Game 1: I'll let this strange line score speak for itself:
The Rays were out-hit by a 2-1 ratio but won by 4. That's in large part because 5 of the Rays' 8 hits left the yard and Oriole pitchers handed out 6 walks but it was a weird game in which the Rays kept thinking they were pulling away but Baltimore kept coming back. The early hero was Luis Corpus, who hit a grand slam in the 2nd and then belted a 3-run homer in the 4th which put the Rays up 8-1, doubling his season HR total to 4. But Baltimore scored 5 times in the 4th with only two of the runs earned thanks to a dropped fly ball from Nate Clark and Ricky Widmar dropping a popup. Andy Aparicio had a bizarre line as he gave up his share of hits but had his strikeout pitch going, finishing 5 7 6 2 2 11 to go to 4-1, 4.08. Nate Clark hit #9 in the 5th, Ricky Widmar hit a 2-run shot in the 6th (#2) and Bo Angeac hit a 2-run blast in the 7th (#3) but it never seemed like enough, especially after Chris Hicks had a terrible 6th, giving up 3 runs in 2/3 of an inning. Tim Siqueiros bailed him out and got through the 7th, as did Jim Connors in the 8th. Connors stayed on for the 9th but put two men on for the tough lefty hitter Tim Steele, so Mike Wherry came in. Baltimore decided to pinch-hit for him with a righty and decided to send the runner from first, so Wherry managed a strike 'em out-throw 'em out double play to end the game and nab his 2nd save. I guess it was fitting for Corpus's throw to end the game after he did so much with the bat.
Game 2: The Rays wasted a fine performance from Kevin Kerstetter in a 4-2 loss at Baltimore tonight. The young lefty was much more impressive in his second start but received no favors from his teammates, both in the field and at the plate. Victor de Jesus' misplay of a grounder directly led to a Baltimore run against him in the 1st, but he settled in from there and ended up going 6 5 2 1 2 6. The problem of course was that the offense wasn't doing much against Oriole ace Zack Farese, who lowered his ERA to 2.91 after a 7.1 4 2 1 1 5 performance. Jaiden Hardaway had a 4th-inning RBI double and Ricky Widmar homered (#3) leading off the 8th, but that was the extent of the run-scoring. They did load the bases in the 9th with 1 out but Luis Corpus hit into a force at the plate and Widmar grounded out to end the game. Not helping matters was Danny Medina, who allowed 2 runs in the 7th which proved to be the difference in the game.
Game 3: The Rays took an 8-2 win over Baltimore behind the strong pitching of Leo Ortega and a balanced hitting attack. Ortega was dealing and whiffed 10 Orioles in 5 1/3, the only drawback being he ran up his pitch count with all the whiffs to 102, allowing 2 runs on 5 hits. It was still more than good enough to go 4-0 and get his ERA down a little to 4.18. Tim Siqueiros got through the 6th and the first out of the 7th before Bob Sirna finished the inning. Kikuo Kawase then struck out the side in a perfect 8th to give him a ridiculous 26 whiffs in 11 innings or 21.3 K/9. Mike Wherry had a perfect 9th with 2 whiffs of his own. They took advantage of a Freudis Nova error to score 3 times in the 2nd on a Bo Angeac sac fly, an Omar Rodriguez double and a Will Quintana single. Nate Clark hit a 2-run shot (#10) in the 5th, Angeac added a solo blast in the 6th (#4) and Mike Harms completed the scoring with a 2-run double in the 9th.
Team record: 17-6. Next up: An off-day then 3 games over the weekend in Toronto.
MLB News: Former Ray Jack Leiter, who won the 2031 NL Cy Young after we traded him to Cincinnati but had kind of a down year last season, is having an even worse season this year as he tore his UCL and will undergo Tommy John surgery. It's adding injury to insult to the Reds as the 2031 NL Champions are now off to a brutal 7-15 start which without Leiter probably isn't going to get much better.