Game 1: This was a brutal loss on several levels. First of all, The Rays have suffered yet another serious pitching injury. Just when he turned things around from a bad 2023, Aaron Ashby had to leave the game in the 6th and will need elbow ligament reconstruction surgery which will puts him out for a little over a year. Secondly, the game itself was a gut punch as twice the Rays had the game won, and twice they blew it between a combination of bad defense and a shaky bullpen. They took a 4-2 lead into the bottom of the 8th with Nick Anderson on the mound and he whiffed the first two Orioles before Rio Ruiz's grounder was booted by Wander Franco. Sure enough the next batter CJ Chatham took Anderson deep to tie the game. Rafael Devers booted the next ground ball (they made 4 errors on the game), but Anderson got out of it. The Orioles tried to return the favor in the 9th when Ryan McKenna dropped Keibert Ruiz's fly ball and Seth Beer singled him home. But Will Smith blew the save in the 9th. After getting the leadoff man out, he walked Adley Rutschman, gave up a RBI triple to Austin Hays to tie it, and an Anthony Santander single to win it. It looked like they'd win behind Tyler Glasnow, but he had an inefficient outing, going 5 3 0 0 4 7 on 105 pitches, and Kirby Yates allowed Ashby's runner (on Ashby's own throwing error) to score, and then Alvarado allowed a Yates runner to score. But the Rays were still up thanks to a big night from Spencer Torkelson, spelling a tired Austin Meadows. Tork hit his 2nd HR of the year, a opposite field job off Max Scherzer, to give the Rays a 2-0 lead, and in the 7th he doubled and scored on Keston Hiura's double with Hiura scoring on a Wander single to make it 4-1. But things went very bad after that, and the Orioles improve to 11-7 and only 2 1/2 behind the Rays.
April 30: Placed P Aaron Ashby on the 60-day DL with elbow ligament reconstruction surgery, recalled P Sandy Gaston from AAA Durham.
It's time to give Gaston and his 80 stuff as a reliever a call. He was put in the Durham rotation to start the season and didn't fare very well, but last year in 33 2/3 innings as a reliever he walked 13 and struck out 71. He'll be wild, he'll be shaky, but he'll be exciting. Obviously he's not going to be used in a high-leverage spots for now, and may just be warming a roster slot until Matt Manning comes back in 10-14 days after a rehab start in Durham, or until I go pick someone up.
Game 2: Well it was nice to get through a game without suffering a season-ending injury to a pitcher, and even nicer to enjoy a 12-3 rout of the Orioles. The Rays trailed in this game 2-1 going into the 5th, and were only up 5-3 going into the 7th before they blew it open late. Vidal Brujan opened the game with a single, stole second and scored on an Austin Meadows double before Anthony Santander, last night's hero, took Daniel Lynch deep to put Baltimore on top. But the Rays strung together 5 singles and a walk to score 4 times in the 5th and chase Orioles starter Grayson Rodriguez, and although Baltimore got one back off Lynch in the 6th to cut it to 5-3, Brujan doubled and scored on a Rafael Devers single in the 7th to make it 6-3. Jose Alvarado got Baltimore out in the bottom and then that man struck again, Hunter Bishop with yet another grand slam to make it 10-3. Ronaldo Hernandez's third hit of the night was a 2-RBI triple in the 9th to complete the scoring, which was quite a sight. With the game in hand, Sandy Gaston made his MLB debut and was impressive, pitching the final 2 innings, allowing only one hit and no walks and striking out 2. Lynch went 6 6 3 3 1 3, which meets the definition of a quality start and certainly counts as one for a soft-tosser going in Camden Yards. Bishop now leads the team in RBI with 17, amazing considering he's only played in 11 games of their 22 to date and has only 37 AB. Brandon Marsh has to wonder if he's going to be Wally Pipped, but he'll get his spot back in about 3-4 weeks' time. His rehab assignment at Durham might last a little longer than normal, though.
More hardware for Mr. Glasnow:
Also on the first of the month, we always get these player development updates from our head scout. Mostly it's a look at which prospects have progressed or regressed, but occasionally MLB players get updated ratings. And sometimes you get something like this, which you really don't want to see:
Yates isn't that big a deal since we just grabbed him off waivers (although it could turn out we wasted nearly $3M on his salary), but the Will Smith information is disturbing, especially in light of the save he blew the other night. Smith always got by on some guile but this could be a problem.
Game 3: The Rays grabbed a 7-4 win to take two of three from Baltimore and go back up 4 1/2 games in the AL East. Max Fried got the start, and he was his typical baserunner-dodging self, going 6.1 7 2 2 5 6, walking the bases loaded at the end in the 7th but Nick Anderson got a sac fly and a strikeout for the Rays to leave the inning with a 4-2 lead. After they added 3 more in the top of the 8th, Asa Lacy came on but continued his recent struggles, allowing 2 runs in 2/3 of an inning and Jasseel De La Cruz had to clean up his mess. De La Cruz stayed on and finished for his 1st save, as Fried went to 4-1 albeit with an unsightly 5.65 ERA. The Rays jumped out to a 3-0 lead on a 1st inning Keibert Ruiz RBI single and Alec Bohm's 3rd HR in less than a week, a 2-run shot in the 3rd. After Anthony Santander homered (again) off Fried, Ruiz's sac fly in the 5th restored the 4-1 lead and after the Baltimore run in the 7th, a couple of the Rays' young guns went deep, first Spencer Torkelson for his 2nd in 3 nights and then a 2-run blast by Nick Schnell made it 7-2.
Team record: 17-6. Off-day tomorrow, then the road trip continues in Toronto.