The 2020 (and beyond) Tampa Bay Rays - Page 24

Art Deco · 12-07-2020, 04:09 PM

Game 1: This season has been one step forward, two steps back, and they took a big step back with the most agonizing loss of the season, blowing a 3-1 lead in the 9th inning and losing 4-3 to New York. The offense was terrible again, generating only a Joe Barker HR (#2) in the 3rd off Jesus Luzardo with only 4 hits through 7 innings. In the 8th, though, Nate Clark blasted a 2-run HR off Mike Tudor in the 8th (#5) and it looked like the Rays would come away with the win. With three lefties due up, Jose Alvarado came on and immediately made a mess, retiring only one of them. This brought on Jasseel De La Cruz, who gave up an infield single to load the bases, and yet another infield single that made it 3-2. With the infield now drawn in, Ricky Widmar made a great diving play to stop a ball and threw it home for the force to make it 2 out, but Victor Robles delivered his 4th hit of the day, a 2-run single, to give the Yankees the win after the Rays went meekly 1-2-3 in the bottom of the 9th off Yankee closer Nick Paciorek. Jack Leiter pitched well, going 6 7 1 1 1 2 and Evan Godwin and Daniel Espino each had a scoreless inning before the Alvarado/JDLC metldown. The real problem is the utter lack of hitting as they only tallied 6 hits tonight, with 2 coming from Clark and 2 from Widmar. Yordan Alvarez struck out his first 3 times up to make it 7 straight at-bats with a whiff and was 0-4 to drop his average to .188. Keibert Ruiz was 0-4 to drop to .218 and all he seems to do is hit into double plays whenever we have a man on 1st. Widmar and Jhon Diaz are the only regulars over .300 and Fabian the only other one over .250. They're now hitting 239/307/407 as a team and are 13th in the AL in runs scored. I know this is only game #24 and regression says it will turn around but it's damn frustrating in the interim.

Note from Durham: Andy Aparicio didn't go to Durham to sulk as he went 7.1 7 1 1 0 6 in his first start after being demoted.

Game 2: Apparently tired of being called out, the Rays' bats went to work tonight in a 10-4 thrashing of the Yankees which saw every hitter in the lineup manage at least one base hit. Judson Fabian hit HR #3 with a man on in the 3rd to make it 2-0, and then we had an honest-to-goodness rally full of numerous hits that saw the Rays score 6 times in the 4th. Keibert Ruiz had a 2-run single, Gavin Lux an RBI double, Nate Clark had a sac fly and Bobby Witt Jr. hit a 2-run triple as runners kept circling the bases at the Trop, a rare sight of late. Ruiz added a 2-run HR in the 5th (#2) to complete the scoring. Blake Money made his first start of the season and was as effective as the hitters tonight, taking a 2-hit shutout into the 7th. Tiring, he hit a couple of batters with 2 out before Hyo-Jun Park hit a 3-run HR to put the Yankees on the board. Money got the final out and finished 7 3 3 3 2 8 in an impressive outing. Aaron Ashby pitched a scoreless 8th but Jeremy Bienick had his problems again in his 2nd MLB appearance, allowing a run and putting 3 on base. He may be heading back to Durham soon as I have no confidence right now using him in anything less than a blowout.

April 27: Optioned P Jeremy Bienick to AAA Durham, recalled P Christian Chamberlain from AAA Durham.

As mentioned above, Bienick probably needs a little more seasoning in Durham. Chamberlain is back, he had cameos in 2026 and 2027 with the big club and now gives us an extra lefty, making the bullpen balanced with 4 LHP and 4 RHP.

Game 3: If you're going to play an 18-inning game, you better f***ing win it as you burn your bullpen in the process. And despite squandering numerous great chances to score in extra innings, the Rays still ended up winning it 3-2 when Nate Clark led off the bottom of the 18th with HR #6 off Luis Severino. The reason why we got to that point was the Rays' penchant for hitting game-winning or game-tying HRs in the 9th at home and with 2 out and nobody on and facing Yankee closer Nick Paciorek, one of the best in MLB, Jhon Diaz went deep for HR #4. Special mention has to go to the just-recalled Christian Chamberlain. With Shane McClanahan struggling all game with baserunners and running up his pitch count, the bullpen had to start its work in the 6th inning and by the time the 15th rolled around, Chamberlain was the last man in the pen (unless you want to count tomorrow night's starter Alec Sachais, and we definitely didn't want to use him). All he did was pull off one of the more heroic relief efforts in team history, pitching 4 perfect innings and striking out 5. He picked up the much-deserved win but will likely be rewarded for his efforts by being sent back to Durham so we can have a fresh arm tomorrow. And I can't say enough about the rest of the bullpen. Mac was nowhere near his sharpest, going 5.1 7 2 2 5 5 on 107 pitches. Hayden Johns came in with the bases loaded and one out and had to face Victor Robles and Vlad Guerrero Jr. and struck them both out. This set the tone for the pen the rest of the way as they combined for an incredible 12.2 4 0 0 2 20 line. Yes that's right, 20 strikeouts for the bullpen and 25 for the game which has to be a team record. Rays batters struck out 18 times themselves for a combined 43 whiffs in the game. The MLB records IRL through 2020 are 26 for a single team and 48 for a game, so we nearly broke those. With the win, they're back to .500 and with Toronto losing they're within 4 games of the lead, the closest they've been for at least a couple of weeks.

Team record: 13-13. Next up: Wander Franco returns to the Trop in enemy colors for the first time as Texas is in town for a weekend series. The Rangers will get the benefit of facing a tired bullpen, so here's hoping Alec Sachais can duplicate his 8-inning Rays debut tomorrow night.

Art Deco · 12-08-2020, 08:54 AM

April 28: Optioned P Christian Chamberlain to AAA Durham, recalled P Tyler Gough from AAA Durham.

Welcome to the show, Tyler Gough. Our 2nd round pick in 2022 out of high school finally climbs the ladder to the top. He's got great (75) stuff and served as Durham's closer last year with a 10/47 BB/K in 32 innings and has been in their rotation this year with a 2/14 BB/K in 13 innings. Despite his low BB totals he's rated as 45 control (and 45 movement, so HRs could be an issue). He'll help out a burned-out pen for now. Chamberlain's 4 innings of relief last night will not be forgotten and he could be back in a couple of weeks.

Game 1: He did it again. On a night when the bullpen was down to Hayden Johns, Jack Filby and the just-recalled Tyler Gough, Alec Sachais came through with a game that might have been even better than his Rays debut 6 days ago, pitching a complete-game 3-hitter in a 3-1 win over Texas. Sachais walked 0 and struck out 12, including Wander Franco looking to end the game with a man on. He actually got the tough-to-whiff Franco 3 times on strikes tonight. His only blemish was a Monte Harrison HR in the 3rd inning but didn't allow a hit after that until Harrison singled leading off the 9th (Wander had the other hit, a single in the 1st). I'm not sure any Rays pitcher in their history has had such a successful 2-start debut. The offense was its usual sluggish self with a couple of exceptions. Judson Fabian went 4-4 and scored the first two runs, coming home both times on Keibert Ruiz RBI singles in the 2nd and the 4th. The pair accounted for 6 of the Rays' 8 hits on the night. Julio Cedillo drew a bases-loaded walk in the 8th for some insurance. The win improves the team to 14-13, putting them over .500 for the first time since winning on Opening Day.

Game 2: Christian Little was denied a win once again, but his teammates weren't as the Rays scored twice in the bottom of the 8th to beat Texas 5-3 after Daniel Espino blew a 3-1 lead in the top of the inning. The win was a season-high 4th straight, put them a season-high 2 games over .500 and pulled them to within 3 of Toronto after the Blue Jays lost in Anaheim. Little was his usual strikeout self (12) and took a shutout into the 7th but had thrown a lot of pitches so when he gave up a leadoff single to start the inning, Jack Filby came on and got through the inning but allowed the runner to score on a SB, WP and sac fly. Espino then came on for the 8th and had his first bad outing of 2028, giving up a couple of hits and walking a pair, including a 2-out 2-run single to Monte Harrison which tied the game. But Nate Clark immediately restored the lead leading off the bottom of the inning with a 500-ft HR to dead center (#7), one of the longest hit at the Trop. A couple of walks then led to Bobby Witt Jr's first big hit in a long time, an RBI double to make it 5-3. With two lefties (and Wander) due up in the 9th, Jose Alvarado got the call for the save and retired the Rangers 1-2-3 to grab save #2, while Espino vultured the win. Earlier they scored 3 times in the first 3 innings. Ricky Widmar led off the game with a triple and Gavin Lux singled him home and after stealing second Lux came in to score on a Yordan Alvarez RBI single. Judson Fabian stayed hot with an RBI double in the 3rd to score Clark with the other run.

Game 3: Bobby Witt, Jr: welcome to the Rays! The 3B, who cost a fortune in talent (Hunter Bishop and Triston Casas) and money (an 8-year, $134M deal), came into today's game sitting on 1 HR and 10 RBI and a .213 batting average through 27 games. To say he's been a disappointment so far was an understatement. But he had his first big game as a Ray, and boy was it a big game as he nearly single-handedly led the Rays to a walk-off 7-5 win over Texas. First after Jhon Diaz doubled in the 5th, Witt singled him home to cut Texas's lead to 3-2. Next, after Texas extended the lead to 4-2, he drilled a 3-run HR in the bottom of the 7th to put the Rays up 5-4. And after Jose Alvarado blew that 5-4 lead in the top of the 9th on a 2-out RBI single by none other than Wander Franco, Witt took Alvarado off the hook by hitting a 2-run walk-off homer off Texas rookie closer Jeff Lavender to win the game and make it 5 straight for the Rays, capping a 3-4, 2 HR, 6 RBI day. Aside from Witt and Diaz (who walked twice ahead of Witt's HRs and scored 3 runs), there was no offense to speak of from the rest of the team with the only other run scoring in the 1st when Ricky Widmar reached on an error, stole second, went to third on the errant throw, and scored on a Nate Clark groundball. Jack Leiter started and had a rough first two innings, allowing 3 runs, but settled in from there until the 7th when he allowed a couple of hits for the 4th Texas run. Hayden Johns pitched out of Leiter's jam and had a 1-2-3 8th but lost the win when Alvarado struggled in the 9th. Meanwhile the Blue Jays continue to fall to Earth, losing again in Anaheim and allowing the Rays to pull within 2 of the division lead.

Team record: 16-13. Next up: 3 games in Minnesota.

Art Deco · 12-08-2020, 03:51 PM

Game 1: The big, bad Rays who struck fear into the hearts of their opponents the last 5+ seasons may be back, as they annihilated the Twins tonight 14-2 to make it 6 straight wins, and with Toronto losing they're only 1 game back of their accustomed perch atop the AL East. Julio Cedillo had the night of his (short) MLB career, going 4-5 with 2 doubles, a HR and 4 RBI. Cedillo did most of his damage in blowing the game open, but it was Jhon Diaz (perhaps the team's most consistent hitter this year) and Ricky Widmar who set the tone as the Rays took a 4-0 2nd inning lead. Diaz blasted HR #5 off Zach Gallen with a man on and then Widmar followed later in the inning with a 2-run double. Yordan Alvarez's RBI single added a run in the 5th and then Cedillo went to work, starting with a 2-run HR in 6th that made a 5-2 game into a 7-2 one and hitting a 2-run double in a 4-run 7th. Gavin Lux put the cherry on top with a 3-run HR in the 9th, his 5th. Blake Money got the start and had some early issues, giving up a couple of runs and putting a fair number of runners on, but settled down once the lead started growing and finished with a flourish, ending up 7 5 2 2 4 9 and improving to 3-0 with 46 whiffs in 31 innings. Tyler Gough made his MLB debut, pitching the final 2 innings and although he allowed 2 hits and a walk, he didn't let anyone score and struck out 3.

Game 2: As Van Morrison once sang, the Rays are "back on top". The bats continue to wake from their April doldrums as the Rays pounded the Twins once again to the tune of 10-5 tonight and coupled with another Toronto loss they're back on top in the AL East, tied with the Jays. They banged out 17 hits in all, with everyone in the lineup picking up at least one. The big news of the night was a milestone: Yordan Alvarez hit his 6th HR of the year and the 400th of his career. It capped a 5-run 4th which made it 9-1, so it wasn't terribly dramatic, but hopefully it will be a harbinger of HRs to come as he's continued to underachieve as a Ray. Before that, though, Nate Clark and Bobby Witt Jr had RBI singles in the first, and a Twins error opened the door for two more runs to score on the error and a wild pitch, making it 4-0 in the 1st. In that 5-run 4th, Gavin Lux had an RBI single (one of his 4 hits for the game), Judson Fabian had an RBI grounder that was misplayed, and they scored another run on a double play before Yordan's blast. Clark added another RBI single in the 8th for the final run. On the mound, Shane McClanahan wasn't his sharpest, which seems to be the story most times out this season, but was effective enough to go to 3-2 with a 6 8 2 2 1 7 performance. Aaron Ashby had a scoreless 7th but Hayden Johns was pretty awful in the 8th, giving up 3 runs and necessitating the use of Jack Filby to pitch a scoreless 9th. In addition to Lux's 4-hit night, Ricky Widmar was a sparkplug again, going 3-4 with 2 doubles, a walk and a steal, and Clark was 3-5 with the 2 RBI.

Game 3: The Rays blew a 3-0 lead but rallied late and made it 8 straight with a 6-3 win in Minnesota, taking sole possession of 1st in the AL East after yet another Blue Jays loss. Although Keibert Ruiz's RBI single in the 8th was the game-winner, breaking a 3-3 tie, the star of the show was Jhon Diaz. The second-year RF continues to rake and his RBI double put the team on the board in the 2nd and his 2-run HR in the 9th made a 4-3 nailbiter into a more comfortable 6-3 win. His 3-hit, 3-RBI day has him up to 333/405/720 with 6 HR and 13 RBI in only 75 AB. Alec Sachais got the start and although he continued his roll by shutting out the Twins through 4 innings he couldn't sashay past them in the 5th (be honest, you knew it was only a matter of time before I used the "Sachais/sashay" pun), allowing 3 runs on 5 hits. He left after that inning going 5 8 3 3 1 6 and the relievers who followed were lights-out for the most part, not allowing Minnesota a hit over the final 4 innings. Evan Godwin had a perfect 6th, and then Daniel Espino did the real yeoman's work. After getting the Twins 1-2-3 on only 11 pitches in the 7th, he came back for the 8th and had another 1-2-3 inning with a pair of whiffs, and deservedly picked up the win. With two lefties due in the 9th, Jose Alvarado came in, but walked one of them and then walked the righty, so Jasseel De La Cruz had to get the final 2 outs for save #6. The other two runs not mentioned here were both courtesy of Nate Clark RBI singles, as he had another 3-hit day and stole 2 bases to go with them. The bats continue to awaken as they had 14 more hits today, with everyone in the lineup again getting a hit except for Isaac DeLeon, who started for a fatigued Ricky Widmar. DeLeon was 0-4 with 3 whiffs and is now 1-19 this season. He's never going to hit for a high average (his calling card is his tremendous power) and playing very infrequently is not helping. But he's still a 65 defender at SS and 3B, making him a valuable backup.

Team record: 19-13. Next up: An off-day then a 3-game weekend set in Baltimore.

Art Deco · 12-09-2020, 08:28 AM

Game 1: After blowing leads of 3-0 early and 4-3 in the 8th, the Rays saw their 8-game winning streak snapped in an 8-6 loss at Camden Yards. Nate Clark put the Rays ahead with a solo shot in the top of the 8th (#8) but it was time for the annual bullpen meltdown in this stadium, and Evan Godwin, who got Daniel Espino out of a bases-loaded jam in the 7th with two outs on 3 pitches, couldn't get anyone out and then Hayden Johns poured gasoline on the fire. Godwin got the leadoff man but then gave up 3 straight singles to score a run and with righty Druw Jones up and the go-ahead run on 3rd I went to Johns over Jack Filby figuring Johns had a better chance to whiff him. Big mistake, as Johns gave up 2 straight hits and a wild pitch to allow 4 more runs to score. Yordan Alvarez (#7) and Joe Barker (#3) went back-to-back in the 9th to make the final score more respectable. The Rays staked Christian Little to a 3-0 lead by the 5th on RBI singles from Jud Fabian and Gavin Lux along with an Alvarez sac fly, but Little gave it back in the 5th and 6th capped by a game-tying 2-run HR from former Ray Rafael Devers, who signed as a FA with the Orioles this year. Little ended 6 5 3 3 3 9 in another no-decision. The Blue Jays won but lost yesterday and are now 1/2 game back, while the Yankees are 1 game back.

Game 2: The Rays put up a couple of touchdowns, which beat Baltimore's field goal and safety in a 14-5 win as the offense continues to roll with 57 runs in the last 6 games. It didn't look like a 14-5 game through the first 3 innings as Jack Leiter was matching 0s with Baltimore ace Bryar Johnson. But the Rays managed to score 8 runs in the 4th inning off Johnson and a reliever, all coming after 2 out and nobody on. Yordan Alvarez and Judson Fabian singled, Bobby Witt Jr walked and Jhon Diaz came through again with a 2-run single. Keibert Ruiz immediately followed with a 3-run HR (#3). That chased Johnson, but Julio Cedillo walked, Ricky Widmar singled, and then Gavin Lux blasted one out (#6) to RCF and suddenly it was 8-0. Judson Fabian added #4 in the 5th to make it 9-0, and later Witt had an RBI single, Nate Clark hit a 2-run shot for #9 and Julio Cedillo rapped a 2-run double. Unlike Johnson, Leiter kept pitching well although he ran a lot of deep counts and was done after going 6 2 1 1 1 7 on 96 pitches. With the huge lead, Tyler Gough came on and wasn't very good, leaving with a run in and 2 men on with 2 out in the 7th, and Aaron Ashby promptly gave up a HR to Gunnar Henderson but managed to finish out the final two innings. Toronto and the Yankees both lost, so the lead is now 1 1/2 games.

Game 3: Isaac DeLeon hit his first MLB homer to lead the Rays to a 7-2 win over Baltimore. And then he hit his second. And his third. With it being a Sunday game it was time for some of the "irregulars" to play, so Connor Kirkley and DeLeon started over Gavin Lux and Bobby Witt Jr. And man did DeLeon come through. I mentioned the other day his calling card is power (70-rated) and he displayed that in spades today. His 2-run shot in the 4th made it 2-0, and he added solo blasts in the 6th and the 9th. He also walked in the 2nd so Baltimore could not retire him today. Kirkley has his own blue-colored skill and that's his batting eye which is a 75. He used it in the 1st, drawing a walk as part of the Rays loading the bases with nobody out. Yordan Alvarez grounded into a double play to get the first run home, and Jud Fabian singled in the next. Kirkley also came through with an RBI double in the 5th and was on base 3 times in 5 appearances with a single and that walk as well. The 7 runs were more than enough for Blake Money, who continues to flourish in the rotation as he and fellow Mariner acquisition Alec Sachais have been instrumental in the team's 10-1 run. Money went 6 4 2 2 1 6 and improves to 4-0, 2.68 with 52 Ks in 37 IP. Evan Godwin and Jack Filby combined to pitched the final 3 innings without incident. The Jays and Yankees won, so the lead remains 1 1/2.

Team record: 21-14. Next up: An off-day then we return home to face the Astros. Houston is off to a brutal 8-26 start but Bramdon Perez is putting up great numbers again: 372/449/669 with 9 HR and he's second in WAR in the AL with 1.7. This is on the heels of his 3.5 WAR season last year where he went 308/381/509 with 20 HR in 428 AB. Nick Frasso may be up and down but Perez has clearly outplayed Yordan Alvarez, something I did not expect when making that trade in the 26/27 offseason.

Art Deco · 12-09-2020, 04:37 PM

Game 1: Bad teams usually find a way to lose, and the 2028 Houston Astros are a bad team at 8-26 having lost 10 straight. Well make that 8-27 and 11 straight as they blew a 6-2 lead to lose to the Rays 7-6 in 10 innings thanks to 7 walks from their bullpen in the 9th and 10th innings, including a bases-loaded walk in each inning to force in the tying and winning runs. It was a strange night at the Trop which started with Shane McClanahan having to leave in the 2nd inning with back spasms after giving up a run. It's a minor injury and shouldn't cause him to miss his next start. Hayden Johns came on for long relief and had a schizophrenic outing. While he whiffed 7 in 3 1/3 innings, he also gave up a 3-run HR to Alex Bregman in the 3rd and another run in the 5th to put the Rays in a 5-1 hole with their only run at that point coming on a Nate Clark single. Judson Fabian hit HR #5 in the 6th to make it 5-2 but Tyler Gough struggled in his second inning of relief and gave up an RBI triple to Bryce Turang with nobody out. Importantly, though, Gough stranded Turang at 3rd getting strikeouts of Ramon Laureano and Eloy Jimenez. And the Rays rallied for 3 in the bottom of the 7th to make it a 1-run game thanks to an RBI triple from Gavin Lux (who had a 4-hit night, missing the cycle by a homer), a Clark groundout and a Fabian double. This set up the bottom of the 9th when Astro closer Junior Fernandez walked 3 Rays to load the bases, struck out Fabian, got a force at the plate from Bobby Witt Jr, but then walked Jhon Diaz to force in the tying run. And Emmanuel Clase repeated Fernandez's feat in the 10th, walking Julio Cedillo and Ricky Widmar, giving up a single to Lux to load the bases, and then walking Clark with the winning run to make it shrimp time at the Trop with a walk-off walk. Jose Alvarado pitched the 10th to pick up win #2. Toronto beat the Yankees so they stay 1 1/2 back while New York drops 3 behind.

Game 2: As I said yesterday the 2028 Astros are a bad team that usually finds a way to lose, and they found a new way tonight after fighting back from a 4-0 deficit to lose to the Rays 5-4 in the bottom of the 9th. This time Jhon Diaz hit a one-out single, stole second, went to to third on a groundout and then scored when Julio Cedillo's grounder was misplayed by Houston 1B Joseph Kalafut. It looked the Rays would be on their way to an easy win after Gavin Lux (#7) and Nate Clark (#10) hit back-to-back 1st inning HRs off one-time Rays prospect Taj Bradley and Ricky Widmar and Yordan Alvarez followed with RBI singles in the 3rd. But Alec Sachais started running out of gas in the 5th, allowing a couple of runs and then left after putting a man on in the 6th, ending up 5.2 6 3 3 3 7. Aaron Ashby came on and couldn't get anyone out, walking two and giving up 2 hits, including a 2-run single allowing Houston to tie the game before Jack Filby got them out of it with a whiff of Eloy Jimenez. Filby got through the 7th and then Daniel Espino took over in a truly dominant performance, retiring all 6 men he faced in the 8th and 9th with 5 via strikeout. He picked up a well-earned win when the Rays won it in the 9th. The Yankees beat Toronto so the lead is now up to 2 1/2 games as the Rays have now won 12 of 13.

Game 3: The Rays completed the sweep of Houston and this time out they didn't need any late inning assistance from wild Astros pitchers or shaky Astro fielding, they just went out and won it the Rays Way: great pitching and just enough hitting in a 3-1 win, their 13th in 14 games. Christian Little got the start and after he got knocked around for a run in the 1st inning he took over from there and wasn't troubled until the 6th, when he pulled a Houdini act. He gave up singles to put men and 1st and 3rd to lead off the inning, got a ground ball at Yordan Alvarez that held the runners, walked Eloy Jimenez to load the bases and then got a grounder at Isaac DeLeon who came home and got the 2nd out. He then whiffed Joseph Kalafut on a 3-2 pitch to end the threat. That ended his day as well, going 6 5 1 1 1 7 on 93 pitches and earning only his 2nd win of the year. Evan Godwin struck out the side in the 7th, and Jose Alvarado put a man on with 2 out in the 8th and Jasseel De La Cruz had to come in for a 4-out save. JDLC walked Jimenez to put 2 men on, but got Alex Bregman to fly out and then proceeded to strike out the side in a 1-2-3 9th for save #7. The star on offense was Joe Barker, getting a rare start. He singled in Bobby Witt Jr in the 4th to tie the game, scored the go-ahead run on Ryan Jeffers' double, and then hit HR #4 in the 7th for a big insurance run. The Yankees took care of Toronto again to move into 2nd place, 3 games behind the Rays.

Team record: 24-14. Next up: 3 at home over the weekend vs those 2nd-place Yankees.

Art Deco · 12-10-2020, 09:30 AM

Game 1: What a difference 2 1/2 weeks make. The last time the Yankees were in town the Rays hit their nadir, blowing a 3-1 lead in the 9th inning and losing 4-3 to the Yankees to start the season 11-13, and at one point they were out of first by 7 games. Fast forward to today and the Rays are 25-14 and 4 games ahead in the division after an 18-2 shellacking of New York, their 14th win in 15 games (and the only game lost was at Baltimore where they led 4-3 in the 8th). For a moment it looked like it might be the Yankees' day when Victor Robles led off the game with a HR off Jack Leiter. But he didn't give the Yankees jack after that, going 7 6 1 1 1 7 to improve to 4-2, 3.06 with a nifty 7/45 BB/K ratio in 50 innings. And of course the bats had their day, with 18 runs and 19 hits. Leading the hit parade was Nate Clark 4-6 with 3 RBI and a steal. Judson Fabian was 4-5 with 2 RBI (including 3 infield hits), Ricky Widmar and Bobby Witt Jr. each drove in 3, and Julio Cedillo was 2-5, 2 RBI with their only HR of the night (#5) and a double. In fact not only did everyone in the starting lineup have a hit, everyone in the starting lineup had at least one RBI. That also included Connor Kirkley, getting a rare start and going 1-4 with 2 walks and 2 RBI. Witt had to leave the game with a mild knee sprain that will keep him DtD for 2 weeks. Probably won't IL him but will mix in a lot of Isaac DeLeon.

May 13: Optioned P Tyler Gough to AAA Durham, recalled P Christian Chamberlain from AAA Durham.

The 15 days were up so we could bring Chamberlain back. It was his heroic 4 perfect innings of relief that helped us win that 18-inning game with the Yankees which was the start of the season turnaround but he had to go down because we needed a fresh arm. He's back now, perhaps to stay. Gough pitched the final 2 innings last night, walking 3 and allowing a run, and he didn't look convincing in any of his outings so back he goes.

Game 2: In this hot streak for the Rays the fact that the bats have been back has been well-chronicled, but you don't win 14 of 15 without good pitching and it was great pitching today that helped the Rays make it 15 of 16 with a 5-1 win over the Yankees. Blake Money has been lights-out since being moved back into the rotation after Mack Anglin went down and he was brilliant again today, going 7 3 1 1 3 8 and upping his record to 5-0, 2.45. His 60 strikeouts (in only 44 innings) are 3rd in the AL and when Anglin comes back (he'll start a rehab assignment in 4 days), the case can be made for going to a 6-man rotation as neither Money nor Alec Sachais deserve to be dropped from it. In fact one could say our weakest and most inconsistent starter this year has been Shane McClanahan, our ace and reigning AL Cy Young award winner, and it's not like he's been that bad. As for today's game, while Money was doing his thing the offense did just enough, concentrating their output in a 4-run 3rd inning. Judson Fabian beat out his 4th infield hit in 2 games to get a run across with 2 out, and then Jhon Diaz had the big hit of the game, a 2-run double to make it 3-0 and he was singled home by Isaac DeLeon. Gavin Lux added HR #8 off Forrest Whitley in the 4th for the 5th and final run. Also Evan Godwin picked up his first save of the season when Jack Filby put two on in the 8th with only one out. Godwin got Joe Allen to roll into a double play on his first pitch to end that inning and he got the Yankees 1-2-3 in the 9th on only 7 pitches, making it a 1 2/3 inning, 8-pitch save. Toronto lost again (they're now 21-20 after starting off 17-7) so they didn't move ahead of New York, meaning the division lead is now 5 games.

Game 3: Just yesterday I was talking about how Shane McClanahan was maybe the team's least consistent starter so far this season. He must have heard me as he flashed his Cy Young form today in a 9-2 win over the Yankees, going 7 5 2 2 1 8 and improving to 4-2, 3.56. Mac was only in trouble in the 3rd when he gave up a Hyo-Jun Park homer and a couple of more hits for a run but was untouchable outside of that inning. Daniel Espino and Christian Chamberlain pitched scoreless innings to finish it off on the mound. The offense once again provided plenty of run support, starting with 3 runs in the 2nd. A Jhon Diaz double was the big hit to put men at 2nd and 3rd, and Isaac DeLeon's RBI grounder, Ryan Jeffers' sac fly and Julio Cedillo's double brought the runs in. DeLeon added an RBI double in the 4th, Diaz launched a 2-run HR (#7) in the 6th and they added 3 more in the 8th on a Cedillo 2-run HR (#6) and a Gavin Lux RBI double. Once again everyone in the lineup had at least one hit. So it's now 16 of 17 for the Rays and if you had told me two weeks ago they'd be 6 games up in the division I'd have told you to put down the crack pipe.

Team record: 27-14. Next up: An off-day then a quick trip to the nation's capital for 2 games against the Nationals before returning home.

Art Deco · 12-10-2020, 04:54 PM

May 15: Sent P Mack Anglin to AAA Durham for a rehab assignment.

Mack will need a couple of starts at Durham at least, and obviously there's no rush to bring him back since the 5 current starters are dealing. By the way, guess who'll be ready for a rehab assignment in about 3 weeks? Vidal Brujan, remember him? This is about a month or two earlier than originally prognosticated when he first went down last year. With a year and a half left on his $13M/year contract and Gavin Lux and Connor Kirkley already on the roster, I've been shopping Brujan and I can get a decent return, especially if I retain some salary which isn't a problem. Stay tuned.

Game 1: The Rays brought their winning run into the nation's capital and made it a season-high 9 straight wins (and 17 of 18) with a 4-2 win behind more brilliance from Alec Sachais. The rookie righty took a 2-hit shutout into the 7th before giving up a 2-out HR to Josh Ellis. He came out for the 8th since his pitch count was only at 81 but gave up a leadoff homer to Jurickson Profar so it was time to get Daniel Espino. He had a 1-2-3 8th and then with lefties Drew Mendoza and Juan Soto due, Jose Alvarado got the 9th inning call. He whiffed Mendoza and walked Soto but got Gleyber Torres to ground into a game-ending double play to get save #3. Sachais went 7 4 2 2 0 7 and is now 3-0, 2.34 with an outstanding 5/42 BB/K ratio in 34.2 innings. The offense came early with a Bobby Witt Jr sac fly in the 1st, a Gavin Lux RBI single (3 more hits for him today, 19 for his last 45) in the 2nd, and Ricky Widmar's 2nd MLB HR in the 4th. Yordan Alvarez added a sac fly in the 7th to make it 4-0. Speaking of hot hitters, Nate Clark was 4-4 today and is 25 for his last 54, raising his average from .248 to .313.

Mack Anglin rehab update: Quite the mixed bag, as Anglin struck out 6 in 3 2/3 innings but also gave up 6 hits and 6 runs with 2 walks on 77 pitches. We'll check in on him again in 5 days.

Game 2: This is really getting kind of ridiculous. By the 4th inning it was 2-0 Rays. By the 5th it was 8-0. By the 6th it was 15-0. Rays hitters took mercy on the Washington staff the rest of the way and hung on for a 15-1 win, #10 in a row and 18th in their last 19. The star of the show on offense was Gavin Lux, who hit a pair of 2-run homers to give him 10 on the year. The first was the one that made it 2-0 in the 4th and the second came in the 6-run 5th. Nate Clark also hit a 3-run shot (#11). Ricky Widmar drove in three, Ryan Jeffers had a 2-run single and even starting pitcher Christian Little managed his first MLB RBI on a grounder to deep 3rd base. Speaking of Little, he was dominating as usual, going 7 3 0 0 2 7 (although the 1 K per inning rate was low for him). Hayden Johns went the final 2 innings, giving up an unearned run when Connor Kirkley, who came on for Lux, booted a 2-out grounder in the 8th allowing the run to score. The Yankees swept their series with Seattle, so the lead remains 5 1/2 games.

Team record: 29-14. Next up: 4 at home vs Seattle.

Art Deco · 12-10-2020, 08:52 PM

Game 1: The Rays jumped out to a 5-0 lead after 3 and it was "here we go again", but Rece Hinds and Seattle had other ideas as their slugging 3B hit a pair of HRs to tie the game and the Mariners eventually prevailed in 11 innings 7-6 to snap the Rays' 10-game win streak. After Jack Leiter allowed Seattle to score in the 4th, Hinds stepped up and hit his first HR to make it 5-3, and in the 6th Hinds took Leiter deep again with a man on to equalize. Outside of those two pitches, Leiter pitched decently but ended up 6.2 6 5 5 2 8. The Rays had a great chance to win it in the bottom of the 9th off one of their recent teammates, Steven Casey, who put men on 2nd and 3rd with 1 out. But Nate Clark hit a foul pop, and Casey wisely intentionally walked Yordan Alvarez to load the bases as he struggles with lefties but is death to righties. And he then struck out the righty Judson Fabian as I had no lefty to pinch-hit on the bench. Seattle then scored off Jose Alvarado when Jarred Kelenic stole 3rd and scored on Keibert Ruiz's throwing error. But the Rays answered back in the bottom of the 10th when Ruiz atoned for his error by doubling in Jhon Diaz. However in the 11th Jasseel De La Cruz gave up a 2-out RBI double to another former Ray, pinch-hitter Patrick Bailey and this time the Rays couldn't answer in the bottom. They did jump out to that 5-0 lead primarily on the strength of a 3-run Bobby Witt Jr HR (#4), along with a Fabian RBI single and Alvarez's 8th HR of the year in the 3rd, a solo shot. A tough loss but you can't win 'em all.

Game 2: The Rays bounced back from last night's loss with an 8-2 drubbing of Seattle behind the surprise power bat of Julio Cedillo. The rookie CF blasted two more HRs today, driving in 3 and giving him 8 for the season. Cedillo is only rated at 45 power and the 8 HR match his career high at any level, set as an 18-year-old in DSL ball in 67 games. Although they weren't the biggest hits in the game, they made a moderate lead a big one, important after last night's blown 5-run lead. The big hit came in the 2nd inning when Gavin Lux broke a 1-1 tie with a bases-clearing double to make it 4-1. Judson Fabian also went deep for #6, a solo shot in the 3rd which preceded the first of Cedillo's. Yordan Alvarez had an RBI single in the 1st for the other Rays run. Blake Money got the start against his old team and started strong, striking out the side in the 1st, but had trouble getting the ball over the plate and just barely made it out of the 5th to qualify for the win when Judson Fabian threw out Jarred Kelenic at home to end the inning with Money at 102 pitches. He still went to 6-0 with a 5 5 2 2 4 7 line. Christian Chamberlain relieved him and was brilliant again, striking out 4 in 1 2/3 innings, and Jack Filby finished out the game going the final 2 1/3 and getting out of a bases-loaded jam in the 9th. The Yankees lost and Blue Jays won, so they are both tied for 2nd 6 games behind the Rays.

Game 3: The offense was in high gear again, banging out 11 runs and 16 hits thanks a pair of 5-run innings in an 11-5 win over Seattle. But the big story of the game was not a good one. Beating out an infield single in the 8th, Julio Cedillo tore his PCL and is done for the season. He's been such a sparkplug for the team, provided 70 defense in CF and was finishing up another 3-hit game as he ended his season with an impressive 1.9 WAR through mid-May. He's going to be missed greatly and we don't really have an obvious replacement for him. More on that at the end of this recap. As for the game, Ricky Widmar had the biggest game of his young MLB career, blasting a 3-run HR in the 2nd to break a 1-1 tie and then hitting a 2-run double to help turn a 6-4 game into an 11-4 game in the 8th. Nate Clark was 2-5 with a HR and 2 RBI, Judson Fabian was 3-4 with 2 RBI and is now hitting .325, and Isaac DeLeon and Jhon Diaz were each 2-4 with an RBI. Shane McClanahan started and was not very good, going 3.1 7 4 4 4 4. Hayden Johns took over for him in the 4th and bucked the trend of his recent poor outing to retire all 8 men he faced, striking out 5 of them and earning his 1st win of the season. When it was 6-4 Daniel Espino and Jose Alvarado each had a strong inning of relief, and after it was 11-4 Aaron Ashby came on and gave up on a run in finishing the game. The Yankees won while Toronto lost so the lead remains 6 over New York.

Now as for the Cedillo replacement options, I had been using Diaz in CF but he's only a 40 there and not a long-term solution. The same goes for Fabian. Shane Sasaki is the CF at Durham but he's even worse, a 35. So short of trading for a real CF (a possibility with Brujan on the block) the best internal solution is Dayle Jenkins at AA Montgomery. He's a legit prospect ranked #49 overall by BNN, a 55 in CF, and the editor sees him as having present MLB ability of 269/345/444 with the potential to do better. That slash line is almost on the nose for his current stats at Montgomery. He was acquired last year from the Phillies for Kevin Schell in a swap of 2025 1st rounders as I was trying to beef up the CF depth in the organization. I'd have to put him on the 40-man (I will this winter anyway) but that's not a problem with 2 spots open already and 1 more opening up with Cedillo going on the 60-day IL. I may look into trade options first.

OK I made a trade, and hoo boy, it's not a very popular one in the Tampa Bay media (and the fan interest "almost crashed" - for the 85th time):

And so continues the Ouroboros-shaped career of Jasson Dominguez. Acquired by us back in 2020 in a deal with the Yankees, he never panned out in accordance with the hype he had back then during his 5-6 seasons in our minor league system and with him approaching minor league free agency, we dealt him back to the Yankees in 2026 for a guy you might have heard of, Nate Clark (who at time looked like a decent, if not spectacular hitting prospect who suddenly went nuts after the deal) and after he rejoined the Yankees, like Clark he suddenly tapped into his potential. Dominguez is now a 70-rated CF and is projected to hit .284 with 46 HRs. That's legit because he's already hit 8 in 82 AB filling in for Victor Robles when he was injured. He may actually be an improvement over Cedillo and is only 25. Of course the price for this almost-too-good-to-be-true Cedillo replacement is Vidal Brujan, one of the franchise cornerstones for the last 6 years. It will be galling to see him in Yankee pinstripes but I was fearing Dominguez more in their lineup down the line than Brujan. Also his skills had declined a bit as he's now 30 and coming off a serious injury. Plus we're only retaining 25% of his salary, which will still save us almost $10M next season, important because we really don't have anyone coming off the books and guys like Christian Little are going to be due a BIG jump in salary in arbitration. So the deal was a no-brainer on a baseball and intellectual level, even if it hurts on an emotional one.

Game 4: The bats went (relatively) quiet today and some very sloppy play in the field (mainly in the person of Gavin Lux) doomed the Rays to a 6-3 loss to Seattle, leaving the teams with a series split. Alec Sachais got off to a shaky start against his old team, giving up an Evan White HR in the 1st and 2 more runs in the 2nd, with one of them scoring thanks to Lux's first error of the day. The 2 Seattle runs in the 2nd erased a brief 2-1 Rays lead on a 2-run single from Yordan Alvarez, but Bobby Witt Jr. tied it up with an RBI single in the 3rd. Sachais settled down, but had to leave in the 6th at 5.2 4 3 2 2 6 on 107 pitches. Jack Filby got the final out of the 6th but ran into trouble in the 7th. He walked the leadoff man and then got an infield pop, but Lux misplayed it into a single. Evan Godwin then came in to face lefty Luke Raley, whom Sachais had whiffed three times, but Raley had the last laugh with a 3-run HR off Godwin which provided the Mariners' winning margin. Meanwhile Nathan Witt shut down the Rays bats in the middle innings, and the Seattle pen held the Rays hitless over the final 3 1/3 including a save in the 9th from ex-Ray Steven Casey. Jasson Dominguez made his Rays debut in CF and went 1-3 with a walk off Casey in the 9th (a rare sight as the one hole in Dominguez's game is his reluctance to take walks) with a caught stealing. Rays baserunners were 0-5 in the series against Sean Murphy and Patrick Bailey trying to steal, also a rare sight. The Yankees lost to Boston so the 6-game lead remains intact.

Team record: 31-16. Next up: An off-day and then the Angels come to town for 3.

Mack Anglin rehab update: He looked pretty damn good today at Durham, going 7 4 0 0 0 7 on 86 pitches. He's probably ready to come back now, but who gets bumped from the rotation? Or do I make it a 6-man rotation? Either way, who goes to Durham? Christian Chamberlain would seem the obvious choice, but he's been excellent, going 7.2 1 0 0 3 11 in his 4 appearances. Hayden Johns is our only legit long reliever so it would be tough to send him down. Decisions like these are why I'm paid the big bucks, I guess.

Art Deco · 12-11-2020, 04:30 PM

Game 1: Joe Barker's 5th HR of the year leading off the 9th against Angels reliever (and top prospect) Danny de Jesus gave the Rays a walk-off 4-3 win in a hard-fought, back-and-forth affair. Christian Little got the start and was his usual brilliant strikeout self, going 6 5 1 1 2 10 but picked up another no-decision leaving the game tied at 1. After Daniel Espino struck out the side in the 7th around a couple of singles (he now has 34 whiffs in 19.2 innings), Ricky Widmar hit a bases-loaded, 2-run single to put the Rays on top (Widmar had driven in their previous run with a 5th-inning double). But Jose Alvarado blew the lead (and a save) in the 8th, giving up a 2-run HR to Jeremiah Jackson. Jasseel De La Cruz started the 9th, but walked Kyren Paris who stole 2nd and advanced to 3rd with two out and lefty slugger Anthony Rizzo due, so Evan Godwin came in. Godwin got Rizzo on a fly ball, setting the stage for Barker's heroics and picking up his first win of the season. The Yankees won so the lead remains 6.

Game 2: Different day, same result as the Rays once against bested the Angels 4-3. This time it didn't take bottom-of-the-9th heroics, just some decent bullpen work to ensure victory. Nate Clark had the game's big hit, a 3-run HR (#13) off Logan Allen in the 3rd inning which made it 3-1. Jack Leiter started and was knocked around a bit in the first for a run but sailed from there until the 5th, when he gave up a solo HR to Anthony Rizzo, 3rd in the AL in WAR and having a renaissance season with the Angels at age 38 in his second go-round with them. Leiter continued to stand strong, though, and made it through 7 with a 7 6 2 2 1 6 line and is now 5-2, 3.39. Jasson Dominguez got his first RBI as a Ray in the 7th thanks to a bases-loaded walk, and that run later proved to be big. I noted earlier how Dominguez doesn't walk much (he had only 2 in 82 AB with the Yankees) but he's drawn 3 now in 3 starts and tonight's was important as Jose Alvarado struggled again in the 8th, giving up 2 hits and leaving with the tying runs at 2nd and 3rd and 2 out. Daniel Espino came in and threw a wild pitch to make it 4-3, but got Nick Solak to fly out to end the threat and Jasseel De La Cruz pitched around a single for a 2K 9th and save #8. The Yankees fell in extras at Baltimore so the lead has grown to a season-high 7 games.

News from Durham: It appears that Andy Aparicio is broken in some fasion. He pitched very well in his first couple of starts since being sent to Durham but has just been horrendous over his last several. Tonight he went 3.1 7 9 7 1 6 and has allowed 23 ER in his last 18 1/3 innings over 4 starts. He still has a 9/24 BB/K ratio in those 18 1/3 innings so it's not his arm or his stuff and he hasn't given up an inordinate # of HRs (3). Perhaps he's going through the worst BABIP luck ever (Durham's defense is pretty bad) but it's kind of alarming.

Game 3: My decision as to whom to replace in the rotation when Mack Anglin comes back (either this weekend or shortly thereafter) just got a lot tougher after Blake Money threw 6 1-hit shutout innings to lead the Rays to a 5-1 win over the Angels and a series sweep. The win is also the 23rd in the Rays' last 26 games. I constantly have to resist the temptation to say he was "money", but Money was brilliant, going 6 1 0 0 2 5 on 94 pitches and is 7-0, 2.29. With some tough lefties starting the 7th (and with the bullpen a bit thin after the last two nights), I gave Christian Chamberlain his first high-leverage opportunity and he came through, retiring the side in order with a couple of whiffs. Another lefty, Alex Verdugo, led off the 8th so I left Chamberlain in and he gave up a double, with Verdugo coming around later to score off Jack Filby, who was a bit shaky and had the tying runs in scoring position before getting Luis Renfigo to ground to first. The offensive star today was Jasson Dominguez, who had two huge hits. His first was his first Rays HR, a solo shot the opposite way to left which made it 3-0, and then with the score 3-1 in the bottom of the 8th the Rays had loaded the bases with nobody out, but Jhon Diaz hit into a force at the plate and Isaac DeLeon hit a shallow fly ball. Just when it looked like they'd squander the opportunity, Dominguez delivered a 2-run single to make it a comfortable 5-1 lead. The game was 0-0 until the bottom of the 6th when Yordan Alvarez singled in a run and Jud Fabian had a sac fly to make it 2-0 Rays early. So what to do about Anglin? My instincts right now are to go to a 6-man rotation, keep Chamberlain up as an extra lefty and send Hayden Johns to Durham, even though he doesn't deserve it. On merit based on 2028 to date the pitcher to drop from the rotation would be Shane McClanahan, but you can't demote the reigning Cy Young award winner to long relief, can you? Decisions, decisions. And at least those decisions aren't as fraught with danger now that the Rays are 8 games up in the AL East after another Yankees loss.

Team record: 34-16. Next up: a weekend 3-game visit to the Phillies. They're off to an impressive 33-17 start and have a very power-laden lineup with the likes of Bryce Harper, Miguel Sano, Francisco Lindor, one-time Ray Nate Lowe and more. Their 81 HR in 50 games is 1st in MLB so I fear for McClanahan, Sachais and Little this weekend. Of course we have some guys who can take advantage of that park also as our 73 HR total ain't too shabby considering we play half our games in the Trop.

Art Deco · 12-11-2020, 07:53 PM

Game 1: The Rays jumped out to an 8-1 lead in the 6th inning and hung on to beat the Phillies 8-5 in their first trip to Citizens Bank Park since 2015. Despite the high score, until the 5th inning it was a pitchers' duel between Shane McClanahan and Jack Patterson with the Phillies up 1-0 on a 1st inning run scored due to a Gavin Lux error. But that changed in the 5th. Keibert Ruiz and McClanahan were retired to start the inning, but Ricky Widmar singled, Lux walked and Nate Clark stepped up and blasted HR #14 to make it 3-1. And the Rays really busted it open in the 6th on a 2-run double from Jasson Dominguez and a 3-run blast (#4) from Widmar. Mac was cruising through 5, whiffing 8 and only allowing 3 hits but the Phillies got to him in the bottom of the 6th on a 2-run single from Francisco Lindor and a 2-run HR by Brendan Rodgers. So it was up to the bullpen, a bullpen with Godwin, Alvarado and JDLC unavailable. So Jack Filby got through the 7th, Aaron Ashby whiffed Bryce Harper and got another out in the 8th, and Daniel Espino grabbed a 4-out save with 3 whiffs, his 1st of the year. Mac improved to 5-2 although he saw his ERA rise to 4.24. The Yankees beat the Mets so the lead stays at 8.

May 27: Optioned P Hayden Johns to AAA Durham, activated P Mack Anglin from his rehab assignment at AAA Durham.

So the 6-man rotation it is, Johns is an MLB pitcher but he had options and was the most logical choice to go down. Anglin will return with a baptism of fire at Citizens Bank Park.

Game 2: It what will go down as one of the wildest games of the year, the Rays came back from a 1st inning 5-0 deficit to eventually go ahead 9-6, only to end up losing 11-9 on a Jordan Groshans 2-run walk-off HR off Jasseel De La Cruz. Mack Anglin was activated off the IL today and man, it did not go well in the 1st inning. He gave up the cycle, including a 2-run HR to Bryce Harper in an inning that saw the Phillies score 5 times on 6 hits. With Hayden Johns down in Durham we don't really have a long reliever now and the bullpen continues a bit thin so he stayed in and actually pitched well over the next 4 innings, allowing only a Francisco Lindor longball to end up 5 8 6 6 2 2. And this bought the Rays enough time to come back, first with a 3-run HR from Gavin Lux (#11) in the 3rd, then a 2-run shot by Bobby Witt Jr (#5) in the 4th, an RBI single and a sac fly from Nate Clark in the 5th and 7th, and Jasson Dominguez's 2nd Rays HR and 10th overall in the 6th, and after 6 1/2 it was 9-6 Rays with Christian Chamberlain pitching a 1-2-3 6th. But Chamberlain didn't have it in the 7th, giving up two infield singles and then a 3-run HR to the same-handed Harper to tie the game. Chamberlain put a couple of more on and Aaron Ashby bailed him out and also pitched through the 8th, but JDLC gave up a Lindor single and then the HR to Groshans for Philly to walk it off in the 9th. Ricky Widmar had himself a day in a losing effort, going 4-5, scoring 3 runs and stealing a base. These two teams have the best records in their respective leagues right now and it would be quite a wild World Series if they met up in a rematch of 2008. The Yankees did finally gain ground on the Rays by beating the Mets, so the lead is down to 7.

Game 3: It was deja vu all over again as the Rays bullpen once again blew a 3-run lead in the late innings and lost on a walk-off homer to the Phillies. Today it was an 8-7 final and Tyler Freeman was the HR hero, blasting a shot to center off Jose Alvarado leading off the 9th. The lack of options hurt the Rays again, with Evan Godwin in his second inning of work pitching to Miguel Sano with no real fully rested RHP available in the pen, and he gave up a 2-run HR that made it 7-6 in the 8th, put a couple more on, and a slightly-tired Jack Filby gave up the tying run. Alec Sachais started and had a game he'll never forget. Not for his pitching, which was OK at 6 5 4 4 2 6 considering the park and the opponent, but for his hitting as he drilled a HR in the 3rd inning off Ryan Rolison, the first HR by a Rays pitcher I've had in this save. In fact the first 4 Rays runs all scored on solo HRs: Gavin Lux (#12) in the 1st, Sachais in the 3rd, Joe Barker (#6) in the 5th and Bobby Witt Jr (#6) in the 7th. They then added 2 more in the 7th on back-to-back doubles by Jasson Dominguez and Keibert Ruiz and a Jhon Diaz pinch-hit RBI single. Barker added an RBI single in the 8th to make it 7-4, but you can never have enough runs in this park as the Rays found out the last two days. The Yankees won again, so the lead is cut to 6 with a series in NY looming and a beleaguered bullpen.

Team record: 35-18. Next up: Out of the frying pan and into the fire at Yankee Stadium for 3 big games with New York. Maybe going to a 7-man bullpen wasn't the greatest idea.

Art Deco · 12-12-2020, 10:08 AM

Game 1: After a pair of heartbreaking losses in Philly the Rays snapped back and won a big 7-3 game over the Yankees, dashing any hopes of the Bronx Bombers to significantly cut into the division lead which now stands at 7. Christian Little got the start and was his usual self again, even if it didn't look that way in the early innings when he gave up 2 runs (1 earned) on 4 hits and had only two whiffs through 3 innings. But after that he was untouchable and ended the day 7 4 2 1 1 10 to lower his ERA to 2.66 and finally get on the winning side of the ledger at 4-3. Joe Barker and Jasson Dominguez led the offense, with the former rapping a pair of RBI singles and the latter with an RBI and 2-run HR (#3/#11). Keibert Ruiz also had an RBI single and Ricky Widmar was 2-4 with a sac fly and a steal. Christian Chamberlain had a nice 8th including a whiff of Vlad Jr to end the inning but as usual when I push him to a 2nd inning he struggled, and after he put two on I had to summon JDLC to get the final two outs in a non-save situation.

Game 2: Jack Leiter, who grew up in nearby New Jersey while his dad was a Yankee broadcaster, pitched another fine game before the locals as the Rays took care of the Yankees again 6-2. Leiter was 6.1 3 2 2 1 6 and was only dinged for HRs by Juan Pereyra (in his MLB debut) and Joe Allen, before giving way to Evan Godwin who pitched 1 2/3 scoreless, with Aaron Ashby pitching the 9th. Leiter left with a 4-2 lead thanks to an RBI grounder from Jud Fabian, a bases-loaded walk to Jasson Dominguez, a Yordan Alvarez sac fly and a Bobby Witt Jr solo shot (#7). Keibert Ruiz's 8th inning 2-run HR (#4) off Mike Tudor gave the Rays some breathing room as they now go ahead by a commanding 8 games in the division. Leiter improves to 6-2, 3.34.

Game 3: The Rays completed the sweep of the Yankees and opened up a 9-game lead in the AL East with a 3-1 win. Blake Money started and wasn't his sharpest, but got the job done including getting Vlad Jr to ground into a double play in the 5th with the bases loaded and one out. He struggled with his control but limited the damage to an Alan Trejo HR in a 5.2 5 1 1 5 5 performance. The bullpen was solid over the final 3 1/3, with Jack Filby going 1 1/3, Daniel Espino getting 5 outs and Jose Alvarado coming in to retire Juan Pereyra for the final out of the game and save #4. Money goes to 8-0, 2.23. The offense was almost exclusively supplied by Yordan Alvarez and Judson Fabian, who combined for 6 of the team's 8 hits. Alvarez had an RBI double in the 1st and a solo HR (#9) in the 3rd, and Fabian hit HR #7 in the 7th to make it 3-1.

Team record: 38-18. Next up: An off-day followed a weekend in Kansas City.

And here's some league recognition for Blake Money:

Also, from Durham:

Art Deco · 12-12-2020, 04:12 PM

Game 1: The Rays went HR-happy and needed every one of them to edge the Royals 8-7 in a wild, back-and-forth game. The star of the game was Jasson Dominguez, who went deep three times including a solo shot in the 8th to tie the game at 7. Dominguez had a 2-run HR in the 2nd and a solo blast in the 6th, giving him 6 as a Ray (in only 39 AB) and 14 overall. He became the 2nd Rays player to go deep 3 times in a game this season as Isaac DeLeon had done so in Baltimore in early May, and it was a DeLeon HR in the 9th that won the game for the Rays, his first since that 3-run HR game and his 4th of the year. Before that the Rays had built a 5-1 lead in the 6th on Dominguez's 2 HRs, a Judson Fabian RBI single and Jhon Diaz's sac fly. Shane McClanahan started and was cruising, having only allowed a Renato Nunez longball but ran out of gas in the 6th, putting a couple of men on with one in, and then Jack Filby totally lost control of the situation, giving up an RBI single, RBI double and a 2-run HR to MJ Melendez and suddenly the Royals were ahead 6-5. Yordan Alvarez hit HR #10 in the top of the 7th to tie it at 6, but Nunez went deep again for KC, this time off Christian Chamberlain to give the Royals the lead before Dominguez and DeLeon homered to complete the Rays' comeback. Evan Godwin picked up win #2 with a scoreless 8th, Jose Alvarado got 2 out in the 9th and put a man on, so Jasseel De La Cruz came in and whiffed Kyle Lewis to end the game and get save #9. In the former Rays department, Hunter Bishop was 0-5 with 4 whiffs, Triston Casas went 2-5, and Nunez was almost impossible to retire, 4-5 with the 2 homers (he's having a big year at age 34 (332/382/559 with 12 HR). Also Xavier Edwards and Ian Lewis were in the lineup and had been Rays farmhands, so 5 of the 9 KC starters were ex-Rays in some fashion. The Yankees lost and fell into a tie with Toronto so the division lead is now 10 1/2 over both.

Game 2: The Rays took another wild one in a series that's resembling last weekend's in Philly, except the Rays are actually winning the games. Today it was 12-9 in a game where the offense kept building big leads and Mack Anglin kept giving them back. On the heels of his shaky return start last weekend against the Phillies, Anglin was pretty awful again today and might end up a long reliever for a while if he keeps it up. After the Rays made it 3-0 in the 2nd on a 3-run homer by Bobby Witt Jr (#8) in his old environs, Anglin surrendered 2 runs in the bottom of the inning, and after Jhon Diaz hit his own 3-run blast in the top of the 3rd as part of a 5-run inning to make it 8-2, Anglin gave 4 back to the Royals. The only reason he was staying in the game was that the Rays had the lead. The Rays expanded the lead to 11-6 in the 5th on back-to-back jacks from Diaz again (#9) and Jasson Dominguez (his 4th in 2 days and #7 with the Rays and #15 overall), and Anglin had two quiet innings to get through the bottom of the 5th. But he ran into trouble again in the sixth, and Aaron Ashby wasn't very good in relief, and it was 11-8. Anglin still picked up the win, perhaps the worst start I've had in this save from a Rays pitcher to get one, going 5.2 6 8 8 5 3. Ashby gave up Kyle Lewis' 2nd HR of the game in the bottom of the 7th after Nate Clark's sac fly in the top of the inning, and somehow the final 2 innings didn't see a run from either team as Evan Godwin pitched a clean 8th and Daniel Espino had a 1-2-3 9th for his 2nd save. Yordan Alvarez and Judson Fabian had RBI singles earlier, and Witt had a sac fly to give him a 4-RBI day to go with the 4 driven in by Diaz. Dominguez tallied 4 hits on the day himself as the bats are simply unconscious right now, a far cry from the first 25 or so games when the offense had trouble rubbing two sticks together.

Game 3: Rained out. It'll be made up as part of a doubleheader when KC comes to town on June 30th. So Alec Sachais will now go 9 days between starts with the 6-man rotation, this rainout, and an off-day tomorrow.

Team record: 40-18. Next up: An off-day, then back home for an odd 2-game series vs Toronto.

Art Deco · 12-12-2020, 08:53 PM

Drafted SS Robbie Salazar in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 1, Pick 31, 31st overall pick).
Drafted RF Jose Sandoval in the 2028 first-year player draft (Supplemental Round 1, Pick 4, 36th overall pick).
Drafted SP Jim Beasley in the 2028 first-year player draft (Supplemental Round 1, Pick 5, 37th overall pick).
Drafted RF Danny Melendez in the 2028 first-year player draft (Supplemental Round 1, Pick 6, 38th overall pick).
Drafted SP Kevin Epperly in the 2028 first-year player draft (Supplemental Round 1, Pick 7, 39th overall pick).
Drafted SP Mike Keck in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 2, Pick 31, 70th overall pick).
Drafted C Chris Mangialardi in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 3, Pick 25, 98th overall pick).
Drafted SP Sincere DuBose in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 4, Pick 27, 126th overall pick).
Drafted CF Steve Huber in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 5, Pick 29, 157th overall pick).
Drafted SP Alex Covarrubias in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 6, Pick 29, 187th overall pick).

So we had all these supplemental 1st round picks this year thanks to all the free agents we lost last offseason (Franco, Hiura, Marsh, Manning), giving us 5 of top 39 overall picks. Wish this were the NFL where I could package several of these to move up, but it ain't, so we ended up with some good players but nobody that really got me excited. This year's draft did not seem as deep as last season's. Our top pick, Salazar, is a HS SS out of Georgia who has potential 55-60 gap power, and a potential 75 eye, but 45 contact.

Sandoval is a 6'6" power-hitting prospect from high school in Puerto Rico with decent speed and a cannon arm for a RF.

Beasley is a college starter (Illinois) who's a power sinkerballer whose ceiling is mid-rotation (Metzler, our scout) or #2 (OSA).

Melendez is a high-school RF who profiles as a pure hitter, with potential 65-80 contact and 55-60 power.

Epperly is interesting, a high-school LHP who has potential 70 movement and 70 control but 45 stuff as an extreme ground-baller who throws 89-91. We better shore up the defense by the time he gets here.

Our 2nd round pick Keck is similar to Epperly except he's a RHP and has a bit more velocity but profiles as another worm-killer.

Mangialardi is a good-hitting catcher out of HS with 55 potential contact and power, and 75 potential gap power.

HSer DuBose is a potential middle to back-end starter who also has a groundball profile, although he throws in the mid-90s. Control could be an issue with him.

Huber is a HS CF who projects to have decent power and contact with good bat speed and Metzler sees him as a starting CF down the line.

Covarrubias is a finesse righty from Georgia Tech (hey it's the 6th round).

Art Deco · 12-13-2020, 08:42 AM

Game 1: After two days off (and eight days of rest for starter Alec Sachais), the Rays got off to a slow start on the mound and at the plate, but managed to find their bearings to eventually blow out Toronto 9-2. Sachais gave up a single and a triple to start the game and put the Rays in an immediate hole, but did well in stranding the runner at 3rd to keep it 1-0. He gave up a 1-out double in the 2nd, and then went 5 2/3 no-hit innings to end it a very Sachais-like 7 3 1 1 0 9 and go to 4-0, 2.70. The bats were slumbering through 4 innings against Jays starter Chris Ellis, who came into the game with an ERA over 6. But they came to life in a 6-run 5th that consisted of a 2-run Bobby Witt Jr single, a Nate Clark sac fly, and a 3-run blast by Yordan Alvarez (#11 and finally heating up?). They added 3 more in the 8th on back-to-back doubles by Jhon Diaz and Jasson Dominguez and Ricky Widmar's 2-run triple. Christian Chamberlain gave up an Edmundo Sosa HR in the 8th in his inning of work while Jack Filby had a 1-2-3 2K 9th to close it out.

Game 2: Jack Leiter just didn't have it today as the Jays proceeded to Leit him up for 8 runs in an 8-4 win over the Rays, snapping a 6-game win streak. Skyler Messinger hit the first of his 2 HRs off Leiter in the 1st inning, a 3-run shot before he could retire anyone, and it just snowballed from there as he went 4 10 8 8 1 5 and saw his ERA balloon to 4.14. Aaron Ashby and Christian Chamberlain combined for 5 innings of 2-hit relief but that just kept the Jays from double digits. The offense was sluggish, scoring twice in the bottom of the first to make it look like it might be a game on an Nate Clark RBI and a Judson Fabian RBI single (Fabes was 4-4 and is now hitting .343, tops in the AL), but all they could manage after that were solo HRs from Gavin Lux (#13, a massive shot to dead center) and Ryan Jeffers, his first as a Ray.

Team record: 41-19. Next up: 4 at home vs Boston.

Art Deco · 12-13-2020, 11:08 AM

Game 1: This was a weird one which included something I think I can safely say I've never seen (and maybe has never happened for all I know or I can Google). The Rays scored their first 7 runs on 7 solo homers on their way to a 9-6 win over Boston that never should have been that close. It all started when Isaac DeLeon led off the game with #5 and Gavin Lux immediately followed suit with the first of two he'd hit. Nate Clark hit the first of his two in the 3rd, Keibert Ruiz led off the 4th with his 5th, and then Lux (#15), Clark (#16) and Yordan Alvarez (#12) went back-to-back-to-back to make it 7-1. Clark (who ended up 4-4) and Alvarez added RBI singles in the 5th and 7th to increase the lead to 9-1. Meanwhile Blake Money was flat-out dealing in winning his 8th straight start since joining the rotation, going 6 5 1 1 1 10 and moving to 9-0, 2.16. The pen had its problems, though. Jack Filby pitched a scoreless 7th, but Evan Godwin couldn't get anyone out and gave up 3 runs in the 8th and Daniel Espino had to clean up his mess with a pair of whiffs. And Jose Alvarado followed in Godwin's footsteps, struggling to get one out while allowing two more runs, so Jasseel De La Cruz had to get the final 2 outs of the 9th and pick up save #10. The net result was that we had to use 5 pitchers to protect a 9-1 lead going into the 7th, not exactly optimal.

Game 2: Mac is back. Shane McClanahan pitched like the reigning AL Cy Young winner he is, going 7 5 0 0 0 5 to lead the Rays to a 3-1 win over Boston. He goes to 6-2 and gets his ERA back under 4 at 3.88 as he was never in serious trouble tonight. He needed to pitch as well as he did because the offense was apparently still tired from circling the bases yesterday and only squeezed out 5 hits. A couple of them came in a key 4th inning rally which saw them score twice. After loading the bases off Boston starter Johan Oviedo with 1 out, Judson Fabian hit a shallow fly ball that couldn't get the runner home. But Oviedo then decided to walk Jhon Diaz and Jasson Dominguez, forcing in a pair of runs. After Daniel Espino pitched a 1-2-3 8th, Nate Clark's RBI double in the bottom gave the Rays some more breathing room. This made Jasseel De La Cruz's adventures in the 9th less stressful, as he walked Ryan Mountcastle with one out, wild-pitched him to 2nd, saw him advance to 3rd on a groundout, and then wild-pitched him home. But he struck out Lewis Brinson to end the game and grab save #11. Since starting the season a mediocre 11-13, the Rays have gone 32-6 since and with the Yankees losing tonight, now lead the AL East by a whopping 11 games.

Game 3: While Mac (McClanahan) was back yesterday, Mack (Anglin) is not. Coming into today, he had two disastrous starts since returning from the IL and added a third today. By the time the 2nd inning was over Boston had 5 runs and 7 hits on their way to an 8-4 win. The only positive to be gleaned from his outing is that he pitched very well over the next 4 innings, allowing only 1 hit and was through 6 on only 86 pitches. But of course I brought him out for the 7th and he gave up a leadoff homer so he ended the day 6 9 6 6 0 6. Still there was enough encouragement there that he'll take his next turn despite the fact we're going with 6 starters and have a bunch of off-days, as an 11-game division lead affords me that luxury. Aaron Ashby gave up 2 runs after relieving Anglin while Christian Chamberlain threw a scoreless 9th. Despite scoring 4 runs, the offense was pretty quiet as all 4 came on homers and we had only 3 non-longball hits. Judson Fabian hit a 2-run shot (#8) in the bottom of the 1st to briefly give the Rays a 2-1 lead, Yordan Alvarez hit a solo shot (#13) in the 4th, and Jasson Dominguez hit one with 2 out in the 9th (#8/#16). Bobby Witt Jr continues to disappoint - he was 0-4 with 2 whiffs today and is 215/278/388 for the year. I know there's positive regression coming but it's still concerning to see someone to whom we made a massive financial commitment still struggling in June. Also Nate Clark had to leave with a bruised elbow after getting hit by a pitch. The injury is minimal for one week, so we'll give him a rest here and there but not completely shut him down.

Game 4: Christian Little has pitched a lot of great games for the Rays the last couple of years, but this one was truly one of his best. In fact if not for Josh Naylor he'd have no-hit the Red Sox over 7 innings. As it was he went 7 2 0 0 1 14 on 102 pitches in a 3-0 Rays win with a couple of Naylor hits all Boston had to show against him. Little is now 5-3, 2.41 and has a 21/121 BB/K ratio in 74.2 innings. Daniel Espino followed with a 7-pitch, 1-2-3 8th with a K and Jose Alvarado, with lefties due and JDLC showing tired, gave up 2 hits to lead off the 9th to make it interesting but struck out the next 3 Red Sox to close it out and grab save #5. Leading off the game, Ricky Widmar supplied all the offense the Rays would need today with HR #5 just inside the LF foul pole off one-time Ray Chris Paddack. Widmar figured in the scoring again in the 3rd when he singled and was doubled to 3rd by Gavin Lux before Yordan Alvarez doubled them both in. Widmar ended up 3-4 with the HR and his AL-leading 23rd steal of the year.

Team record: 44-20. Next up: 3 games in Oriole Park at Camden Yards.

Art Deco · 12-13-2020, 11:31 PM

Game 1: Alec Sachais was dominant again as he combined with Christian Chamberlain and Jack Filby on a 5-0 2-hit shutout of Baltimore in a tough place to pitch. Sachais, who was just upgraded from 65 to 70 stuff per the scouts, went 7 2 0 0 1 11 on 99 pitches to go to 5-0, 2.39 with a 10/74 BB/K ratio in 60.1 innings. Neither he nor Blake Money (acquired in the same deal last year for Patrick Bailey) have lost a game since being put into the rotation. Yordan Alvarez's 3-run HR (#14) in the 1st inning was all the Rays needed on offense, although they did add Bobby Witt Jr's sac fly after Jasson Dominguez tripled, and Ricky Widmar's 2nd HR in as many days (#6) on a night they only managed 7 hits.

Game 2: The Rays scored early and often on their way to an 11-5 rout of Baltimore. Jhon Diaz broke out of a mini-slump with a 3-run HR (#10) to cap a 4-run 1st inning, Nate Clark returned to the lineup with a 2-run shot (#17) in the 3rd, and they added 3 more in the 4th on a Ryan Jeffers RBI double and RBI singles by Clark and Yordan Alvarez to go up 9-0. Meanwhile Jack Leiter was brilliant in the early going, pitching a perfect game through 5 with 7 strikeouts. But things unraveled for him fairly quickly, giving up a pair of doubles and a HR in the 6th to make it 9-3, and then two more solo HRs in the 7th before leaving with an odd 6.2 5 5 5 0 9 line, still good enough for win #7. Bobby Witt Jr (#9) and Alvarez (#15) added solo HRs in the 8th and 9th to round out the scoring, and Aaron Ashby went 2 1/3 with no hits or walks to finish out the game.

Game 3: The Blake Money/Christian Little/Alec Sachais triumvirate has been damn near unhittable over the last month and a half, and is one of the main reasons why this team is 36-7 after starting 11-13. Today it was Money's turn to dominate in an 8-4 not-really-that-close win over the Orioles to sweep the series in Baltimore. Money is now 10-0, 2.09 after a 6.2 4 1 1 1 9 performance as it's starting to look like yet another Cy Young Award will be coming to Tampa Bay unless these 3 end up splitting the votes. Christian Chamberlain gave up his obligatory HR to a righty when Druw Jones took him deep in the 8th, and Jose Alvarado put men on 2nd and 3rd to start his 9th inning and they both scored on grounders, which is why Baltimore ended up with 4. The offense did its usual thing, with Gavin Lux singling in Ricky Widmar in the top of the 1st to kick things off, and Jhon Diaz homering for the second straight day (#11) with a man on in the 4th to put the Rays ahead to stay 3-1. They blew it open in a 5-run 6th which featured a Jud Fabian RBI double, a Diaz RBI single, a 2-run double from Jasson Dominguez and an RBI single from Keibert Ruiz. The only bad news was that Isaac DeLeon went 0-4 today, snapping a 13-game hitting streak.

Team record: 47-20. Next up: An off-day, followed by Atlanta's first visit to the Trop since the 2025 World Series for 3 this weekend. The Braves, perennial playoff participants, are off to a rough 32-35 start this year but are on a 5-game winning streak.

Art Deco · 12-14-2020, 04:23 PM

Game 1: There was a lot of buzz in the baseball world about tonight's matchup of Cy Young winners as Mike Soroka faced Shane McClanahan in the opener of this interleague series, but as so often is the case the projected pitchers' duel fizzled out, although one of the pitchers hung in there and ended up doing OK. That pitcher turned out to be Mac, as the Rays ended up bombing Atlanta 14-3 and chased Soroka in the 3rd inning. At first though it looked like McClanahan would be the one taking an early shower as the Braves jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the 2nd inning on a 2-run Johan Cruz homer. But the Rays struck back against Soroka in the bottom of the inning with 4 runs, capped by a 3-run blast from Keibert Ruiz (#6). And when Nate Clark hit the first of his 2 longballs against Soroka in the 4th, he was pulled. That didn't stop the bleeding for Atlanta, though, as the Rays scored 7 times over the next three innings, including another HR from Clark with a man on (#19), a Bobby Witt Jr RBI double, an RBI single from Ruiz, etc, etc. Jasson Dominguez added HR #17 (9 as a Ray) later in the game as the Rays scored in every inning but the 6th. Clark and Ruiz each ended with 4-RBI nights, and everyone in the lineup had a hit (in fact aside from Witt and Yordan Alvarez, everyone had at least 2 hits). Mac (now 7-2) meanwhile settled down from his rough start and ended up striking out 11 over 7 innings for the win, even though he allowed 9 hits and the 3 runs. Jack Filby pitched the final 2 innings. The Yankees lost in Houston so the lead has now grown to an absurd 12 1/2 games.

Game 2: There was a weird feeling around the team after the game. They.....lost? Yes, the way things have been going lately a loss almost seems shocking, but some shaky work from the bullpen and a relatively quiet day at the plate added up to a 5-3 Atlanta win over the Rays. But there was a silver lining in the defeat as Mack Anglin finally appeared to be back in form after looking terrible in his 3 post-injury starts (20 ER in 16.1 innings). Anglin went 6 4 2 1 1 6 on 87 pitches, with his only problems being with Ronald Acuna Jr, who is a problem for most pitchers. Acuna's 3rd inning RBI double scored Michael Berglund, who reached when Nate Clark (in a rare start in the field) dropped a fly ball (now you know why they're rare) to give Atlanta a 1-0 lead, and in the 6th Acuna took Anglin deep to LCF to tie the game at 2. Otherwise Mack was in command, a great sign. The Rays were up 2-1 for awhile thanks to back-to-back homers from Jasson Dominguez and Keibert Ruiz (#7 and his 2nd in as many days). After Anglin left with the game tied at 2, Evan Godwin coughed up a run in the 7th to put the Braves ahead, but Dominguez got that run right back in the bottom of the frame on an inside-the-park HR, giving him a 2-HR game and 19 overall for the season. So with a tie game in the 8th Daniel Espino came in, normally lockdown time as he came in with an 0.67 ERA and 41 whiffs in 26 innings. But after striking out Acuna to start the inning, he gave up a single to Willy Adames and then a long and loud HR to Ozzie Albies and that proved to be the game-winner for Atlanta. Outside of Dominguez (and Ruiz who also had 2 hits), the offense only managed 2 other hits the whole night as they faced a rare lefty in Kantaro Yokoyama, who has bedeviled the Rays in the past (most notably 6 years ago with Cleveland when he stopped their 25-game win streak). Yordan Alvarez, Gavin Lux and Jhon Diaz, lefty hitters all, got the day off today in favor of Connor Kirkley, Joe Barker and Isaac DeLeon, none of whom did much. Yokoyoma was just the 19th lefty they've faced in 69 games this season and only the second they've seen this month.

Game 3: Normal service resumed at the Trop as the Rays had a dominant team pitching performance today in a 4-0 win over Atlanta. Christian Little got the start and was his usual self, but it took him 98 pitches to get through 5 innings so the bullpen had to get it done the rest of the way and they emphatically did. Little went 5 4 0 0 2 10 to go to 6-3, 2.26, while Jack Filby (2 perfect innings with 2 Ks), Jose Alvarado (1-2-3 with 2Ks) and Jasseel De La Cruz (also 1-2-3 with 2Ks) meant the staff had a combined 9 4 0 0 2 16 line today. With that kind of pitching it didn't take much offense to win and it wasn't until the 5th that the big hit of the game came, a 2-run HR to the rays tank by Gavin Lux (#16). They tacked on 2 more runs in the 6th on a Jhon Diaz RBI single and Jasson Dominguez's RBI fielder's choice.

Team record: 49-21. Next up: An off-day, then interleague play continues as the Mets come to town for a pair.

Art Deco · 12-14-2020, 09:18 PM

Game 1: What an ugly and disappointing game. After four perfect innings two days ago, the bullpen was horrific today, blowing a 3-run lead in the 9th to send us to extra innings where they gave up 5 more runs in an ultimate 11-8, 14-inning loss to the Mets. 7.1 14 9 7 3 9 was the combined line of the bullpen as the Mets scored twice in the 12th and 3 more times in the 15th. Alec Sachais got the start and while he was much more hittable than normal, he still got the job done after surrendering a 2-run HR to Miguel Andujar in the 1st inning, finishing 6.2 9 2 2 0 7 and leaving up 5-2. After Evan Godwin got the final out of the 7th, the Rays added another run to go up 6-2. Daniel Espino was ineffective for the second straight outing, giving up Andujar's 2nd HR of the game and another hit in the 8th, but Jose Alvarado rescued him. Alvarado then put one on with one out in the 9th for Jasseel De La Cruz to come on, and JDLC gave up another hit, putting two men on for Pete Alonso, and the Met slugger crushed a 2-0 pitch to tie the game. Jack Filby, in his second inning, should have been out of the 12th but Keibert Ruiz threw away a squibber in front of the plate that would have been the third out, and Danny Santana singled in both runners to give the Mets an 8-6 lead. But Jhon Diaz crushed HR #12 with a man on to tie it with one out, and the Rays put the next two men on but couldn't get the winning run in. That cost them in the 14th when with one out, Aaron Ashby loaded the bases and Andujar's career night continued when he cleared them for a 4-hit, 2-HR, 6-RBI game. Earlier the Rays were looking in good shape after Nate Clark hit #20 with a man on to give them a 4-2 lead and Judson Fabian hit his 2nd RBI double of the game as part of a 4-hit night. Gavin Lux was also on base 5 times with 4 hits and a walk in 7 plate appearances. Jasson Dominguez had to leave with a "moderate" 1-2 week back injury, so he may have to go on the IL. We may also need to call up a reliever.

June 21: Placed OF Jasson Dominguez on the 10-day IL with back stiffness, recalled OF Luis Berdin from AAA Durham.

We're going to fake it with Jhon Diaz and his 40 defense in CF for 10-14 days, the only other option was to call up Dayle Jenkins from AA but he'd have to go on the 40-man and we'd burn service time which isn't worth it for two weeks. Berdin finally gets the long-deserved call even if it is temporary.

Game 2: The Rays managed a split of their series with the Mets, hanging on for a 5-4 win with Blake Money making it 10 wins in 10 starts and going to 11-0. It looked like a romp in the early innings as the Rays raced out to a 5-0 lead by the 3rd. Yordan Alvarez singled in a run in the 1st, Ryan Jeffers had a 2-run single in the 2nd scoring Luis Berdin, who singled in his first MLB at-bat, and they picked up a 3rd run in the inning on a double play. Alvarez then followed with HR #16 in the 3rd. Meanwhile, Money was dealing, shutting out the Mets on 3 hits through 5 innings. But he got into trouble in the 6th, giving up a couple of hits, and with the bullpen down to a skeleton crew Jack Leiter was pressed into relief today with his next start being skipped thanks to the 6-man rotation and days off. The adjustment to relief did not suit Leiter well, as he gave up 3 hits, scoring Money's two runners and two of his own, and it was suddenly 5-4. Money's day ended 5.1 5 2 2 1 9. Leiter stayed on for the 7th and got a couple of outs, then walked a man and Daniel Espino got him out of the inning and pitched a scoreless 8th. Jasseel De La Cruz atoned for last night's debacle by getting a 1-2-3 9th, including a rematch with Pete Alonso with 2 out which he won when he got the Met slugger to ground to 2nd to end the game and picked up save #12. Berdin went 1-4 in his debut and stole a base. After the Rays torched New York starter Koby Blunt for the 5 runs, ex-Rays farmhand Emerson Hancock came on. You may recall we traded him at the end of spring training for Jeffers, and the Cards tried to sneak Hancock through waivers but the Mets claimed him. Anyway, Hancock has pitched well in long relief for New York and did so again today with 3 scoreless innings. He has a 12/52 BB/K ratio through 44 innings with a 3.22 ERA.

Team record: 50-22. Next up: a 7-game west coast trip starts with 4 games in Anaheim.

After the game we made a trade:

Wanted to pick up another lefty, for this year and next as Aaron Ashby will be a free agent (right now our only free agent) at year's end. Bowers has put up good numbers and will go to Durham for now, although he may replace Christian Chamberlain at some point. The price was right for me as Mace was never going to get a callup and he's toiled for 2 1/2 years at Durham and deserves an MLB shot (assuming Arizona gives him one).

Art Deco · 12-15-2020, 09:06 AM

Game 1: With only 3 relievers fresh after a couple of games with heavy bullpen usage, we were going to need Shane McClanahan to go deep tonight. Mission accomplished, as Mac pitched into the 8th and a 2-run double by Keibert Ruiz in the 9th gave the Rays a 4-3 win in the first game of the road trip. Mac went 7.1 7 2 2 2 4 on 102 pitches and gave way to Evan Godwin, who got the final two outs of the 8th as it went 2-2 to the 9th. Jhon Diaz walked, Luis Berdin reached on an error, and Ruiz ripped a double to the RF corner scoring them both. Jose Alvarado came in for the save, and although he gave up a 2-out HR to the same-handed Alex Verdugo, he still picked save #6 while Godwin notched win #3. The Rays' earlier runs came in the 3rd on a Gavin Lux RBI double, and in the 4th when Berdin had his first MLB extra-base hit and first MLB RBI with a run-scoring double.

Game 2: Kind of a sad effort tonight as the Rays fell 7-3 to the Angels. Mack Anglin started, and it looked like he'd build on his fine start last time out after he shut the Angels out on 40 pitches through 4 innings. But after the Rays gave him a 3-0 lead in the top of the 5th, he gave it right back with 3 in the bottom of the inning, allowed another run in the 6th, and put a man on with out in the 7th. Aaron Ashby then poured gasoline on the fire, giving up an RBI double then a 2-run HR to make it 7-3 and the offense did nothing outside that 5th inning, ending with only 4 hits on the night. 3 of those hits came from Luis Berdin, who hit a pair of doubles including a run-scoring with in the 5th with the other two scored on an Isaac DeLeon double. Anglin ended up 6.1 7 5 5 1 5, while not great wasn't completely terrible either. The bullpen continues to confound, though. They have a 4.29 ERA which is 11th in the AL. Pretty bad, right? Yet we have a 13-7 record in 1-run games and are 3 games better than our Pythagorean record. The thing I've noticed is that on any given night, they're either really bad or really good. Espino has been lights-out (with a couple of recent exceptions) but everyone else has had their meltdowns yet have been effective overall. Godwin has a 5.20 ERA yet has 0.8 WAR and 40 K in 27 IP, JDLC's ERA is 4.43 but he has 0.7 WAR (28 K in 20), and Alvarado has a 5.11 ERA despite 37 Ks in 24.2 innings. Ashby has -0.2 WAR and 5 HR allowed in 29.2 innings, though, so he's been bad all the way through and could be a candidate for trade/release (release more likely as he seems have zero trade value) with the Bowers acquisition.

June 24: Designated P Aaron Ashby for assignment and placed him on waivers, recalled P Jeremy Bowers from AAA Durham.

As stated above, Ashby wasn't getting it done anymore, and was going to be a FA at year's end anyway so it's time to take a look at Bowers who pitched very well in his rookie season this year in Arizona. We bid Ashby a fond farewell, and he'll always have those three rings.

Game 3: The Rays had a 3-run 1st inning without hitting the ball out of the infield and Christian Little pitched six strong innings again before having to leave with a blister as they bested the Angels 5-2. LA starter Keider Montero walked the bases loaded, gave up an infield single to Bobby Witt Jr to score the first run, walked Jhon Diaz to force in the 2nd and gave up another infield single to Joe Barker to make it 3-0. Witt drove in another run in the 3rd with a groundout to make it 4-0, and Barker hit one considerably farther his next time up, into the RF stands for #6 to make it 5-0 in the 4th. Little was pitching well as usual, although he had a brief hiccup in the 5th when he gave up a 2-run HR to Chance Sisco. Still he was more pitch-efficient than usual today, going 6 5 2 2 1 8 on only 85 pitches and was set to take a rare foray into the 7th inning when he developed a blister problem and had to leave after 6. It's a one-week injury so we'll probably skip his start, either through an off-day or putting Leiter back into the rotation (I have to check the schedule). The mercurial bullpen was excellent tonight, with Jack Filby, Jose Alvarado and Jasseel De La Cruz each pitching scoreless innings. JDLC grabbed save #13 while Little goes to 7-3, 2.31.

Game 4: It was the Alec Sachais show again as the rookie righty shut down the Angels to the tune of 7 6 1 0 0 6 in a 4-1 Rays win over the Angels to take 3 of 4 in the series (and 6 of 7 in the season series after the Angels beat them in last year's ALCS). Sachais was never in any serious trouble, and kept his pitch count low enough to start the 8th, but a 2-base Bobby Witt Jr error and an RBI double from Luis Renfigo meant he gave way to Jose Alvarado with lefties Anthony Rizzo and Eric Herman due up. Alvarado got the job done, retiring those two and two more on a grand total of 12 pitches, and Daniel Espino got the final 2 outs on 5 pitches to wrap up the win. No save for Espino since he didn't start the 9th while Sachais goes to 6-0, 2.19 with a 10/87 BB/K ratio in 74 innings. The bulk of the offense came in a 3rd inning rally that saw Isaac DeLeon and Jhon Diaz single, Ricky Widmar single in DeLeon, Connor Kirkley walk to load the bases and Nate Clark single in Diaz and Widmar. Kirkley added his 2nd MLB homer in the 8th.

Team record: 53-23. Next up: 3 games in Oakland.

Art Deco · 12-15-2020, 05:35 PM

Game 1: Blake Money won his 11th straight start to go 12-0, and the Rays broke open a close game late to thump Oakland 10-2. Money was solid, going 6 7 2 2 2 8 as his league-leading ERA sits now at 2.23. It was 2-2 going into the 6th on Jhon Diaz's RBI groundout and Yordan Alvarez's 17th HR of the year before the Rays got 3 in the inning and never looked back. Nate Clark had an RBI single and Bobby Witt Jr had a 2-RBI knock. A Gavin Lux groundout in the 7th made it 6-2, and then they blew it open wide in the 8th with 4 runs. Alvarez led off the inning with his 2nd HR of the game (#18), Luis Berdin hit his first MLB round-tripper with a man on, and Lux singled in a run to complete the scoring. Meanwhile, Jeremy Bowers made an impressive debut in the 7th. After giving up a leadoff single, he struck out the next 3 batters including former Rays (or Rays properties) Billy Benedetto and Seth Beer. Jack Filby pitched a scoreless 8th and 9th to finish it out.

Game 2: Drama at the Oakland Coliseum as the Rays got HRs from Yordan Alvarez and Bobby Witt Jr. in the 9th inning off two-time former Ray Ryne Stanek to pull out a 5-4 come-from-behind win. Trailing 4-3, Alvarez led off the 9th with #19 (and his 3rd in 2 days) to tie it, and two batters later Witt hit #10 to win it. Stanek is an interesting case, he's the A's closer and leads MLB with 25 saves but he's really not been that good as he has 5 losses and now 3 blown saves to go with it, and a 5.52 ERA. Shane McClanahan started and was looking like the loser even though he pitched well most of the game but was victimized by some bad sequencing. He put two men on in the 3rd and gave up a 3-run HR, and loaded the bases before leaving in the 7th only for Evan Godwin to allow a sac fly for Oakland to take the lead as he went 6.1 5 4 4 2 7. Godwin pitched an inning, Daniel Espino got the final 2 outs in the 8th (and the win), and in the 9th with a lefty leading off I brought in Jeremy Bowers as I had a brain fart and forgot about the 3-batter rule (after managing about 1500+ games in this save), intending to bring in Jasseel De La Cruz next. Thankfully Bowers got two out and only gave up a single, and then JDLC did get the final out for save #14. Before all this, the Rays got RBI singles from Keibert Ruiz and Gavin Lux in the 3rd to briefly go up 2-0, and got the tying run in the 7th on a wild pitch.

Game 3: The Rays completed the sweep of Oakland behind Mack Anglin's best outing since coming off the IL and a pair of HRs from Gavin Lux in a 5-1 win. Anglin was scattering the hits, getting a couple of double plays and picking up key strikeouts in a 6.1 7 1 1 1 7 performance to even his record at 3-3. Before Lux hit HRs 17 and 18 in the 7th and 9th the big hit came from Luis Berdin, who had a 2-run shot in the 4th, his 2nd and his 6th extra-base hit in as many games (he's slugging a cool .818). The other run came on a Bobby Witt Jr double-play grounder. The bullpen was sharp again, with Evan Godwin retiring both men he faced, Jose Alvarado with a perfect 2K 8th and Jasseel De La Cruz whiffing a pair around a hit in the 9th. No save with the 4-run lead after Lux's 2nd HR, though. Lux is now 293/363/560 after a slow start and is 2nd in the AL in WAR at 3.4.

Team record: 56-23. Next up: An off-day followed by 5(!) games with Kansas City at home. The first of these will be a rainout makeup doubleheader where the Rays will be the road team at the Trop in Game 1, and the series wraps around through Monday.

Also since we're essentially halfway through the season, the next post will be a midseason report card and a look at all of our recently departed Rays to see how they're faring with their new clubs this year.

12-07-2020, 04:09 PM	#461
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	April 25-27, 2028: vs NY Yankees (3) Game 1: This season has been one step forward, two steps back, and they took a big step back with the most agonizing loss of the season, blowing a 3-1 lead in the 9th inning and losing 4-3 to New York. The offense was terrible again, generating only a Joe Barker HR (#2) in the 3rd off Jesus Luzardo with only 4 hits through 7 innings. In the 8th, though, Nate Clark blasted a 2-run HR off Mike Tudor in the 8th (#5) and it looked like the Rays would come away with the win. With three lefties due up, Jose Alvarado came on and immediately made a mess, retiring only one of them. This brought on Jasseel De La Cruz, who gave up an infield single to load the bases, and yet another infield single that made it 3-2. With the infield now drawn in, Ricky Widmar made a great diving play to stop a ball and threw it home for the force to make it 2 out, but Victor Robles delivered his 4th hit of the day, a 2-run single, to give the Yankees the win after the Rays went meekly 1-2-3 in the bottom of the 9th off Yankee closer Nick Paciorek. Jack Leiter pitched well, going 6 7 1 1 1 2 and Evan Godwin and Daniel Espino each had a scoreless inning before the Alvarado/JDLC metldown. The real problem is the utter lack of hitting as they only tallied 6 hits tonight, with 2 coming from Clark and 2 from Widmar. Yordan Alvarez struck out his first 3 times up to make it 7 straight at-bats with a whiff and was 0-4 to drop his average to .188. Keibert Ruiz was 0-4 to drop to .218 and all he seems to do is hit into double plays whenever we have a man on 1st. Widmar and Jhon Diaz are the only regulars over .300 and Fabian the only other one over .250. They're now hitting 239/307/407 as a team and are 13th in the AL in runs scored. I know this is only game #24 and regression says it will turn around but it's damn frustrating in the interim. Note from Durham: Andy Aparicio didn't go to Durham to sulk as he went 7.1 7 1 1 0 6 in his first start after being demoted. Game 2: Apparently tired of being called out, the Rays' bats went to work tonight in a 10-4 thrashing of the Yankees which saw every hitter in the lineup manage at least one base hit. Judson Fabian hit HR #3 with a man on in the 3rd to make it 2-0, and then we had an honest-to-goodness rally full of numerous hits that saw the Rays score 6 times in the 4th. Keibert Ruiz had a 2-run single, Gavin Lux an RBI double, Nate Clark had a sac fly and Bobby Witt Jr. hit a 2-run triple as runners kept circling the bases at the Trop, a rare sight of late. Ruiz added a 2-run HR in the 5th (#2) to complete the scoring. Blake Money made his first start of the season and was as effective as the hitters tonight, taking a 2-hit shutout into the 7th. Tiring, he hit a couple of batters with 2 out before Hyo-Jun Park hit a 3-run HR to put the Yankees on the board. Money got the final out and finished 7 3 3 3 2 8 in an impressive outing. Aaron Ashby pitched a scoreless 8th but Jeremy Bienick had his problems again in his 2nd MLB appearance, allowing a run and putting 3 on base. He may be heading back to Durham soon as I have no confidence right now using him in anything less than a blowout. April 27: Optioned P Jeremy Bienick to AAA Durham, recalled P Christian Chamberlain from AAA Durham. As mentioned above, Bienick probably needs a little more seasoning in Durham. Chamberlain is back, he had cameos in 2026 and 2027 with the big club and now gives us an extra lefty, making the bullpen balanced with 4 LHP and 4 RHP. Game 3: If you're going to play an 18-inning game, you better f**ing win it as you burn your bullpen in the process. And despite squandering numerous great chances to score in extra innings, the Rays still ended up winning it 3-2 when Nate Clark led off the bottom of the 18th with HR #6 off Luis Severino. The reason why we got to that point was the Rays' penchant for hitting game-winning or game-tying HRs in the 9th at home and with 2 out and nobody on and facing Yankee closer Nick Paciorek, one of the best in MLB, Jhon Diaz went deep for HR #4. Special mention has to go to the just-recalled Christian Chamberlain. With Shane McClanahan struggling all game with baserunners and running up his pitch count, the bullpen had to start its work in the 6th inning and by the time the 15th rolled around, Chamberlain was the last man in the pen (unless you want to count tomorrow night's starter Alec Sachais, and we definitely didn't want to use him). All he did was pull off one of the more heroic relief efforts in team history, pitching 4 perfect innings and striking out 5. He picked up the much-deserved win but will likely be rewarded for his efforts by being sent back to Durham so we can have a fresh arm tomorrow. And I can't say enough about the rest of the bullpen. Mac was nowhere near his sharpest, going 5.1 7 2 2 5 5 on 107 pitches. Hayden Johns came in with the bases loaded and one out and had to face Victor Robles and Vlad Guerrero Jr. and struck them both out. This set the tone for the pen the rest of the way as they combined for an incredible 12.2 4 0 0 2 20 line. Yes that's right, 20 strikeouts for the bullpen and 25 for the game which has to be a team record. Rays batters struck out 18 times themselves for a combined 43 whiffs in the game. The MLB records IRL through 2020 are 26 for a single team and 48 for a game, so we nearly broke those. With the win, they're back to .500 and with Toronto losing they're within 4 games of the lead, the closest they've been for at least a couple of weeks. Team record: 13-13. Next up: Wander Franco returns to the Trop in enemy colors for the first time as Texas is in town for a weekend series. The Rangers will get the benefit of facing a tired bullpen, so here's hoping Alec Sachais can duplicate his 8-inning Rays debut tomorrow night. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-07-2020 at 09:55 PM.*

12-08-2020, 08:54 AM	#462
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	April 28-30, 2028: vs Texas (3) April 28: Optioned P Christian Chamberlain to AAA Durham, recalled P Tyler Gough from AAA Durham. Welcome to the show, Tyler Gough. Our 2nd round pick in 2022 out of high school finally climbs the ladder to the top. He's got great (75) stuff and served as Durham's closer last year with a 10/47 BB/K in 32 innings and has been in their rotation this year with a 2/14 BB/K in 13 innings. Despite his low BB totals he's rated as 45 control (and 45 movement, so HRs could be an issue). He'll help out a burned-out pen for now. Chamberlain's 4 innings of relief last night will not be forgotten and he could be back in a couple of weeks. Game 1: He did it again. On a night when the bullpen was down to Hayden Johns, Jack Filby and the just-recalled Tyler Gough, Alec Sachais came through with a game that might have been even better than his Rays debut 6 days ago, pitching a complete-game 3-hitter in a 3-1 win over Texas. Sachais walked 0 and struck out 12, including Wander Franco looking to end the game with a man on. He actually got the tough-to-whiff Franco 3 times on strikes tonight. His only blemish was a Monte Harrison HR in the 3rd inning but didn't allow a hit after that until Harrison singled leading off the 9th (Wander had the other hit, a single in the 1st). I'm not sure any Rays pitcher in their history has had such a successful 2-start debut. The offense was its usual sluggish self with a couple of exceptions. Judson Fabian went 4-4 and scored the first two runs, coming home both times on Keibert Ruiz RBI singles in the 2nd and the 4th. The pair accounted for 6 of the Rays' 8 hits on the night. Julio Cedillo drew a bases-loaded walk in the 8th for some insurance. The win improves the team to 14-13, putting them over .500 for the first time since winning on Opening Day. Game 2: Christian Little was denied a win once again, but his teammates weren't as the Rays scored twice in the bottom of the 8th to beat Texas 5-3 after Daniel Espino blew a 3-1 lead in the top of the inning. The win was a season-high 4th straight, put them a season-high 2 games over .500 and pulled them to within 3 of Toronto after the Blue Jays lost in Anaheim. Little was his usual strikeout self (12) and took a shutout into the 7th but had thrown a lot of pitches so when he gave up a leadoff single to start the inning, Jack Filby came on and got through the inning but allowed the runner to score on a SB, WP and sac fly. Espino then came on for the 8th and had his first bad outing of 2028, giving up a couple of hits and walking a pair, including a 2-out 2-run single to Monte Harrison which tied the game. But Nate Clark immediately restored the lead leading off the bottom of the inning with a 500-ft HR to dead center (#7), one of the longest hit at the Trop. A couple of walks then led to Bobby Witt Jr's first big hit in a long time, an RBI double to make it 5-3. With two lefties (and Wander) due up in the 9th, Jose Alvarado got the call for the save and retired the Rangers 1-2-3 to grab save #2, while Espino vultured the win. Earlier they scored 3 times in the first 3 innings. Ricky Widmar led off the game with a triple and Gavin Lux singled him home and after stealing second Lux came in to score on a Yordan Alvarez RBI single. Judson Fabian stayed hot with an RBI double in the 3rd to score Clark with the other run. Game 3: Bobby Witt, Jr: welcome to the Rays! The 3B, who cost a fortune in talent (Hunter Bishop and Triston Casas) and money (an 8-year, $134M deal), came into today's game sitting on 1 HR and 10 RBI and a .213 batting average through 27 games. To say he's been a disappointment so far was an understatement. But he had his first big game as a Ray, and boy was it a big game as he nearly single-handedly led the Rays to a walk-off 7-5 win over Texas. First after Jhon Diaz doubled in the 5th, Witt singled him home to cut Texas's lead to 3-2. Next, after Texas extended the lead to 4-2, he drilled a 3-run HR in the bottom of the 7th to put the Rays up 5-4. And after Jose Alvarado blew that 5-4 lead in the top of the 9th on a 2-out RBI single by none other than Wander Franco, Witt took Alvarado off the hook by hitting a 2-run walk-off homer off Texas rookie closer Jeff Lavender to win the game and make it 5 straight for the Rays, capping a 3-4, 2 HR, 6 RBI day. Aside from Witt and Diaz (who walked twice ahead of Witt's HRs and scored 3 runs), there was no offense to speak of from the rest of the team with the only other run scoring in the 1st when Ricky Widmar reached on an error, stole second, went to third on the errant throw, and scored on a Nate Clark groundball. Jack Leiter started and had a rough first two innings, allowing 3 runs, but settled in from there until the 7th when he allowed a couple of hits for the 4th Texas run. Hayden Johns pitched out of Leiter's jam and had a 1-2-3 8th but lost the win when Alvarado struggled in the 9th. Meanwhile the Blue Jays continue to fall to Earth, losing again in Anaheim and allowing the Rays to pull within 2 of the division lead. Team record: 16-13. Next up: 3 games in Minnesota. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-08-2020 at 12:46 PM.

12-08-2020, 03:51 PM	#463
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 1-3, 2028: at Minnesota (3) Game 1: The big, bad Rays who struck fear into the hearts of their opponents the last 5+ seasons may be back, as they annihilated the Twins tonight 14-2 to make it 6 straight wins, and with Toronto losing they're only 1 game back of their accustomed perch atop the AL East. Julio Cedillo had the night of his (short) MLB career, going 4-5 with 2 doubles, a HR and 4 RBI. Cedillo did most of his damage in blowing the game open, but it was Jhon Diaz (perhaps the team's most consistent hitter this year) and Ricky Widmar who set the tone as the Rays took a 4-0 2nd inning lead. Diaz blasted HR #5 off Zach Gallen with a man on and then Widmar followed later in the inning with a 2-run double. Yordan Alvarez's RBI single added a run in the 5th and then Cedillo went to work, starting with a 2-run HR in 6th that made a 5-2 game into a 7-2 one and hitting a 2-run double in a 4-run 7th. Gavin Lux put the cherry on top with a 3-run HR in the 9th, his 5th. Blake Money got the start and had some early issues, giving up a couple of runs and putting a fair number of runners on, but settled down once the lead started growing and finished with a flourish, ending up 7 5 2 2 4 9 and improving to 3-0 with 46 whiffs in 31 innings. Tyler Gough made his MLB debut, pitching the final 2 innings and although he allowed 2 hits and a walk, he didn't let anyone score and struck out 3. Game 2: As Van Morrison once sang, the Rays are "back on top". The bats continue to wake from their April doldrums as the Rays pounded the Twins once again to the tune of 10-5 tonight and coupled with another Toronto loss they're back on top in the AL East, tied with the Jays. They banged out 17 hits in all, with everyone in the lineup picking up at least one. The big news of the night was a milestone: Yordan Alvarez hit his 6th HR of the year and the 400th of his career. It capped a 5-run 4th which made it 9-1, so it wasn't terribly dramatic, but hopefully it will be a harbinger of HRs to come as he's continued to underachieve as a Ray. Before that, though, Nate Clark and Bobby Witt Jr had RBI singles in the first, and a Twins error opened the door for two more runs to score on the error and a wild pitch, making it 4-0 in the 1st. In that 5-run 4th, Gavin Lux had an RBI single (one of his 4 hits for the game), Judson Fabian had an RBI grounder that was misplayed, and they scored another run on a double play before Yordan's blast. Clark added another RBI single in the 8th for the final run. On the mound, Shane McClanahan wasn't his sharpest, which seems to be the story most times out this season, but was effective enough to go to 3-2 with a 6 8 2 2 1 7 performance. Aaron Ashby had a scoreless 7th but Hayden Johns was pretty awful in the 8th, giving up 3 runs and necessitating the use of Jack Filby to pitch a scoreless 9th. In addition to Lux's 4-hit night, Ricky Widmar was a sparkplug again, going 3-4 with 2 doubles, a walk and a steal, and Clark was 3-5 with the 2 RBI. Game 3: The Rays blew a 3-0 lead but rallied late and made it 8 straight with a 6-3 win in Minnesota, taking sole possession of 1st in the AL East after yet another Blue Jays loss. Although Keibert Ruiz's RBI single in the 8th was the game-winner, breaking a 3-3 tie, the star of the show was Jhon Diaz. The second-year RF continues to rake and his RBI double put the team on the board in the 2nd and his 2-run HR in the 9th made a 4-3 nailbiter into a more comfortable 6-3 win. His 3-hit, 3-RBI day has him up to 333/405/720 with 6 HR and 13 RBI in only 75 AB. Alec Sachais got the start and although he continued his roll by shutting out the Twins through 4 innings he couldn't sashay past them in the 5th (be honest, you knew it was only a matter of time before I used the "Sachais/sashay" pun), allowing 3 runs on 5 hits. He left after that inning going 5 8 3 3 1 6 and the relievers who followed were lights-out for the most part, not allowing Minnesota a hit over the final 4 innings. Evan Godwin had a perfect 6th, and then Daniel Espino did the real yeoman's work. After getting the Twins 1-2-3 on only 11 pitches in the 7th, he came back for the 8th and had another 1-2-3 inning with a pair of whiffs, and deservedly picked up the win. With two lefties due in the 9th, Jose Alvarado came in, but walked one of them and then walked the righty, so Jasseel De La Cruz had to get the final 2 outs for save #6. The other two runs not mentioned here were both courtesy of Nate Clark RBI singles, as he had another 3-hit day and stole 2 bases to go with them. The bats continue to awaken as they had 14 more hits today, with everyone in the lineup again getting a hit except for Isaac DeLeon, who started for a fatigued Ricky Widmar. DeLeon was 0-4 with 3 whiffs and is now 1-19 this season. He's never going to hit for a high average (his calling card is his tremendous power) and playing very infrequently is not helping. But he's still a 65 defender at SS and 3B, making him a valuable backup. Team record: 19-13. Next up: An off-day then a 3-game weekend set in Baltimore. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-08-2020 at 08:12 PM.

12-09-2020, 08:28 AM	#464
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 5-7, 2028: at Baltimore (3) Game 1: After blowing leads of 3-0 early and 4-3 in the 8th, the Rays saw their 8-game winning streak snapped in an 8-6 loss at Camden Yards. Nate Clark put the Rays ahead with a solo shot in the top of the 8th (#8) but it was time for the annual bullpen meltdown in this stadium, and Evan Godwin, who got Daniel Espino out of a bases-loaded jam in the 7th with two outs on 3 pitches, couldn't get anyone out and then Hayden Johns poured gasoline on the fire. Godwin got the leadoff man but then gave up 3 straight singles to score a run and with righty Druw Jones up and the go-ahead run on 3rd I went to Johns over Jack Filby figuring Johns had a better chance to whiff him. Big mistake, as Johns gave up 2 straight hits and a wild pitch to allow 4 more runs to score. Yordan Alvarez (#7) and Joe Barker (#3) went back-to-back in the 9th to make the final score more respectable. The Rays staked Christian Little to a 3-0 lead by the 5th on RBI singles from Jud Fabian and Gavin Lux along with an Alvarez sac fly, but Little gave it back in the 5th and 6th capped by a game-tying 2-run HR from former Ray Rafael Devers, who signed as a FA with the Orioles this year. Little ended 6 5 3 3 3 9 in another no-decision. The Blue Jays won but lost yesterday and are now 1/2 game back, while the Yankees are 1 game back. Game 2: The Rays put up a couple of touchdowns, which beat Baltimore's field goal and safety in a 14-5 win as the offense continues to roll with 57 runs in the last 6 games. It didn't look like a 14-5 game through the first 3 innings as Jack Leiter was matching 0s with Baltimore ace Bryar Johnson. But the Rays managed to score 8 runs in the 4th inning off Johnson and a reliever, all coming after 2 out and nobody on. Yordan Alvarez and Judson Fabian singled, Bobby Witt Jr walked and Jhon Diaz came through again with a 2-run single. Keibert Ruiz immediately followed with a 3-run HR (#3). That chased Johnson, but Julio Cedillo walked, Ricky Widmar singled, and then Gavin Lux blasted one out (#6) to RCF and suddenly it was 8-0. Judson Fabian added #4 in the 5th to make it 9-0, and later Witt had an RBI single, Nate Clark hit a 2-run shot for #9 and Julio Cedillo rapped a 2-run double. Unlike Johnson, Leiter kept pitching well although he ran a lot of deep counts and was done after going 6 2 1 1 1 7 on 96 pitches. With the huge lead, Tyler Gough came on and wasn't very good, leaving with a run in and 2 men on with 2 out in the 7th, and Aaron Ashby promptly gave up a HR to Gunnar Henderson but managed to finish out the final two innings. Toronto and the Yankees both lost, so the lead is now 1 1/2 games. Game 3: Isaac DeLeon hit his first MLB homer to lead the Rays to a 7-2 win over Baltimore. And then he hit his second. And his third. With it being a Sunday game it was time for some of the "irregulars" to play, so Connor Kirkley and DeLeon started over Gavin Lux and Bobby Witt Jr. And man did DeLeon come through. I mentioned the other day his calling card is power (70-rated) and he displayed that in spades today. His 2-run shot in the 4th made it 2-0, and he added solo blasts in the 6th and the 9th. He also walked in the 2nd so Baltimore could not retire him today. Kirkley has his own blue-colored skill and that's his batting eye which is a 75. He used it in the 1st, drawing a walk as part of the Rays loading the bases with nobody out. Yordan Alvarez grounded into a double play to get the first run home, and Jud Fabian singled in the next. Kirkley also came through with an RBI double in the 5th and was on base 3 times in 5 appearances with a single and that walk as well. The 7 runs were more than enough for Blake Money, who continues to flourish in the rotation as he and fellow Mariner acquisition Alec Sachais have been instrumental in the team's 10-1 run. Money went 6 4 2 2 1 6 and improves to 4-0, 2.68 with 52 Ks in 37 IP. Evan Godwin and Jack Filby combined to pitched the final 3 innings without incident. The Jays and Yankees won, so the lead remains 1 1/2. Team record: 21-14. Next up: An off-day then we return home to face the Astros. Houston is off to a brutal 8-26 start but Bramdon Perez is putting up great numbers again: 372/449/669 with 9 HR and he's second in WAR in the AL with 1.7. This is on the heels of his 3.5 WAR season last year where he went 308/381/509 with 20 HR in 428 AB. Nick Frasso may be up and down but Perez has clearly outplayed Yordan Alvarez, something I did not expect when making that trade in the 26/27 offseason. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-09-2020 at 01:13 PM.

12-09-2020, 04:37 PM	#465
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 9-11, 2028: vs Houston (3) Game 1: Bad teams usually find a way to lose, and the 2028 Houston Astros are a bad team at 8-26 having lost 10 straight. Well make that 8-27 and 11 straight as they blew a 6-2 lead to lose to the Rays 7-6 in 10 innings thanks to 7 walks from their bullpen in the 9th and 10th innings, including a bases-loaded walk in each inning to force in the tying and winning runs. It was a strange night at the Trop which started with Shane McClanahan having to leave in the 2nd inning with back spasms after giving up a run. It's a minor injury and shouldn't cause him to miss his next start. Hayden Johns came on for long relief and had a schizophrenic outing. While he whiffed 7 in 3 1/3 innings, he also gave up a 3-run HR to Alex Bregman in the 3rd and another run in the 5th to put the Rays in a 5-1 hole with their only run at that point coming on a Nate Clark single. Judson Fabian hit HR #5 in the 6th to make it 5-2 but Tyler Gough struggled in his second inning of relief and gave up an RBI triple to Bryce Turang with nobody out. Importantly, though, Gough stranded Turang at 3rd getting strikeouts of Ramon Laureano and Eloy Jimenez. And the Rays rallied for 3 in the bottom of the 7th to make it a 1-run game thanks to an RBI triple from Gavin Lux (who had a 4-hit night, missing the cycle by a homer), a Clark groundout and a Fabian double. This set up the bottom of the 9th when Astro closer Junior Fernandez walked 3 Rays to load the bases, struck out Fabian, got a force at the plate from Bobby Witt Jr, but then walked Jhon Diaz to force in the tying run. And Emmanuel Clase repeated Fernandez's feat in the 10th, walking Julio Cedillo and Ricky Widmar, giving up a single to Lux to load the bases, and then walking Clark with the winning run to make it shrimp time at the Trop with a walk-off walk. Jose Alvarado pitched the 10th to pick up win #2. Toronto beat the Yankees so they stay 1 1/2 back while New York drops 3 behind. Game 2: As I said yesterday the 2028 Astros are a bad team that usually finds a way to lose, and they found a new way tonight after fighting back from a 4-0 deficit to lose to the Rays 5-4 in the bottom of the 9th. This time Jhon Diaz hit a one-out single, stole second, went to to third on a groundout and then scored when Julio Cedillo's grounder was misplayed by Houston 1B Joseph Kalafut. It looked the Rays would be on their way to an easy win after Gavin Lux (#7) and Nate Clark (#10) hit back-to-back 1st inning HRs off one-time Rays prospect Taj Bradley and Ricky Widmar and Yordan Alvarez followed with RBI singles in the 3rd. But Alec Sachais started running out of gas in the 5th, allowing a couple of runs and then left after putting a man on in the 6th, ending up 5.2 6 3 3 3 7. Aaron Ashby came on and couldn't get anyone out, walking two and giving up 2 hits, including a 2-run single allowing Houston to tie the game before Jack Filby got them out of it with a whiff of Eloy Jimenez. Filby got through the 7th and then Daniel Espino took over in a truly dominant performance, retiring all 6 men he faced in the 8th and 9th with 5 via strikeout. He picked up a well-earned win when the Rays won it in the 9th. The Yankees beat Toronto so the lead is now up to 2 1/2 games as the Rays have now won 12 of 13. Game 3: The Rays completed the sweep of Houston and this time out they didn't need any late inning assistance from wild Astros pitchers or shaky Astro fielding, they just went out and won it the Rays Way: great pitching and just enough hitting in a 3-1 win, their 13th in 14 games. Christian Little got the start and after he got knocked around for a run in the 1st inning he took over from there and wasn't troubled until the 6th, when he pulled a Houdini act. He gave up singles to put men and 1st and 3rd to lead off the inning, got a ground ball at Yordan Alvarez that held the runners, walked Eloy Jimenez to load the bases and then got a grounder at Isaac DeLeon who came home and got the 2nd out. He then whiffed Joseph Kalafut on a 3-2 pitch to end the threat. That ended his day as well, going 6 5 1 1 1 7 on 93 pitches and earning only his 2nd win of the year. Evan Godwin struck out the side in the 7th, and Jose Alvarado put a man on with 2 out in the 8th and Jasseel De La Cruz had to come in for a 4-out save. JDLC walked Jimenez to put 2 men on, but got Alex Bregman to fly out and then proceeded to strike out the side in a 1-2-3 9th for save #7. The star on offense was Joe Barker, getting a rare start. He singled in Bobby Witt Jr in the 4th to tie the game, scored the go-ahead run on Ryan Jeffers' double, and then hit HR #4 in the 7th for a big insurance run. The Yankees took care of Toronto again to move into 2nd place, 3 games behind the Rays. Team record: 24-14. Next up: 3 at home over the weekend vs those 2nd-place Yankees. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-09-2020 at 10:04 PM.

12-10-2020, 09:30 AM	#466
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 12-14, 2028: vs NY Yankees (3) Game 1: What a difference 2 1/2 weeks make. The last time the Yankees were in town the Rays hit their nadir, blowing a 3-1 lead in the 9th inning and losing 4-3 to the Yankees to start the season 11-13, and at one point they were out of first by 7 games. Fast forward to today and the Rays are 25-14 and 4 games ahead in the division after an 18-2 shellacking of New York, their 14th win in 15 games (and the only game lost was at Baltimore where they led 4-3 in the 8th). For a moment it looked like it might be the Yankees' day when Victor Robles led off the game with a HR off Jack Leiter. But he didn't give the Yankees jack after that, going 7 6 1 1 1 7 to improve to 4-2, 3.06 with a nifty 7/45 BB/K ratio in 50 innings. And of course the bats had their day, with 18 runs and 19 hits. Leading the hit parade was Nate Clark 4-6 with 3 RBI and a steal. Judson Fabian was 4-5 with 2 RBI (including 3 infield hits), Ricky Widmar and Bobby Witt Jr. each drove in 3, and Julio Cedillo was 2-5, 2 RBI with their only HR of the night (#5) and a double. In fact not only did everyone in the starting lineup have a hit, everyone in the starting lineup had at least one RBI. That also included Connor Kirkley, getting a rare start and going 1-4 with 2 walks and 2 RBI. Witt had to leave the game with a mild knee sprain that will keep him DtD for 2 weeks. Probably won't IL him but will mix in a lot of Isaac DeLeon. May 13: Optioned P Tyler Gough to AAA Durham, recalled P Christian Chamberlain from AAA Durham. The 15 days were up so we could bring Chamberlain back. It was his heroic 4 perfect innings of relief that helped us win that 18-inning game with the Yankees which was the start of the season turnaround but he had to go down because we needed a fresh arm. He's back now, perhaps to stay. Gough pitched the final 2 innings last night, walking 3 and allowing a run, and he didn't look convincing in any of his outings so back he goes. Game 2: In this hot streak for the Rays the fact that the bats have been back has been well-chronicled, but you don't win 14 of 15 without good pitching and it was great pitching today that helped the Rays make it 15 of 16 with a 5-1 win over the Yankees. Blake Money has been lights-out since being moved back into the rotation after Mack Anglin went down and he was brilliant again today, going 7 3 1 1 3 8 and upping his record to 5-0, 2.45. His 60 strikeouts (in only 44 innings) are 3rd in the AL and when Anglin comes back (he'll start a rehab assignment in 4 days), the case can be made for going to a 6-man rotation as neither Money nor Alec Sachais deserve to be dropped from it. In fact one could say our weakest and most inconsistent starter this year has been Shane McClanahan, our ace and reigning AL Cy Young award winner, and it's not like he's been that bad. As for today's game, while Money was doing his thing the offense did just enough, concentrating their output in a 4-run 3rd inning. Judson Fabian beat out his 4th infield hit in 2 games to get a run across with 2 out, and then Jhon Diaz had the big hit of the game, a 2-run double to make it 3-0 and he was singled home by Isaac DeLeon. Gavin Lux added HR #8 off Forrest Whitley in the 4th for the 5th and final run. Also Evan Godwin picked up his first save of the season when Jack Filby put two on in the 8th with only one out. Godwin got Joe Allen to roll into a double play on his first pitch to end that inning and he got the Yankees 1-2-3 in the 9th on only 7 pitches, making it a 1 2/3 inning, 8-pitch save. Toronto lost again (they're now 21-20 after starting off 17-7) so they didn't move ahead of New York, meaning the division lead is now 5 games. Game 3: Just yesterday I was talking about how Shane McClanahan was maybe the team's least consistent starter so far this season. He must have heard me as he flashed his Cy Young form today in a 9-2 win over the Yankees, going 7 5 2 2 1 8 and improving to 4-2, 3.56. Mac was only in trouble in the 3rd when he gave up a Hyo-Jun Park homer and a couple of more hits for a run but was untouchable outside of that inning. Daniel Espino and Christian Chamberlain pitched scoreless innings to finish it off on the mound. The offense once again provided plenty of run support, starting with 3 runs in the 2nd. A Jhon Diaz double was the big hit to put men at 2nd and 3rd, and Isaac DeLeon's RBI grounder, Ryan Jeffers' sac fly and Julio Cedillo's double brought the runs in. DeLeon added an RBI double in the 4th, Diaz launched a 2-run HR (#7) in the 6th and they added 3 more in the 8th on a Cedillo 2-run HR (#6) and a Gavin Lux RBI double. Once again everyone in the lineup had at least one hit. So it's now 16 of 17 for the Rays and if you had told me two weeks ago they'd be 6 games up in the division I'd have told you to put down the crack pipe. Team record: 27-14. Next up: An off-day then a quick trip to the nation's capital for 2 games against the Nationals before returning home. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-10-2020 at 01:49 PM.

12-10-2020, 04:54 PM	#467
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 16-17, 2028: at Washington (2) May 15: Sent P Mack Anglin to AAA Durham for a rehab assignment. Mack will need a couple of starts at Durham at least, and obviously there's no rush to bring him back since the 5 current starters are dealing. By the way, guess who'll be ready for a rehab assignment in about 3 weeks? Vidal Brujan, remember him? This is about a month or two earlier than originally prognosticated when he first went down last year. With a year and a half left on his $13M/year contract and Gavin Lux and Connor Kirkley already on the roster, I've been shopping Brujan and I can get a decent return, especially if I retain some salary which isn't a problem. Stay tuned. Game 1: The Rays brought their winning run into the nation's capital and made it a season-high 9 straight wins (and 17 of 18) with a 4-2 win behind more brilliance from Alec Sachais. The rookie righty took a 2-hit shutout into the 7th before giving up a 2-out HR to Josh Ellis. He came out for the 8th since his pitch count was only at 81 but gave up a leadoff homer to Jurickson Profar so it was time to get Daniel Espino. He had a 1-2-3 8th and then with lefties Drew Mendoza and Juan Soto due, Jose Alvarado got the 9th inning call. He whiffed Mendoza and walked Soto but got Gleyber Torres to ground into a game-ending double play to get save #3. Sachais went 7 4 2 2 0 7 and is now 3-0, 2.34 with an outstanding 5/42 BB/K ratio in 34.2 innings. The offense came early with a Bobby Witt Jr sac fly in the 1st, a Gavin Lux RBI single (3 more hits for him today, 19 for his last 45) in the 2nd, and Ricky Widmar's 2nd MLB HR in the 4th. Yordan Alvarez added a sac fly in the 7th to make it 4-0. Speaking of hot hitters, Nate Clark was 4-4 today and is 25 for his last 54, raising his average from .248 to .313. Mack Anglin rehab update: Quite the mixed bag, as Anglin struck out 6 in 3 2/3 innings but also gave up 6 hits and 6 runs with 2 walks on 77 pitches. We'll check in on him again in 5 days. Game 2: This is really getting kind of ridiculous. By the 4th inning it was 2-0 Rays. By the 5th it was 8-0. By the 6th it was 15-0. Rays hitters took mercy on the Washington staff the rest of the way and hung on for a 15-1 win, #10 in a row and 18th in their last 19. The star of the show on offense was Gavin Lux, who hit a pair of 2-run homers to give him 10 on the year. The first was the one that made it 2-0 in the 4th and the second came in the 6-run 5th. Nate Clark also hit a 3-run shot (#11). Ricky Widmar drove in three, Ryan Jeffers had a 2-run single and even starting pitcher Christian Little managed his first MLB RBI on a grounder to deep 3rd base. Speaking of Little, he was dominating as usual, going 7 3 0 0 2 7 (although the 1 K per inning rate was low for him). Hayden Johns went the final 2 innings, giving up an unearned run when Connor Kirkley, who came on for Lux, booted a 2-out grounder in the 8th allowing the run to score. The Yankees swept their series with Seattle, so the lead remains 5 1/2 games. Team record: 29-14. Next up: 4 at home vs Seattle. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-10-2020 at 06:29 PM.

12-10-2020, 08:52 PM	#468
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 18-21, 2028: vs Seattle (4) Game 1: The Rays jumped out to a 5-0 lead after 3 and it was "here we go again", but Rece Hinds and Seattle had other ideas as their slugging 3B hit a pair of HRs to tie the game and the Mariners eventually prevailed in 11 innings 7-6 to snap the Rays' 10-game win streak. After Jack Leiter allowed Seattle to score in the 4th, Hinds stepped up and hit his first HR to make it 5-3, and in the 6th Hinds took Leiter deep again with a man on to equalize. Outside of those two pitches, Leiter pitched decently but ended up 6.2 6 5 5 2 8. The Rays had a great chance to win it in the bottom of the 9th off one of their recent teammates, Steven Casey, who put men on 2nd and 3rd with 1 out. But Nate Clark hit a foul pop, and Casey wisely intentionally walked Yordan Alvarez to load the bases as he struggles with lefties but is death to righties. And he then struck out the righty Judson Fabian as I had no lefty to pinch-hit on the bench. Seattle then scored off Jose Alvarado when Jarred Kelenic stole 3rd and scored on Keibert Ruiz's throwing error. But the Rays answered back in the bottom of the 10th when Ruiz atoned for his error by doubling in Jhon Diaz. However in the 11th Jasseel De La Cruz gave up a 2-out RBI double to another former Ray, pinch-hitter Patrick Bailey and this time the Rays couldn't answer in the bottom. They did jump out to that 5-0 lead primarily on the strength of a 3-run Bobby Witt Jr HR (#4), along with a Fabian RBI single and Alvarez's 8th HR of the year in the 3rd, a solo shot. A tough loss but you can't win 'em all. Game 2: The Rays bounced back from last night's loss with an 8-2 drubbing of Seattle behind the surprise power bat of Julio Cedillo. The rookie CF blasted two more HRs today, driving in 3 and giving him 8 for the season. Cedillo is only rated at 45 power and the 8 HR match his career high at any level, set as an 18-year-old in DSL ball in 67 games. Although they weren't the biggest hits in the game, they made a moderate lead a big one, important after last night's blown 5-run lead. The big hit came in the 2nd inning when Gavin Lux broke a 1-1 tie with a bases-clearing double to make it 4-1. Judson Fabian also went deep for #6, a solo shot in the 3rd which preceded the first of Cedillo's. Yordan Alvarez had an RBI single in the 1st for the other Rays run. Blake Money got the start against his old team and started strong, striking out the side in the 1st, but had trouble getting the ball over the plate and just barely made it out of the 5th to qualify for the win when Judson Fabian threw out Jarred Kelenic at home to end the inning with Money at 102 pitches. He still went to 6-0 with a 5 5 2 2 4 7 line. Christian Chamberlain relieved him and was brilliant again, striking out 4 in 1 2/3 innings, and Jack Filby finished out the game going the final 2 1/3 and getting out of a bases-loaded jam in the 9th. The Yankees lost and Blue Jays won, so they are both tied for 2nd 6 games behind the Rays. Game 3: The offense was in high gear again, banging out 11 runs and 16 hits thanks a pair of 5-run innings in an 11-5 win over Seattle. But the big story of the game was not a good one. Beating out an infield single in the 8th, Julio Cedillo tore his PCL and is done for the season. He's been such a sparkplug for the team, provided 70 defense in CF and was finishing up another 3-hit game as he ended his season with an impressive 1.9 WAR through mid-May. He's going to be missed greatly and we don't really have an obvious replacement for him. More on that at the end of this recap. As for the game, Ricky Widmar had the biggest game of his young MLB career, blasting a 3-run HR in the 2nd to break a 1-1 tie and then hitting a 2-run double to help turn a 6-4 game into an 11-4 game in the 8th. Nate Clark was 2-5 with a HR and 2 RBI, Judson Fabian was 3-4 with 2 RBI and is now hitting .325, and Isaac DeLeon and Jhon Diaz were each 2-4 with an RBI. Shane McClanahan started and was not very good, going 3.1 7 4 4 4 4. Hayden Johns took over for him in the 4th and bucked the trend of his recent poor outing to retire all 8 men he faced, striking out 5 of them and earning his 1st win of the season. When it was 6-4 Daniel Espino and Jose Alvarado each had a strong inning of relief, and after it was 11-4 Aaron Ashby came on and gave up on a run in finishing the game. The Yankees won while Toronto lost so the lead remains 6 over New York. Now as for the Cedillo replacement options, I had been using Diaz in CF but he's only a 40 there and not a long-term solution. The same goes for Fabian. Shane Sasaki is the CF at Durham but he's even worse, a 35. So short of trading for a real CF (a possibility with Brujan on the block) the best internal solution is Dayle Jenkins at AA Montgomery. He's a legit prospect ranked #49 overall by BNN, a 55 in CF, and the editor sees him as having present MLB ability of 269/345/444 with the potential to do better. That slash line is almost on the nose for his current stats at Montgomery. He was acquired last year from the Phillies for Kevin Schell in a swap of 2025 1st rounders as I was trying to beef up the CF depth in the organization. I'd have to put him on the 40-man (I will this winter anyway) but that's not a problem with 2 spots open already and 1 more opening up with Cedillo going on the 60-day IL. I may look into trade options first. OK I made a trade, and hoo boy, it's not a very popular one in the Tampa Bay media (and the fan interest "almost crashed" - for the 85th time): And so continues the Ouroboros-shaped career of Jasson Dominguez. Acquired by us back in 2020 in a deal with the Yankees, he never panned out in accordance with the hype he had back then during his 5-6 seasons in our minor league system and with him approaching minor league free agency, we dealt him back to the Yankees in 2026 for a guy you might have heard of, Nate Clark (who at time looked like a decent, if not spectacular hitting prospect who suddenly went nuts after the deal) and after he rejoined the Yankees, like Clark he suddenly tapped into his potential. Dominguez is now a 70-rated CF and is projected to hit .284 with 46 HRs. That's legit because he's already hit 8 in 82 AB filling in for Victor Robles when he was injured. He may actually be an improvement over Cedillo and is only 25. Of course the price for this almost-too-good-to-be-true Cedillo replacement is Vidal Brujan, one of the franchise cornerstones for the last 6 years. It will be galling to see him in Yankee pinstripes but I was fearing Dominguez more in their lineup down the line than Brujan. Also his skills had declined a bit as he's now 30 and coming off a serious injury. Plus we're only retaining 25% of his salary, which will still save us almost $10M next season, important because we really don't have anyone coming off the books and guys like Christian Little are going to be due a BIG jump in salary in arbitration. So the deal was a no-brainer on a baseball and intellectual level, even if it hurts on an emotional one. Game 4: The bats went (relatively) quiet today and some very sloppy play in the field (mainly in the person of Gavin Lux) doomed the Rays to a 6-3 loss to Seattle, leaving the teams with a series split. Alec Sachais got off to a shaky start against his old team, giving up an Evan White HR in the 1st and 2 more runs in the 2nd, with one of them scoring thanks to Lux's first error of the day. The 2 Seattle runs in the 2nd erased a brief 2-1 Rays lead on a 2-run single from Yordan Alvarez, but Bobby Witt Jr. tied it up with an RBI single in the 3rd. Sachais settled down, but had to leave in the 6th at 5.2 4 3 2 2 6 on 107 pitches. Jack Filby got the final out of the 6th but ran into trouble in the 7th. He walked the leadoff man and then got an infield pop, but Lux misplayed it into a single. Evan Godwin then came in to face lefty Luke Raley, whom Sachais had whiffed three times, but Raley had the last laugh with a 3-run HR off Godwin which provided the Mariners' winning margin. Meanwhile Nathan Witt shut down the Rays bats in the middle innings, and the Seattle pen held the Rays hitless over the final 3 1/3 including a save in the 9th from ex-Ray Steven Casey. Jasson Dominguez made his Rays debut in CF and went 1-3 with a walk off Casey in the 9th (a rare sight as the one hole in Dominguez's game is his reluctance to take walks) with a caught stealing. Rays baserunners were 0-5 in the series against Sean Murphy and Patrick Bailey trying to steal, also a rare sight. The Yankees lost to Boston so the 6-game lead remains intact. Team record: 31-16. Next up: An off-day and then the Angels come to town for 3. Mack Anglin rehab update: He looked pretty damn good today at Durham, going 7 4 0 0 0 7 on 86 pitches. He's probably ready to come back now, but who gets bumped from the rotation? Or do I make it a 6-man rotation? Either way, who goes to Durham? Christian Chamberlain would seem the obvious choice, but he's been excellent, going 7.2 1 0 0 3 11 in his 4 appearances. Hayden Johns is our only legit long reliever so it would be tough to send him down. Decisions like these are why I'm paid the big bucks, I guess. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-11-2020 at 02:40 PM.

12-11-2020, 04:30 PM	#469
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 23-25, 2028: vs LA Angels (3) Game 1: Joe Barker's 5th HR of the year leading off the 9th against Angels reliever (and top prospect) Danny de Jesus gave the Rays a walk-off 4-3 win in a hard-fought, back-and-forth affair. Christian Little got the start and was his usual brilliant strikeout self, going 6 5 1 1 2 10 but picked up another no-decision leaving the game tied at 1. After Daniel Espino struck out the side in the 7th around a couple of singles (he now has 34 whiffs in 19.2 innings), Ricky Widmar hit a bases-loaded, 2-run single to put the Rays on top (Widmar had driven in their previous run with a 5th-inning double). But Jose Alvarado blew the lead (and a save) in the 8th, giving up a 2-run HR to Jeremiah Jackson. Jasseel De La Cruz started the 9th, but walked Kyren Paris who stole 2nd and advanced to 3rd with two out and lefty slugger Anthony Rizzo due, so Evan Godwin came in. Godwin got Rizzo on a fly ball, setting the stage for Barker's heroics and picking up his first win of the season. The Yankees won so the lead remains 6. Game 2: Different day, same result as the Rays once against bested the Angels 4-3. This time it didn't take bottom-of-the-9th heroics, just some decent bullpen work to ensure victory. Nate Clark had the game's big hit, a 3-run HR (#13) off Logan Allen in the 3rd inning which made it 3-1. Jack Leiter started and was knocked around a bit in the first for a run but sailed from there until the 5th, when he gave up a solo HR to Anthony Rizzo, 3rd in the AL in WAR and having a renaissance season with the Angels at age 38 in his second go-round with them. Leiter continued to stand strong, though, and made it through 7 with a 7 6 2 2 1 6 line and is now 5-2, 3.39. Jasson Dominguez got his first RBI as a Ray in the 7th thanks to a bases-loaded walk, and that run later proved to be big. I noted earlier how Dominguez doesn't walk much (he had only 2 in 82 AB with the Yankees) but he's drawn 3 now in 3 starts and tonight's was important as Jose Alvarado struggled again in the 8th, giving up 2 hits and leaving with the tying runs at 2nd and 3rd and 2 out. Daniel Espino came in and threw a wild pitch to make it 4-3, but got Nick Solak to fly out to end the threat and Jasseel De La Cruz pitched around a single for a 2K 9th and save #8. The Yankees fell in extras at Baltimore so the lead has grown to a season-high 7 games. News from Durham: It appears that Andy Aparicio is broken in some fasion. He pitched very well in his first couple of starts since being sent to Durham but has just been horrendous over his last several. Tonight he went 3.1 7 9 7 1 6 and has allowed 23 ER in his last 18 1/3 innings over 4 starts. He still has a 9/24 BB/K ratio in those 18 1/3 innings so it's not his arm or his stuff and he hasn't given up an inordinate # of HRs (3). Perhaps he's going through the worst BABIP luck ever (Durham's defense is pretty bad) but it's kind of alarming. Game 3: My decision as to whom to replace in the rotation when Mack Anglin comes back (either this weekend or shortly thereafter) just got a lot tougher after Blake Money threw 6 1-hit shutout innings to lead the Rays to a 5-1 win over the Angels and a series sweep. The win is also the 23rd in the Rays' last 26 games. I constantly have to resist the temptation to say he was "money", but Money was brilliant, going 6 1 0 0 2 5 on 94 pitches and is 7-0, 2.29. With some tough lefties starting the 7th (and with the bullpen a bit thin after the last two nights), I gave Christian Chamberlain his first high-leverage opportunity and he came through, retiring the side in order with a couple of whiffs. Another lefty, Alex Verdugo, led off the 8th so I left Chamberlain in and he gave up a double, with Verdugo coming around later to score off Jack Filby, who was a bit shaky and had the tying runs in scoring position before getting Luis Renfigo to ground to first. The offensive star today was Jasson Dominguez, who had two huge hits. His first was his first Rays HR, a solo shot the opposite way to left which made it 3-0, and then with the score 3-1 in the bottom of the 8th the Rays had loaded the bases with nobody out, but Jhon Diaz hit into a force at the plate and Isaac DeLeon hit a shallow fly ball. Just when it looked like they'd squander the opportunity, Dominguez delivered a 2-run single to make it a comfortable 5-1 lead. The game was 0-0 until the bottom of the 6th when Yordan Alvarez singled in a run and Jud Fabian had a sac fly to make it 2-0 Rays early. So what to do about Anglin? My instincts right now are to go to a 6-man rotation, keep Chamberlain up as an extra lefty and send Hayden Johns to Durham, even though he doesn't deserve it. On merit based on 2028 to date the pitcher to drop from the rotation would be Shane McClanahan, but you can't demote the reigning Cy Young award winner to long relief, can you? Decisions, decisions. And at least those decisions aren't as fraught with danger now that the Rays are 8 games up in the AL East after another Yankees loss. Team record: 34-16. Next up: a weekend 3-game visit to the Phillies. They're off to an impressive 33-17 start and have a very power-laden lineup with the likes of Bryce Harper, Miguel Sano, Francisco Lindor, one-time Ray Nate Lowe and more. Their 81 HR in 50 games is 1st in MLB so I fear for McClanahan, Sachais and Little this weekend. Of course we have some guys who can take advantage of that park also as our 73 HR total ain't too shabby considering we play half our games in the Trop. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-11-2020 at 07:02 PM.

12-11-2020, 07:53 PM	#470
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 26-28, 2028: at Philadelphia (3) Game 1: The Rays jumped out to an 8-1 lead in the 6th inning and hung on to beat the Phillies 8-5 in their first trip to Citizens Bank Park since 2015. Despite the high score, until the 5th inning it was a pitchers' duel between Shane McClanahan and Jack Patterson with the Phillies up 1-0 on a 1st inning run scored due to a Gavin Lux error. But that changed in the 5th. Keibert Ruiz and McClanahan were retired to start the inning, but Ricky Widmar singled, Lux walked and Nate Clark stepped up and blasted HR #14 to make it 3-1. And the Rays really busted it open in the 6th on a 2-run double from Jasson Dominguez and a 3-run blast (#4) from Widmar. Mac was cruising through 5, whiffing 8 and only allowing 3 hits but the Phillies got to him in the bottom of the 6th on a 2-run single from Francisco Lindor and a 2-run HR by Brendan Rodgers. So it was up to the bullpen, a bullpen with Godwin, Alvarado and JDLC unavailable. So Jack Filby got through the 7th, Aaron Ashby whiffed Bryce Harper and got another out in the 8th, and Daniel Espino grabbed a 4-out save with 3 whiffs, his 1st of the year. Mac improved to 5-2 although he saw his ERA rise to 4.24. The Yankees beat the Mets so the lead stays at 8. May 27: Optioned P Hayden Johns to AAA Durham, activated P Mack Anglin from his rehab assignment at AAA Durham. So the 6-man rotation it is, Johns is an MLB pitcher but he had options and was the most logical choice to go down. Anglin will return with a baptism of fire at Citizens Bank Park. Game 2: It what will go down as one of the wildest games of the year, the Rays came back from a 1st inning 5-0 deficit to eventually go ahead 9-6, only to end up losing 11-9 on a Jordan Groshans 2-run walk-off HR off Jasseel De La Cruz. Mack Anglin was activated off the IL today and man, it did not go well in the 1st inning. He gave up the cycle, including a 2-run HR to Bryce Harper in an inning that saw the Phillies score 5 times on 6 hits. With Hayden Johns down in Durham we don't really have a long reliever now and the bullpen continues a bit thin so he stayed in and actually pitched well over the next 4 innings, allowing only a Francisco Lindor longball to end up 5 8 6 6 2 2. And this bought the Rays enough time to come back, first with a 3-run HR from Gavin Lux (#11) in the 3rd, then a 2-run shot by Bobby Witt Jr (#5) in the 4th, an RBI single and a sac fly from Nate Clark in the 5th and 7th, and Jasson Dominguez's 2nd Rays HR and 10th overall in the 6th, and after 6 1/2 it was 9-6 Rays with Christian Chamberlain pitching a 1-2-3 6th. But Chamberlain didn't have it in the 7th, giving up two infield singles and then a 3-run HR to the same-handed Harper to tie the game. Chamberlain put a couple of more on and Aaron Ashby bailed him out and also pitched through the 8th, but JDLC gave up a Lindor single and then the HR to Groshans for Philly to walk it off in the 9th. Ricky Widmar had himself a day in a losing effort, going 4-5, scoring 3 runs and stealing a base. These two teams have the best records in their respective leagues right now and it would be quite a wild World Series if they met up in a rematch of 2008. The Yankees did finally gain ground on the Rays by beating the Mets, so the lead is down to 7. Game 3: It was deja vu all over again as the Rays bullpen once again blew a 3-run lead in the late innings and lost on a walk-off homer to the Phillies. Today it was an 8-7 final and Tyler Freeman was the HR hero, blasting a shot to center off Jose Alvarado leading off the 9th. The lack of options hurt the Rays again, with Evan Godwin in his second inning of work pitching to Miguel Sano with no real fully rested RHP available in the pen, and he gave up a 2-run HR that made it 7-6 in the 8th, put a couple more on, and a slightly-tired Jack Filby gave up the tying run. Alec Sachais started and had a game he'll never forget. Not for his pitching, which was OK at 6 5 4 4 2 6 considering the park and the opponent, but for his hitting as he drilled a HR in the 3rd inning off Ryan Rolison, the first HR by a Rays pitcher I've had in this save. In fact the first 4 Rays runs all scored on solo HRs: Gavin Lux (#12) in the 1st, Sachais in the 3rd, Joe Barker (#6) in the 5th and Bobby Witt Jr (#6) in the 7th. They then added 2 more in the 7th on back-to-back doubles by Jasson Dominguez and Keibert Ruiz and a Jhon Diaz pinch-hit RBI single. Barker added an RBI single in the 8th to make it 7-4, but you can never have enough runs in this park as the Rays found out the last two days. The Yankees won again, so the lead is cut to 6 with a series in NY looming and a beleaguered bullpen. Team record: 35-18. Next up: Out of the frying pan and into the fire at Yankee Stadium for 3 big games with New York. Maybe going to a 7-man bullpen wasn't the greatest idea. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-11-2020 at 11:12 PM.

12-12-2020, 10:08 AM	#471
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	May 29-31, 2028: at NY Yankees (3) Game 1: After a pair of heartbreaking losses in Philly the Rays snapped back and won a big 7-3 game over the Yankees, dashing any hopes of the Bronx Bombers to significantly cut into the division lead which now stands at 7. Christian Little got the start and was his usual self again, even if it didn't look that way in the early innings when he gave up 2 runs (1 earned) on 4 hits and had only two whiffs through 3 innings. But after that he was untouchable and ended the day 7 4 2 1 1 10 to lower his ERA to 2.66 and finally get on the winning side of the ledger at 4-3. Joe Barker and Jasson Dominguez led the offense, with the former rapping a pair of RBI singles and the latter with an RBI and 2-run HR (#3/#11). Keibert Ruiz also had an RBI single and Ricky Widmar was 2-4 with a sac fly and a steal. Christian Chamberlain had a nice 8th including a whiff of Vlad Jr to end the inning but as usual when I push him to a 2nd inning he struggled, and after he put two on I had to summon JDLC to get the final two outs in a non-save situation. Game 2: Jack Leiter, who grew up in nearby New Jersey while his dad was a Yankee broadcaster, pitched another fine game before the locals as the Rays took care of the Yankees again 6-2. Leiter was 6.1 3 2 2 1 6 and was only dinged for HRs by Juan Pereyra (in his MLB debut) and Joe Allen, before giving way to Evan Godwin who pitched 1 2/3 scoreless, with Aaron Ashby pitching the 9th. Leiter left with a 4-2 lead thanks to an RBI grounder from Jud Fabian, a bases-loaded walk to Jasson Dominguez, a Yordan Alvarez sac fly and a Bobby Witt Jr solo shot (#7). Keibert Ruiz's 8th inning 2-run HR (#4) off Mike Tudor gave the Rays some breathing room as they now go ahead by a commanding 8 games in the division. Leiter improves to 6-2, 3.34. Game 3: The Rays completed the sweep of the Yankees and opened up a 9-game lead in the AL East with a 3-1 win. Blake Money started and wasn't his sharpest, but got the job done including getting Vlad Jr to ground into a double play in the 5th with the bases loaded and one out. He struggled with his control but limited the damage to an Alan Trejo HR in a 5.2 5 1 1 5 5 performance. The bullpen was solid over the final 3 1/3, with Jack Filby going 1 1/3, Daniel Espino getting 5 outs and Jose Alvarado coming in to retire Juan Pereyra for the final out of the game and save #4. Money goes to 8-0, 2.23. The offense was almost exclusively supplied by Yordan Alvarez and Judson Fabian, who combined for 6 of the team's 8 hits. Alvarez had an RBI double in the 1st and a solo HR (#9) in the 3rd, and Fabian hit HR #7 in the 7th to make it 3-1. Team record: 38-18. Next up: An off-day followed a weekend in Kansas City. And here's some league recognition for Blake Money: Also, from Durham: Last edited by Art Deco; 12-12-2020 at 03:11 PM.

12-12-2020, 04:12 PM	#472
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	June 2-4, 2028: at Kansas City (3) Game 1: The Rays went HR-happy and needed every one of them to edge the Royals 8-7 in a wild, back-and-forth game. The star of the game was Jasson Dominguez, who went deep three times including a solo shot in the 8th to tie the game at 7. Dominguez had a 2-run HR in the 2nd and a solo blast in the 6th, giving him 6 as a Ray (in only 39 AB) and 14 overall. He became the 2nd Rays player to go deep 3 times in a game this season as Isaac DeLeon had done so in Baltimore in early May, and it was a DeLeon HR in the 9th that won the game for the Rays, his first since that 3-run HR game and his 4th of the year. Before that the Rays had built a 5-1 lead in the 6th on Dominguez's 2 HRs, a Judson Fabian RBI single and Jhon Diaz's sac fly. Shane McClanahan started and was cruising, having only allowed a Renato Nunez longball but ran out of gas in the 6th, putting a couple of men on with one in, and then Jack Filby totally lost control of the situation, giving up an RBI single, RBI double and a 2-run HR to MJ Melendez and suddenly the Royals were ahead 6-5. Yordan Alvarez hit HR #10 in the top of the 7th to tie it at 6, but Nunez went deep again for KC, this time off Christian Chamberlain to give the Royals the lead before Dominguez and DeLeon homered to complete the Rays' comeback. Evan Godwin picked up win #2 with a scoreless 8th, Jose Alvarado got 2 out in the 9th and put a man on, so Jasseel De La Cruz came in and whiffed Kyle Lewis to end the game and get save #9. In the former Rays department, Hunter Bishop was 0-5 with 4 whiffs, Triston Casas went 2-5, and Nunez was almost impossible to retire, 4-5 with the 2 homers (he's having a big year at age 34 (332/382/559 with 12 HR). Also Xavier Edwards and Ian Lewis were in the lineup and had been Rays farmhands, so 5 of the 9 KC starters were ex-Rays in some fashion. The Yankees lost and fell into a tie with Toronto so the division lead is now 10 1/2 over both. Game 2: The Rays took another wild one in a series that's resembling last weekend's in Philly, except the Rays are actually winning the games. Today it was 12-9 in a game where the offense kept building big leads and Mack Anglin kept giving them back. On the heels of his shaky return start last weekend against the Phillies, Anglin was pretty awful again today and might end up a long reliever for a while if he keeps it up. After the Rays made it 3-0 in the 2nd on a 3-run homer by Bobby Witt Jr (#8) in his old environs, Anglin surrendered 2 runs in the bottom of the inning, and after Jhon Diaz hit his own 3-run blast in the top of the 3rd as part of a 5-run inning to make it 8-2, Anglin gave 4 back to the Royals. The only reason he was staying in the game was that the Rays had the lead. The Rays expanded the lead to 11-6 in the 5th on back-to-back jacks from Diaz again (#9) and Jasson Dominguez (his 4th in 2 days and #7 with the Rays and #15 overall), and Anglin had two quiet innings to get through the bottom of the 5th. But he ran into trouble again in the sixth, and Aaron Ashby wasn't very good in relief, and it was 11-8. Anglin still picked up the win, perhaps the worst start I've had in this save from a Rays pitcher to get one, going 5.2 6 8 8 5 3. Ashby gave up Kyle Lewis' 2nd HR of the game in the bottom of the 7th after Nate Clark's sac fly in the top of the inning, and somehow the final 2 innings didn't see a run from either team as Evan Godwin pitched a clean 8th and Daniel Espino had a 1-2-3 9th for his 2nd save. Yordan Alvarez and Judson Fabian had RBI singles earlier, and Witt had a sac fly to give him a 4-RBI day to go with the 4 driven in by Diaz. Dominguez tallied 4 hits on the day himself as the bats are simply unconscious right now, a far cry from the first 25 or so games when the offense had trouble rubbing two sticks together. Game 3: Rained out. It'll be made up as part of a doubleheader when KC comes to town on June 30th. So Alec Sachais will now go 9 days between starts with the 6-man rotation, this rainout, and an off-day tomorrow. Team record: 40-18. Next up: An off-day, then back home for an odd 2-game series vs Toronto. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-12-2020 at 08:43 PM.

12-12-2020, 08:53 PM	#473
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	The 2028 Amateur Draft Drafted SS Robbie Salazar in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 1, Pick 31, 31st overall pick). Drafted RF Jose Sandoval in the 2028 first-year player draft (Supplemental Round 1, Pick 4, 36th overall pick). Drafted SP Jim Beasley in the 2028 first-year player draft (Supplemental Round 1, Pick 5, 37th overall pick). Drafted RF Danny Melendez in the 2028 first-year player draft (Supplemental Round 1, Pick 6, 38th overall pick). Drafted SP Kevin Epperly in the 2028 first-year player draft (Supplemental Round 1, Pick 7, 39th overall pick). Drafted SP Mike Keck in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 2, Pick 31, 70th overall pick). Drafted C Chris Mangialardi in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 3, Pick 25, 98th overall pick). Drafted SP Sincere DuBose in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 4, Pick 27, 126th overall pick). Drafted CF Steve Huber in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 5, Pick 29, 157th overall pick). Drafted SP Alex Covarrubias in the 2028 first-year player draft (Round 6, Pick 29, 187th overall pick). So we had all these supplemental 1st round picks this year thanks to all the free agents we lost last offseason (Franco, Hiura, Marsh, Manning), giving us 5 of top 39 overall picks. Wish this were the NFL where I could package several of these to move up, but it ain't, so we ended up with some good players but nobody that really got me excited. This year's draft did not seem as deep as last season's. Our top pick, Salazar, is a HS SS out of Georgia who has potential 55-60 gap power, and a potential 75 eye, but 45 contact. Sandoval is a 6'6" power-hitting prospect from high school in Puerto Rico with decent speed and a cannon arm for a RF. Beasley is a college starter (Illinois) who's a power sinkerballer whose ceiling is mid-rotation (Metzler, our scout) or #2 (OSA). Melendez is a high-school RF who profiles as a pure hitter, with potential 65-80 contact and 55-60 power. Epperly is interesting, a high-school LHP who has potential 70 movement and 70 control but 45 stuff as an extreme ground-baller who throws 89-91. We better shore up the defense by the time he gets here. Our 2nd round pick Keck is similar to Epperly except he's a RHP and has a bit more velocity but profiles as another worm-killer. Mangialardi is a good-hitting catcher out of HS with 55 potential contact and power, and 75 potential gap power. HSer DuBose is a potential middle to back-end starter who also has a groundball profile, although he throws in the mid-90s. Control could be an issue with him. Huber is a HS CF who projects to have decent power and contact with good bat speed and Metzler sees him as a starting CF down the line. Covarrubias is a finesse righty from Georgia Tech (hey it's the 6th round). Last edited by Art Deco; 12-12-2020 at 09:27 PM.

12-13-2020, 08:42 AM	#474
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	June 6-7, 2028: vs Toronto (2) Game 1: After two days off (and eight days of rest for starter Alec Sachais), the Rays got off to a slow start on the mound and at the plate, but managed to find their bearings to eventually blow out Toronto 9-2. Sachais gave up a single and a triple to start the game and put the Rays in an immediate hole, but did well in stranding the runner at 3rd to keep it 1-0. He gave up a 1-out double in the 2nd, and then went 5 2/3 no-hit innings to end it a very Sachais-like 7 3 1 1 0 9 and go to 4-0, 2.70. The bats were slumbering through 4 innings against Jays starter Chris Ellis, who came into the game with an ERA over 6. But they came to life in a 6-run 5th that consisted of a 2-run Bobby Witt Jr single, a Nate Clark sac fly, and a 3-run blast by Yordan Alvarez (#11 and finally heating up?). They added 3 more in the 8th on back-to-back doubles by Jhon Diaz and Jasson Dominguez and Ricky Widmar's 2-run triple. Christian Chamberlain gave up an Edmundo Sosa HR in the 8th in his inning of work while Jack Filby had a 1-2-3 2K 9th to close it out. Game 2: Jack Leiter just didn't have it today as the Jays proceeded to Leit him up for 8 runs in an 8-4 win over the Rays, snapping a 6-game win streak. Skyler Messinger hit the first of his 2 HRs off Leiter in the 1st inning, a 3-run shot before he could retire anyone, and it just snowballed from there as he went 4 10 8 8 1 5 and saw his ERA balloon to 4.14. Aaron Ashby and Christian Chamberlain combined for 5 innings of 2-hit relief but that just kept the Jays from double digits. The offense was sluggish, scoring twice in the bottom of the first to make it look like it might be a game on an Nate Clark RBI and a Judson Fabian RBI single (Fabes was 4-4 and is now hitting .343, tops in the AL), but all they could manage after that were solo HRs from Gavin Lux (#13, a massive shot to dead center) and Ryan Jeffers, his first as a Ray. Team record: 41-19. Next up: 4 at home vs Boston. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-13-2020 at 09:44 AM.

12-13-2020, 11:08 AM	#475
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	June 8-11, 2028: vs Boston (4) Game 1: This was a weird one which included something I think I can safely say I've never seen (and maybe has never happened for all I know or I can Google). The Rays scored their first 7 runs on 7 solo homers on their way to a 9-6 win over Boston that never should have been that close. It all started when Isaac DeLeon led off the game with #5 and Gavin Lux immediately followed suit with the first of two he'd hit. Nate Clark hit the first of his two in the 3rd, Keibert Ruiz led off the 4th with his 5th, and then Lux (#15), Clark (#16) and Yordan Alvarez (#12) went back-to-back-to-back to make it 7-1. Clark (who ended up 4-4) and Alvarez added RBI singles in the 5th and 7th to increase the lead to 9-1. Meanwhile Blake Money was flat-out dealing in winning his 8th straight start since joining the rotation, going 6 5 1 1 1 10 and moving to 9-0, 2.16. The pen had its problems, though. Jack Filby pitched a scoreless 7th, but Evan Godwin couldn't get anyone out and gave up 3 runs in the 8th and Daniel Espino had to clean up his mess with a pair of whiffs. And Jose Alvarado followed in Godwin's footsteps, struggling to get one out while allowing two more runs, so Jasseel De La Cruz had to get the final 2 outs of the 9th and pick up save #10. The net result was that we had to use 5 pitchers to protect a 9-1 lead going into the 7th, not exactly optimal. Game 2: Mac is back. Shane McClanahan pitched like the reigning AL Cy Young winner he is, going 7 5 0 0 0 5 to lead the Rays to a 3-1 win over Boston. He goes to 6-2 and gets his ERA back under 4 at 3.88 as he was never in serious trouble tonight. He needed to pitch as well as he did because the offense was apparently still tired from circling the bases yesterday and only squeezed out 5 hits. A couple of them came in a key 4th inning rally which saw them score twice. After loading the bases off Boston starter Johan Oviedo with 1 out, Judson Fabian hit a shallow fly ball that couldn't get the runner home. But Oviedo then decided to walk Jhon Diaz and Jasson Dominguez, forcing in a pair of runs. After Daniel Espino pitched a 1-2-3 8th, Nate Clark's RBI double in the bottom gave the Rays some more breathing room. This made Jasseel De La Cruz's adventures in the 9th less stressful, as he walked Ryan Mountcastle with one out, wild-pitched him to 2nd, saw him advance to 3rd on a groundout, and then wild-pitched him home. But he struck out Lewis Brinson to end the game and grab save #11. Since starting the season a mediocre 11-13, the Rays have gone 32-6 since and with the Yankees losing tonight, now lead the AL East by a whopping 11 games. Game 3: While Mac (McClanahan) was back yesterday, Mack (Anglin) is not. Coming into today, he had two disastrous starts since returning from the IL and added a third today. By the time the 2nd inning was over Boston had 5 runs and 7 hits on their way to an 8-4 win. The only positive to be gleaned from his outing is that he pitched very well over the next 4 innings, allowing only 1 hit and was through 6 on only 86 pitches. But of course I brought him out for the 7th and he gave up a leadoff homer so he ended the day 6 9 6 6 0 6. Still there was enough encouragement there that he'll take his next turn despite the fact we're going with 6 starters and have a bunch of off-days, as an 11-game division lead affords me that luxury. Aaron Ashby gave up 2 runs after relieving Anglin while Christian Chamberlain threw a scoreless 9th. Despite scoring 4 runs, the offense was pretty quiet as all 4 came on homers and we had only 3 non-longball hits. Judson Fabian hit a 2-run shot (#8) in the bottom of the 1st to briefly give the Rays a 2-1 lead, Yordan Alvarez hit a solo shot (#13) in the 4th, and Jasson Dominguez hit one with 2 out in the 9th (#8/#16). Bobby Witt Jr continues to disappoint - he was 0-4 with 2 whiffs today and is 215/278/388 for the year. I know there's positive regression coming but it's still concerning to see someone to whom we made a massive financial commitment still struggling in June. Also Nate Clark had to leave with a bruised elbow after getting hit by a pitch. The injury is minimal for one week, so we'll give him a rest here and there but not completely shut him down. Game 4: Christian Little has pitched a lot of great games for the Rays the last couple of years, but this one was truly one of his best. In fact if not for Josh Naylor he'd have no-hit the Red Sox over 7 innings. As it was he went 7 2 0 0 1 14 on 102 pitches in a 3-0 Rays win with a couple of Naylor hits all Boston had to show against him. Little is now 5-3, 2.41 and has a 21/121 BB/K ratio in 74.2 innings. Daniel Espino followed with a 7-pitch, 1-2-3 8th with a K and Jose Alvarado, with lefties due and JDLC showing tired, gave up 2 hits to lead off the 9th to make it interesting but struck out the next 3 Red Sox to close it out and grab save #5. Leading off the game, Ricky Widmar supplied all the offense the Rays would need today with HR #5 just inside the LF foul pole off one-time Ray Chris Paddack. Widmar figured in the scoring again in the 3rd when he singled and was doubled to 3rd by Gavin Lux before Yordan Alvarez doubled them both in. Widmar ended up 3-4 with the HR and his AL-leading 23rd steal of the year. Team record: 44-20. Next up: 3 games in Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-13-2020 at 08:15 PM.

12-13-2020, 11:31 PM	#476
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	June 12-14, 2028: at Baltimore (3) Game 1: Alec Sachais was dominant again as he combined with Christian Chamberlain and Jack Filby on a 5-0 2-hit shutout of Baltimore in a tough place to pitch. Sachais, who was just upgraded from 65 to 70 stuff per the scouts, went 7 2 0 0 1 11 on 99 pitches to go to 5-0, 2.39 with a 10/74 BB/K ratio in 60.1 innings. Neither he nor Blake Money (acquired in the same deal last year for Patrick Bailey) have lost a game since being put into the rotation. Yordan Alvarez's 3-run HR (#14) in the 1st inning was all the Rays needed on offense, although they did add Bobby Witt Jr's sac fly after Jasson Dominguez tripled, and Ricky Widmar's 2nd HR in as many days (#6) on a night they only managed 7 hits. Game 2: The Rays scored early and often on their way to an 11-5 rout of Baltimore. Jhon Diaz broke out of a mini-slump with a 3-run HR (#10) to cap a 4-run 1st inning, Nate Clark returned to the lineup with a 2-run shot (#17) in the 3rd, and they added 3 more in the 4th on a Ryan Jeffers RBI double and RBI singles by Clark and Yordan Alvarez to go up 9-0. Meanwhile Jack Leiter was brilliant in the early going, pitching a perfect game through 5 with 7 strikeouts. But things unraveled for him fairly quickly, giving up a pair of doubles and a HR in the 6th to make it 9-3, and then two more solo HRs in the 7th before leaving with an odd 6.2 5 5 5 0 9 line, still good enough for win #7. Bobby Witt Jr (#9) and Alvarez (#15) added solo HRs in the 8th and 9th to round out the scoring, and Aaron Ashby went 2 1/3 with no hits or walks to finish out the game. Game 3: The Blake Money/Christian Little/Alec Sachais triumvirate has been damn near unhittable over the last month and a half, and is one of the main reasons why this team is 36-7 after starting 11-13. Today it was Money's turn to dominate in an 8-4 not-really-that-close win over the Orioles to sweep the series in Baltimore. Money is now 10-0, 2.09 after a 6.2 4 1 1 1 9 performance as it's starting to look like yet another Cy Young Award will be coming to Tampa Bay unless these 3 end up splitting the votes. Christian Chamberlain gave up his obligatory HR to a righty when Druw Jones took him deep in the 8th, and Jose Alvarado put men on 2nd and 3rd to start his 9th inning and they both scored on grounders, which is why Baltimore ended up with 4. The offense did its usual thing, with Gavin Lux singling in Ricky Widmar in the top of the 1st to kick things off, and Jhon Diaz homering for the second straight day (#11) with a man on in the 4th to put the Rays ahead to stay 3-1. They blew it open in a 5-run 6th which featured a Jud Fabian RBI double, a Diaz RBI single, a 2-run double from Jasson Dominguez and an RBI single from Keibert Ruiz. The only bad news was that Isaac DeLeon went 0-4 today, snapping a 13-game hitting streak. Team record: 47-20. Next up: An off-day, followed by Atlanta's first visit to the Trop since the 2025 World Series for 3 this weekend. The Braves, perennial playoff participants, are off to a rough 32-35 start this year but are on a 5-game winning streak. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-14-2020 at 12:11 PM.

12-14-2020, 04:23 PM	#477
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	June 16-18, 2028: vs Atlanta (3) Game 1: There was a lot of buzz in the baseball world about tonight's matchup of Cy Young winners as Mike Soroka faced Shane McClanahan in the opener of this interleague series, but as so often is the case the projected pitchers' duel fizzled out, although one of the pitchers hung in there and ended up doing OK. That pitcher turned out to be Mac, as the Rays ended up bombing Atlanta 14-3 and chased Soroka in the 3rd inning. At first though it looked like McClanahan would be the one taking an early shower as the Braves jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the 2nd inning on a 2-run Johan Cruz homer. But the Rays struck back against Soroka in the bottom of the inning with 4 runs, capped by a 3-run blast from Keibert Ruiz (#6). And when Nate Clark hit the first of his 2 longballs against Soroka in the 4th, he was pulled. That didn't stop the bleeding for Atlanta, though, as the Rays scored 7 times over the next three innings, including another HR from Clark with a man on (#19), a Bobby Witt Jr RBI double, an RBI single from Ruiz, etc, etc. Jasson Dominguez added HR #17 (9 as a Ray) later in the game as the Rays scored in every inning but the 6th. Clark and Ruiz each ended with 4-RBI nights, and everyone in the lineup had a hit (in fact aside from Witt and Yordan Alvarez, everyone had at least 2 hits). Mac (now 7-2) meanwhile settled down from his rough start and ended up striking out 11 over 7 innings for the win, even though he allowed 9 hits and the 3 runs. Jack Filby pitched the final 2 innings. The Yankees lost in Houston so the lead has now grown to an absurd 12 1/2 games. Game 2: There was a weird feeling around the team after the game. They.....lost? Yes, the way things have been going lately a loss almost seems shocking, but some shaky work from the bullpen and a relatively quiet day at the plate added up to a 5-3 Atlanta win over the Rays. But there was a silver lining in the defeat as Mack Anglin finally appeared to be back in form after looking terrible in his 3 post-injury starts (20 ER in 16.1 innings). Anglin went 6 4 2 1 1 6 on 87 pitches, with his only problems being with Ronald Acuna Jr, who is a problem for most pitchers. Acuna's 3rd inning RBI double scored Michael Berglund, who reached when Nate Clark (in a rare start in the field) dropped a fly ball (now you know why they're rare) to give Atlanta a 1-0 lead, and in the 6th Acuna took Anglin deep to LCF to tie the game at 2. Otherwise Mack was in command, a great sign. The Rays were up 2-1 for awhile thanks to back-to-back homers from Jasson Dominguez and Keibert Ruiz (#7 and his 2nd in as many days). After Anglin left with the game tied at 2, Evan Godwin coughed up a run in the 7th to put the Braves ahead, but Dominguez got that run right back in the bottom of the frame on an inside-the-park HR, giving him a 2-HR game and 19 overall for the season. So with a tie game in the 8th Daniel Espino came in, normally lockdown time as he came in with an 0.67 ERA and 41 whiffs in 26 innings. But after striking out Acuna to start the inning, he gave up a single to Willy Adames and then a long and loud HR to Ozzie Albies and that proved to be the game-winner for Atlanta. Outside of Dominguez (and Ruiz who also had 2 hits), the offense only managed 2 other hits the whole night as they faced a rare lefty in Kantaro Yokoyama, who has bedeviled the Rays in the past (most notably 6 years ago with Cleveland when he stopped their 25-game win streak). Yordan Alvarez, Gavin Lux and Jhon Diaz, lefty hitters all, got the day off today in favor of Connor Kirkley, Joe Barker and Isaac DeLeon, none of whom did much. Yokoyoma was just the 19th lefty they've faced in 69 games this season and only the second they've seen this month. Game 3: Normal service resumed at the Trop as the Rays had a dominant team pitching performance today in a 4-0 win over Atlanta. Christian Little got the start and was his usual self, but it took him 98 pitches to get through 5 innings so the bullpen had to get it done the rest of the way and they emphatically did. Little went 5 4 0 0 2 10 to go to 6-3, 2.26, while Jack Filby (2 perfect innings with 2 Ks), Jose Alvarado (1-2-3 with 2Ks) and Jasseel De La Cruz (also 1-2-3 with 2Ks) meant the staff had a combined 9 4 0 0 2 16 line today. With that kind of pitching it didn't take much offense to win and it wasn't until the 5th that the big hit of the game came, a 2-run HR to the rays tank by Gavin Lux (#16). They tacked on 2 more runs in the 6th on a Jhon Diaz RBI single and Jasson Dominguez's RBI fielder's choice. Team record: 49-21. Next up: An off-day, then interleague play continues as the Mets come to town for a pair. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-14-2020 at 07:42 PM.

12-14-2020, 09:18 PM	#478
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	June 20-21, 2028: vs NY Mets (2) Game 1: What an ugly and disappointing game. After four perfect innings two days ago, the bullpen was horrific today, blowing a 3-run lead in the 9th to send us to extra innings where they gave up 5 more runs in an ultimate 11-8, 14-inning loss to the Mets. 7.1 14 9 7 3 9 was the combined line of the bullpen as the Mets scored twice in the 12th and 3 more times in the 15th. Alec Sachais got the start and while he was much more hittable than normal, he still got the job done after surrendering a 2-run HR to Miguel Andujar in the 1st inning, finishing 6.2 9 2 2 0 7 and leaving up 5-2. After Evan Godwin got the final out of the 7th, the Rays added another run to go up 6-2. Daniel Espino was ineffective for the second straight outing, giving up Andujar's 2nd HR of the game and another hit in the 8th, but Jose Alvarado rescued him. Alvarado then put one on with one out in the 9th for Jasseel De La Cruz to come on, and JDLC gave up another hit, putting two men on for Pete Alonso, and the Met slugger crushed a 2-0 pitch to tie the game. Jack Filby, in his second inning, should have been out of the 12th but Keibert Ruiz threw away a squibber in front of the plate that would have been the third out, and Danny Santana singled in both runners to give the Mets an 8-6 lead. But Jhon Diaz crushed HR #12 with a man on to tie it with one out, and the Rays put the next two men on but couldn't get the winning run in. That cost them in the 14th when with one out, Aaron Ashby loaded the bases and Andujar's career night continued when he cleared them for a 4-hit, 2-HR, 6-RBI game. Earlier the Rays were looking in good shape after Nate Clark hit #20 with a man on to give them a 4-2 lead and Judson Fabian hit his 2nd RBI double of the game as part of a 4-hit night. Gavin Lux was also on base 5 times with 4 hits and a walk in 7 plate appearances. Jasson Dominguez had to leave with a "moderate" 1-2 week back injury, so he may have to go on the IL. We may also need to call up a reliever. June 21: Placed OF Jasson Dominguez on the 10-day IL with back stiffness, recalled OF Luis Berdin from AAA Durham. We're going to fake it with Jhon Diaz and his 40 defense in CF for 10-14 days, the only other option was to call up Dayle Jenkins from AA but he'd have to go on the 40-man and we'd burn service time which isn't worth it for two weeks. Berdin finally gets the long-deserved call even if it is temporary. Game 2: The Rays managed a split of their series with the Mets, hanging on for a 5-4 win with Blake Money making it 10 wins in 10 starts and going to 11-0. It looked like a romp in the early innings as the Rays raced out to a 5-0 lead by the 3rd. Yordan Alvarez singled in a run in the 1st, Ryan Jeffers had a 2-run single in the 2nd scoring Luis Berdin, who singled in his first MLB at-bat, and they picked up a 3rd run in the inning on a double play. Alvarez then followed with HR #16 in the 3rd. Meanwhile, Money was dealing, shutting out the Mets on 3 hits through 5 innings. But he got into trouble in the 6th, giving up a couple of hits, and with the bullpen down to a skeleton crew Jack Leiter was pressed into relief today with his next start being skipped thanks to the 6-man rotation and days off. The adjustment to relief did not suit Leiter well, as he gave up 3 hits, scoring Money's two runners and two of his own, and it was suddenly 5-4. Money's day ended 5.1 5 2 2 1 9. Leiter stayed on for the 7th and got a couple of outs, then walked a man and Daniel Espino got him out of the inning and pitched a scoreless 8th. Jasseel De La Cruz atoned for last night's debacle by getting a 1-2-3 9th, including a rematch with Pete Alonso with 2 out which he won when he got the Met slugger to ground to 2nd to end the game and picked up save #12. Berdin went 1-4 in his debut and stole a base. After the Rays torched New York starter Koby Blunt for the 5 runs, ex-Rays farmhand Emerson Hancock came on. You may recall we traded him at the end of spring training for Jeffers, and the Cards tried to sneak Hancock through waivers but the Mets claimed him. Anyway, Hancock has pitched well in long relief for New York and did so again today with 3 scoreless innings. He has a 12/52 BB/K ratio through 44 innings with a 3.22 ERA. Team record: 50-22. Next up: a 7-game west coast trip starts with 4 games in Anaheim. After the game we made a trade: Wanted to pick up another lefty, for this year and next as Aaron Ashby will be a free agent (right now our only free agent) at year's end. Bowers has put up good numbers and will go to Durham for now, although he may replace Christian Chamberlain at some point. The price was right for me as Mace was never going to get a callup and he's toiled for 2 1/2 years at Durham and deserves an MLB shot (assuming Arizona gives him one). Last edited by Art Deco; 12-15-2020 at 08:14 AM.

12-15-2020, 09:06 AM	#479
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	June 22-25, 2028: at LA Angels (4) Game 1: With only 3 relievers fresh after a couple of games with heavy bullpen usage, we were going to need Shane McClanahan to go deep tonight. Mission accomplished, as Mac pitched into the 8th and a 2-run double by Keibert Ruiz in the 9th gave the Rays a 4-3 win in the first game of the road trip. Mac went 7.1 7 2 2 2 4 on 102 pitches and gave way to Evan Godwin, who got the final two outs of the 8th as it went 2-2 to the 9th. Jhon Diaz walked, Luis Berdin reached on an error, and Ruiz ripped a double to the RF corner scoring them both. Jose Alvarado came in for the save, and although he gave up a 2-out HR to the same-handed Alex Verdugo, he still picked save #6 while Godwin notched win #3. The Rays' earlier runs came in the 3rd on a Gavin Lux RBI double, and in the 4th when Berdin had his first MLB extra-base hit and first MLB RBI with a run-scoring double. Game 2: Kind of a sad effort tonight as the Rays fell 7-3 to the Angels. Mack Anglin started, and it looked like he'd build on his fine start last time out after he shut the Angels out on 40 pitches through 4 innings. But after the Rays gave him a 3-0 lead in the top of the 5th, he gave it right back with 3 in the bottom of the inning, allowed another run in the 6th, and put a man on with out in the 7th. Aaron Ashby then poured gasoline on the fire, giving up an RBI double then a 2-run HR to make it 7-3 and the offense did nothing outside that 5th inning, ending with only 4 hits on the night. 3 of those hits came from Luis Berdin, who hit a pair of doubles including a run-scoring with in the 5th with the other two scored on an Isaac DeLeon double. Anglin ended up 6.1 7 5 5 1 5, while not great wasn't completely terrible either. The bullpen continues to confound, though. They have a 4.29 ERA which is 11th in the AL. Pretty bad, right? Yet we have a 13-7 record in 1-run games and are 3 games better than our Pythagorean record. The thing I've noticed is that on any given night, they're either really bad or really good. Espino has been lights-out (with a couple of recent exceptions) but everyone else has had their meltdowns yet have been effective overall. Godwin has a 5.20 ERA yet has 0.8 WAR and 40 K in 27 IP, JDLC's ERA is 4.43 but he has 0.7 WAR (28 K in 20), and Alvarado has a 5.11 ERA despite 37 Ks in 24.2 innings. Ashby has -0.2 WAR and 5 HR allowed in 29.2 innings, though, so he's been bad all the way through and could be a candidate for trade/release (release more likely as he seems have zero trade value) with the Bowers acquisition. June 24: Designated P Aaron Ashby for assignment and placed him on waivers, recalled P Jeremy Bowers from AAA Durham. As stated above, Ashby wasn't getting it done anymore, and was going to be a FA at year's end anyway so it's time to take a look at Bowers who pitched very well in his rookie season this year in Arizona. We bid Ashby a fond farewell, and he'll always have those three rings. Game 3: The Rays had a 3-run 1st inning without hitting the ball out of the infield and Christian Little pitched six strong innings again before having to leave with a blister as they bested the Angels 5-2. LA starter Keider Montero walked the bases loaded, gave up an infield single to Bobby Witt Jr to score the first run, walked Jhon Diaz to force in the 2nd and gave up another infield single to Joe Barker to make it 3-0. Witt drove in another run in the 3rd with a groundout to make it 4-0, and Barker hit one considerably farther his next time up, into the RF stands for #6 to make it 5-0 in the 4th. Little was pitching well as usual, although he had a brief hiccup in the 5th when he gave up a 2-run HR to Chance Sisco. Still he was more pitch-efficient than usual today, going 6 5 2 2 1 8 on only 85 pitches and was set to take a rare foray into the 7th inning when he developed a blister problem and had to leave after 6. It's a one-week injury so we'll probably skip his start, either through an off-day or putting Leiter back into the rotation (I have to check the schedule). The mercurial bullpen was excellent tonight, with Jack Filby, Jose Alvarado and Jasseel De La Cruz each pitching scoreless innings. JDLC grabbed save #13 while Little goes to 7-3, 2.31. Game 4: It was the Alec Sachais show again as the rookie righty shut down the Angels to the tune of 7 6 1 0 0 6 in a 4-1 Rays win over the Angels to take 3 of 4 in the series (and 6 of 7 in the season series after the Angels beat them in last year's ALCS). Sachais was never in any serious trouble, and kept his pitch count low enough to start the 8th, but a 2-base Bobby Witt Jr error and an RBI double from Luis Renfigo meant he gave way to Jose Alvarado with lefties Anthony Rizzo and Eric Herman due up. Alvarado got the job done, retiring those two and two more on a grand total of 12 pitches, and Daniel Espino got the final 2 outs on 5 pitches to wrap up the win. No save for Espino since he didn't start the 9th while Sachais goes to 6-0, 2.19 with a 10/87 BB/K ratio in 74 innings. The bulk of the offense came in a 3rd inning rally that saw Isaac DeLeon and Jhon Diaz single, Ricky Widmar single in DeLeon, Connor Kirkley walk to load the bases and Nate Clark single in Diaz and Widmar. Kirkley added his 2nd MLB homer in the 8th. Team record: 53-23. Next up: 3 games in Oakland. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-15-2020 at 04:12 PM.

12-15-2020, 05:35 PM	#480
Art Deco Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2020 Posts: 6,937	June 26-28, 2028: at Oakland (3) Game 1: Blake Money won his 11th straight start to go 12-0, and the Rays broke open a close game late to thump Oakland 10-2. Money was solid, going 6 7 2 2 2 8 as his league-leading ERA sits now at 2.23. It was 2-2 going into the 6th on Jhon Diaz's RBI groundout and Yordan Alvarez's 17th HR of the year before the Rays got 3 in the inning and never looked back. Nate Clark had an RBI single and Bobby Witt Jr had a 2-RBI knock. A Gavin Lux groundout in the 7th made it 6-2, and then they blew it open wide in the 8th with 4 runs. Alvarez led off the inning with his 2nd HR of the game (#18), Luis Berdin hit his first MLB round-tripper with a man on, and Lux singled in a run to complete the scoring. Meanwhile, Jeremy Bowers made an impressive debut in the 7th. After giving up a leadoff single, he struck out the next 3 batters including former Rays (or Rays properties) Billy Benedetto and Seth Beer. Jack Filby pitched a scoreless 8th and 9th to finish it out. Game 2: Drama at the Oakland Coliseum as the Rays got HRs from Yordan Alvarez and Bobby Witt Jr. in the 9th inning off two-time former Ray Ryne Stanek to pull out a 5-4 come-from-behind win. Trailing 4-3, Alvarez led off the 9th with #19 (and his 3rd in 2 days) to tie it, and two batters later Witt hit #10 to win it. Stanek is an interesting case, he's the A's closer and leads MLB with 25 saves but he's really not been that good as he has 5 losses and now 3 blown saves to go with it, and a 5.52 ERA. Shane McClanahan started and was looking like the loser even though he pitched well most of the game but was victimized by some bad sequencing. He put two men on in the 3rd and gave up a 3-run HR, and loaded the bases before leaving in the 7th only for Evan Godwin to allow a sac fly for Oakland to take the lead as he went 6.1 5 4 4 2 7. Godwin pitched an inning, Daniel Espino got the final 2 outs in the 8th (and the win), and in the 9th with a lefty leading off I brought in Jeremy Bowers as I had a brain fart and forgot about the 3-batter rule (after managing about 1500+ games in this save), intending to bring in Jasseel De La Cruz next. Thankfully Bowers got two out and only gave up a single, and then JDLC did get the final out for save #14. Before all this, the Rays got RBI singles from Keibert Ruiz and Gavin Lux in the 3rd to briefly go up 2-0, and got the tying run in the 7th on a wild pitch. Game 3: The Rays completed the sweep of Oakland behind Mack Anglin's best outing since coming off the IL and a pair of HRs from Gavin Lux in a 5-1 win. Anglin was scattering the hits, getting a couple of double plays and picking up key strikeouts in a 6.1 7 1 1 1 7 performance to even his record at 3-3. Before Lux hit HRs 17 and 18 in the 7th and 9th the big hit came from Luis Berdin, who had a 2-run shot in the 4th, his 2nd and his 6th extra-base hit in as many games (he's slugging a cool .818). The other run came on a Bobby Witt Jr double-play grounder. The bullpen was sharp again, with Evan Godwin retiring both men he faced, Jose Alvarado with a perfect 2K 8th and Jasseel De La Cruz whiffing a pair around a hit in the 9th. No save with the 4-run lead after Lux's 2nd HR, though. Lux is now 293/363/560 after a slow start and is 2nd in the AL in WAR at 3.4. Team record: 56-23. Next up: An off-day followed by 5(!) games with Kansas City at home. The first of these will be a rainout makeup doubleheader where the Rays will be the road team at the Trop in Game 1, and the series wraps around through Monday. Also since we're essentially halfway through the season, the next post will be a midseason report card and a look at all of our recently departed Rays to see how they're faring with their new clubs this year. Last edited by Art Deco; 12-16-2020 at 12:05 AM.