July 22: vs Boston 1-4 L. LP-McClanahan (11-7, 6 6 3 3 1 5). Lucas Giolito and the Boston pen held the Rays to two hits in the loss.
July 23: vs Philadelphia 2-3 L (10). LP-Adam (6-5). Starter-Littell (5.2 2 2 2 2 3). HR-Campusano (7). A couple of former Rays had a hand in their defeat - Rule 5 draftee Logan Workman held them to 2 runs in 6 innings and Jose Alvarado threw a perfect 9th and 10th against them after Adam allowed the Manfred Man to score in the top of the 10th.
July 24: vs Philadelphia 7-2 W. WP-Baz (3-1). Starter-Springs (5.1 6 2 2 0 6). HR-Caminero (16), C.Williams (6). Junior's 3-run homer in the 6th erased a 2-0 Philly lead and they added on from there to win going away.
July 25: Off-Day.
July 26: at Baltimore 7-3 W. WP-Bradley (11-4, 6 4 3 3 1 10). HR-T.Hernandez (19), Paredes (26). After famously taking 18 of 19 from Baltimore a few years back, the Rays have found wins against the Orioles hard to come by in recent seasons but tonight they got the job done at Camden Yards. Taj gave up a 3-run homer in the first and it was "here we go again" but the bats battled back with Paredes' 3-run shot in the 5th off former Rays farmhand Seth Johnson putting them ahead to stay. Yandy was also 3-5 with a double and 2 RBI.
July 27: at Baltimore 1-2 L. LP-Baz (3-2). Starter-Rasmussen (5 4 1 1 1 10). HR-Kjerstad (8). A tough one as runs were hard to come by, no more so than in the 9th when the Rays loaded the bases with nobody out, only to have the next two guys fan and the third fly out to end the game. Ras's most dominant start of the year was for naught.
July 28: at Baltimore 8-5 W. WP-McClanahan (12-7, 7 4 1 1 1 10). HR-Caminero (17), T.Hernandez (20). Mac was unbelievable again versus one of the game's top lineups and they coasted with a 7-1 lead after the third thanks in part to big games from Caminero and Campusano, each with 3 hits and 2 RBI. O's pulled within 7-4 after Mac left but they managed to hold on.
Team record: 63-44. At 7 1/2 were as close as we've been to Baltimore since the 10-game losing streak, but the division remains an extreme long shot. The good news is that we're 5 up in the first wild card and 8 up over fourth. And with the series win in Baltimore we at least showed we can beat these guys as they'd be our likely ALDS opponent if we win our wild card series.
Trade time! (Deals were made just before the week's final game)
Our seemingly never-ending quest for consistency at DH against righties (
Curtis Mead has done quite well against LHP) has hopefully come to an end as we've reunited the Lowe brothers as Nathaniel joins Josh on the Rays after 5 years out of the system. N.Lowe isn't going to be a huge home run slugger but he's a consistent on-base guy (291/360/464 this year with 13 HR) with enough pop and a track record to improve the offense after the struggles of
Jonathan Aranda (211/293/330) and
Xavier Isaac (204/258/374) at a position where you need to hit. Ironically going the other way is Heriberto Hernandez, one of three guys we acquired from the Rangers back in 2020 when we dealt them Lowe. As you can see my AGM did not like this deal, perhaps because of Lowe's nearly $10M salary. He's progged to get $12.4M next year but we're not going to pay that as we'll look to deal him in the offseason or worst case non-tender him, so this is really a rental deal for us.
Isaac was optioned to Durham to make room, and speaking of Aranda we had to make room on the 40-man so off to the nation's capital he goes:
We got a decent return for him in Hunter, a bat-first catcher with 20-25 HR power who drilled 46 of 'em between two minor-league stops last year and 19 more so far this year. He's a 45 catcher and also plays some 1B/3B (not that well) so he could be a backup who DHs some of the time, maybe a mini-Mitch Garver type.
Players of the Week:
AL: Daulton Varsho (TOR), 10-25, 4 HR, 6 RBI
NL: Michael Harris II (ATL), 12-24, 1 HR, 7 RBI. That's the third time in four weeks Harris has received this award, so I fully expect him to be the July PotM in the NL.