Monthly awards time:
Prized 1B prospect Jon Jimenez won the Batter of the Month award in the IL again, and Phil Hable, the outfielder we got from Texas for Jon Whiteleather, won the Southern League Batter of the Month award with a .337-5-26 July; for the year he's hitting 289/369/489 with 16 HR and 61 RBI.
Game 1: Another day, another comfortable win for the Rays as they ended up blasting the Astros 12-3 for their 7th straight victory. Nate Schultz got the start and began in dominating fashion, whiffing 8 Astros in the first 4 innings and allowing only one hit. They did string a few hits together off him in the 5th, though, and a 3-run homer from highly-regarded Astros SS prospect Hector Cortes cut the lead to 4-3. But that would be all Schultz would allow, going 7 4 3 3 0 8 and now 14-1, 3.21. Bob Sirna and Danny Medina each got in an inning of work; with the starters so good recently and going 6-7 innings there hasn't been a lot of bullpen use. On offense the big early blow came from Vlad Guerrero Jr as his 3-run shot in the 3rd, his 2nd as a Ray and 21st overall, made it 3-0 and Omar Rodriguez added a solo shot (#14) in the 4th. And after Houston had closed the gap to 1, Jaiden Hardaway immediately responded in the top of the 6th with a 3-run homer (#26) while Nate Clark added #37 with a man on in the 8th.
Game 2: These games seem to be getting more ridiculous with this team as they bashed 9 - count 'em, 9 - homers today in a 16-6 beatdown of Houston, falling just one short of the single-game team MLB record set by the Blue Jays in 1987. What is a record is that 9 different Rays homered, including 8 of the 9 starters (Melvin Gutierrez, you slacker) plus Danny Ayala as a pinch-hitter. Not going to try to recap them, instead here's the relevant section of the box score:
Nate Thompson started and pitched pretty well, even if he did give up 4 runs in 6 2/3, 2 came on a homer and 2 were the result of an RBI triple which scored on a sac fly. Jim Connors and Kevin Kerstetter were the mop-up guys, with Kersetter giving up a 2-run homer of his own in the 9th. In case you were wondering like I was how many HR they've hit as a team it's 242 so far in 105 games or 2.3/game. That average has come up considerably lately no doubt.
MLB News: Alec Sachais made his San Diego debut tonight. He gave up a 2-run home in the 1st then had to leave in the 2nd with a blister, so not exactly a roaring success.
Game 3: After being smoked by a combined score of 28-9 the last two nights, Houston turned the tables with an 11-2 beatdown of the Rays. Leo Ortega just didn't have it tonight, giving up a 3-run homer in the 1st inning on his way to a 3 9 5 5 1 4 night, and the relief wasn't much relief tonight. Danny Medina gave up a pair of homers despite being rated for 70 movement and while Bob Sirna had a scoreless inning the decision to give Kikuo Kawase his first work in 8 days backfired when he was hit hard for 4 runs on 2 hits and 2 walks in 2/3 of an inning, with his ERA rising from 0.95 to 1.69. And since he threw 22 pitches he's probably not available tomorrow. Meanwhile the bats were mostly silent, in part due to Nate Clark, Bo Angeac and Jaiden Hardaway all getting the night off. Vlad Guerrero Jr had a 2-run double for the only Rays scoring as part of his 3-4 night - he's 345/356/603 since being acquired so he's held up his end so far unlike some other big-name mid-season acquisitions in the past.
Game 4: The Rays bounced back from yesterday's debacle by taking a 5-2 decision over Houston in a rare game between the teams which featured a save situation. Andy Aparicio was on the bump for the Rays looking to continue his hot run and he did so, at least for the first 6 innings when he held the Astros to two hits and made it 31 innings with allowing only one earned run. But he gave up a leadoff homer to Danny Rivera, who had 1 longball coming into this series but homered for the third straight game, and then loaded the bases with nobody out with the score 5-1. Mike Wherry came in, struck out old Rays favorite Austin Meadows, and then induced a 5-3 double play to keep the game at 5-1. Wherry stayed on for the 8th, gave up a 2-out homer, and Tim Siqueiros notched the final out. Jordan Diaz then came on for the 9th and got a 1-2-3 inning on 8 pitches for his 9th save. Aparicio improves to 15-4, 3.17 after a 6 4 1 1 3 6 outing. The offense was a 2-man affair with all 5 runs coming thanks to the bats of Jaiden Hardaway and Vlad Guerrero Jr. Vlad homered in the 1st to make it 1-0, Hardaway hit #28 in the 3rd to double the lead, then in the 5th Hardaway singled in Melvin Gutierrez and Guerrero followed with 2nd homer of the game, #5 as a Ray and #24 overall. After his 3-4 night, Hardaway is now up to 7.9 WAR.
Team record: 86-24. Next up: Back home for some interleague action against Milwaukee for 3 this weekend.