August 20: Recalled P Tim Siquerios from AAA Durham.
So this is funny. Since OOTP doesn't support the extra man for the doubleheader rule and I needed to call up someone to start Game 2, I sent Jordan Diaz to Durham for the day since he threw 30+ pitches yesterday. So when I made that move, I received this message:
Going to be awkward when I call him back up tomorrow.
Game 1: The Rays kept coming back in the first game of the doubleheader, but they eventually fell short by the score of 6-5. Mike Mooney was pitching right after the Rays had tied it up with 2 in the top of the 8th, and had to come out with back spasms. Enter Daniel Espino, and Jo Adell greeted him with a triple off the scoreboard in RF and Livan Soto singled home Adell with the winning run. The Rays put two on the in the 9th but couldn't get the tying run home. Mack Anglin started and wasn't that good, giving up 3 HRs in total in a 5 9 5 5 2 6 outing. Romulo Canelon went 1 1/3 but he too had to leave with a sore thumb (he'll be fine tomorrow), so that brought in Mooney, who will have these back spasms bother him for a week but be minimal. The Rays offense came on a Jhon Diaz RBI single (part of a 3-hit day), a 2-run Connor Kirkley single, a Jasson Dominguez RBI single and a run off a wild pitch.
Game 2: The Rays managed a split of the doubleheader and an end to their mini 2-game losing streak with a 5-4 win in 10 innings thanks to a Baltimore error. With Jasson Dominguez on 3rd and two out, the Orioles paid some serious respect to rookie Dayle Jenkins by intentionally walking him to pitch to Dane Ayers. It looked like the move would pay off when Ayers hit a routine grounder to Orioles 2B Livan Soto, but Soto made a bad throw to 1st allowing Ayers to reach and Dominguez to score. Evan Godwin, who got the final 2 outs of the 9th, stayed on for the 10th and retired Baltimore without incident for his 2nd win. It was a weird game before that with the Rays taking an early 3-0 lead on homers from Ricky Widmar (#15) and Jenkins (#3) and an Ayers RBI single. Tim Siqueiros got the start but was terribly wild, walking 7 in his 4 innings which took 101 pitches to get through. But as he only allowed 2 hits and struck out 4, the Orioles managed only one run off him. Andy Aparicio took over in the 5th and looked dominant for two innings, retiring all 6 batters he faced with 5 via strikeout. But after Judson Fabian singled in a run in the 7th to make it 4-1, Aparicio ran into big trouble in the bottom of the inning, allowing a pair of homers to let Baltimore even it up. He still struck out the side around those homers, so he had a bizarre 3 3 3 3 0 8 line to go with Siquerios' 4 2 1 1 7 4. Aparicio now has a ridiculous 123 whiffs in 75.1 innings this season. Based on the platoon matchups and the thinned-out bullpen, Jasseel De La Cruz came on in the 8th in a tied game and went 1 1/3 scoreless before Godwin took over.
Game 3: It was your typical Camden Yards game: lots of homers, lots of lead changes, lots of offense, and the Rays prevailed for the second straight day in 10 innings 8-7. Nate Clark's 2nd HR of the game, off the wonderfully-named Benvenuto Patitucci, broke the tie and gave him 29 for the season to cap a 3-5, 4-RBI day. Jose Alvarado, who had pitched the 9th, stayed in for the 10th and earned his 5th win of the year. It was actually only a 2-1 game through 6 innings as Shane McClanahan dueled Ruben Galindo with Clark's first homer one of only two hits the Rays managed to that point. Mac was at 90 pitches entering the 7th and probably was left in too long as he gave up a 3-run HR to Sam Hilliard and it was 5-1 Orioles after 7. But the Rays exploded for 6 runs in the 8th. It started off innocently enough with a Connor Kirkley homer (#14) that looked like a consolation run, but a couple of more Rays reached and Clark drilled a 2-run double to make it 5-4 with 2 out. Baltimore's Luke Leto then served up HR #27 to Joe Barker and the Rays had a 6-5 lead. Leto was pulled and Bobby Witt Jr greeted Nick Wittgren with HR #25 to give the Rays a little insurance and that proved big in the bottom of the inning when Jasseel De La Cruz's second-half struggles continued as he served up a 2-run HR to allow Baltimore to tie it back up. This set the stage for Clark's winner in extras as Barker and Keibert Ruiz joined Clark with 3-hit games.
Game 4: After 3 games in 2 days which required a lot of pitchers, the bullpen was pretty burned out coming into tonight's game with Jordan Diaz and Mike Mooney the only relievers not tired, and Mooney is battling back spasms. So we needed a big game from Alec Sachais and he came through for the most part, going 6 6 1 1 1 6 on 106 pitches and tiring in the 6th. He left with the score 2-1 Rays as the offense was struggling with the only runs on a Joe Barker single, steal and RBI groundout from Jhon Diaz and Jasson Dominguez's 31st HR of the year. Mooney got through the 7th and Dominguez added another solo shot (#32) in the top of the 8th. After getting an out and giving up a hit, Mooney gave way to Diaz, who got Adley Rustchman to pop out. But then the meltdown started and by the time it was over Diaz had allowed a pair of 2-run HRs and despite Nate Clark's 30th in the top of the 9th the Rays lost 5-4. Now whether any of this had to do with clubhouse issues with Diaz remains to be seen, for now I'm just chalking it up to Camden Yards.
Team record: 89-36. Next up: A much needed off-day before the Yankees (sans Vlad Jr. who's injured but should be back next week) come to town for the weekend.