[Art Deco]

Game 1: Nate Schultz was in command and the Rays did all their scoring with 3 big homers in a 7-4 win over the Yankees at Publix Park. Outside of an Ivan Vega homer in the 3rd, Schultz completely shut down the Yankees on 85 pitches through 8 innings only allowing 3 hits. Things went a bit sour in the 9th, a single was followed by Luis Corpus throwing a grounder in front of the plate into CF and Mario Aguilar tripled both runners home. Jordan Diaz came in and got a fly ball which scored Aguilar and a groundball to end the game. Schultz finished 8.1 5 4 2 0 6 and improved to 19-2, 3.23. The offense consisted of three homers off Yankee shortstop-turned-starting pitcher Cade Horton, with Victor de Jesus (#48) hitting a 2-run shot in the 1st, Jaiden Hardaway's 2-run blast in the 5th (#40), and Vlad Guerrero's 3-run homer (#14/33) in the 6th against his former team. They actually had more runs today than hits (6).

Game 2: It was a premium pitching matchup with Andy Aparicio going against the Yankees' Eric Peterson, two of top starters in the AL, and it was advantage Peterson tonight as the Yankees took care of the Rays 7-2. Aparicio was in trouble early when the first two Yankee hitters bunted their way on and he served up a 2-run double to Sal Mota as part of a 3-run first inning. He'd get touched for another run in the 5th and finished 6 6 4 4 0 8. Meanwhile Peterson retired he first 10 Rays before Dayle Jenkins hit his first homer since coming back from injury, his 8th of the year, to get the Rays on the board and Will Quintana's fielder's choice brought another run home in the 5th. But the Rays bullpen wasn't very good today as Tim Siqueiros gave up a run in the 7th and Chris Hicks continued to stink by serving up a 2-run homer in the 9th. Jaiden Hardaway did manage his 200th hit of the season in the 8th to go with 103 walks, making him only the 15th* player in history to have 200 hits and 100 walks in the same season, including luminaries such as Lou Gehrig (7x), Wade Boggs (4x), Babe Ruth (3x), Todd Helton (2x), and Stan Musial (2x).

*Cody Bellinger and Gavin Lux in 2021, and Juan Soto in 2021 and 2022 are the only ones in this save I'm aware of accomplishing the feat.

Game 3: Danny Medina took a no-hitter into the 7th inning and then it all went wrong as the Yankees took the series from the Rays with a 6-5 win. Medina walked the first man he faced and it was "here we go again" with his control issues since moving to the rotation but he retired 18 straight Yankees from there. He only held a slender 1-0 lead thanks to Victor de Jesus' 49th HR of the year in the bottom of the 6th, but things went sour in the 7th. Medina's control issues resurfaced and he walked the bases loaded. Normally he'd be pulled at this point but with the no-hitter still intact he got a longer leash. He got Mario Aguilar to hit a shallow fly ball to right to hold the runners but Monday's Yankee starting pitcher Cade Horton drilled a 2-run single to break up the no-hitter, the shutout and the lead. Tim Siquieros was then summoned and he was unusually terrible, giving up a 2-run single to score Medina's other two runners then two more hits to score two of his own runners and suddenly it was 6-1. The Rays valiantly fought back, starting with a 2-run Dayle Jenkins homer in the bottom of the inning (#9) and after Nate Clark singled, de Jesus doubled him home to make it 6-4. We got a scare when de Jesus had to leave after going into 2nd, but it's just DtD back soreness. Clark equaled de Jesus for the MLB HR lead by hitting his 49th in the 9th off Yankee closer Ji-Hoon Yoo but that would be as close as they got. David Sanchez turned in a nice outing relieving Siqueiros, retiring all 4 men he faced and Kikuo Kawase pitched the 9th to get him some work.

Team record: 116-31. Next up: An off-day then Boston comes for a weekend visit.