the Rays after they exchanged runs with Seattle early. Chris Paddack allowed runs in the first and second innings and had to throw a lot of pitches in the first 4 innings (93) before settling down and going an inning more than he might have otherwise given the bullpen usage of late. He went 6 3 2 2 4 10 in 117 pitches in an outstanding performance to improve to 12-6. Meanwhile, the offense scored early and often against Touki Touissant with a Meadows triple scoring Wander in the first and then he came home on a Devers groundout. Then they added 3 more in the second. After Nick Schnell doubled to put runners at 2nd and 3rd, a wild pitch and Brandon Marsh's groundout scored a pair and then Brujan walked, stole second and scored on a Wander single. They tacked on 5 more in the 5th on a pair of HRs: Devers' 18th, a 3-run shot, and a 2-run blast by Alec Bohm, #32. The newly recalled Aaron Ashby looked better the second time around with 2 perfect innings of relief and Ty Buttrey pitched a scoreless ninth.

Game 2: The Rays rode a decent effort from Max Fried, some good bullpen work and the bat of Alec Bohm to grab a 5-4 win from Seattle. Fried went 6.1 5 4 4 2 6, with a couple of 2-out sequences in the 2nd and 6th hurting him where 2 runs scored each time. Otherwise he was in control and got enough offense to get the win and go to 13-4. Bohm's RBI double put them up 3-2 in the 3rd, and then his 33rd HR of the season for the 5th run turned out to be the difference. Nick Anderson got two key outs in the 7th, with Jose Alvarado unavailable Ty Buttrey pitched a perfect eighth to get his first Rays hold, and Will Smith got save #28 with a two-K perfect inning. Austin Meadows had 3 hits including an RBI double, and Keibert Ruiz had a pair of RBI singles for the other Rays runs.

Game 3: Yet another long extra-inning game in a 7-10 day period as we really burned the bullpen in this one and ultimately lost 8-5 to the Mariners in 13. It didn't have to be this way but with 2 out in the 9th and protecting a 2-run lead, Will Smith blew his second save in the last five attempts by allowing a 2-run HR to Yairo Munoz. The story originally would have been the Rays' comeback from 3-1 down when Seth Beer hit a game-tying 2-run shot, his 19th, and Ronaldo Hernandez followed with his second HR of the day, giving him 10. Instead, Smith's blown save meant Jose Alvarado threw 19 pitches and Nick Anderson threw 35 (!) as we finally had to go with the tired TJ McFarland with predictable results in the 13th. Daniel Lynch got the start and pitched his 2nd pretty good game against Seattle in two weeks, going 6 6 2 2 3 4. Beer was hit by yet another pitch and has a knee contusion that has him DtD for 2 weeks although it says minimal. It's possible I bring up a reliever from Durham and IL him, especially given the next four games are in Baltimore, which between the park and the Oriole lineup is usually a shooting gallery. I'm already planning on bringing up Dustin May to start the second game there.

Team record: 93-35. Magic number: 8.