Rays Rally Late, But Lose to Yankees on Injury-Filled Night
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Being stuck in a rut, and a deep rut at that, often requires something fluky to get out of it. That looked like that was going to happen for Tampa Bay Rays on Monday night, where they broke up a Gerrit Cole no-hitter in the eighth inning and scored two runs to tie the game with a couple of slow dribblers, neither of which traveled more than about 60 feet.
But nothing seems to be going right for the Rays at the moment, and Monday night's game didn't either. The Yankees scored twice in the top of the ninth to win 4-2, with the go-ahead run coming on an Aaron Hicks triple off the wall in right field that Manuel Margot almost caught, but he sprained his knee while colliding with the wall and the run scored.
He had to be carted off the field with what is likely a significant knee injury, according to Rays manager Kevin Cash. That, combined with center fielder Kevin Kiermaier leaving the game in the third inning with a hip injury, and the Rays lost much more than a baseball game.
"It's awful, and it's unfortunate,'' Rays pitcher Shane McClanahan said of Margot's injury. "Manny is a leader on this team and a key contributor. We love what he brings to the field every day, so we're all keeping him in our thoughts.
"We've lost of lot of key guys, but we're just going to have to keep doing what we're doing and make the best of a bad situation.''
The injuries put a serious damper on what was a terrific ballgame. The pitcher's duel between McClanahan and Cole, ''two of the best pitchers in the game,'' according to Cash, lived up to the hype. McClanahan lasted six innings, giving up just a first-inning home run to Anthony Rizzo.
Cole took a 2-0 lead into the eighth inning — the Yankees scored an unearned run in the seventh on a bad Ji-Man Choi error — working into the eighth inning with a no-hitter. Then things got weird.
The Rays, who had scored only five runs total in their five losses last week, didn't get to Cole until second baseman Isaac Paredes singled to open the eighth.
And then rookie left fielder Josh Lowe, who was recalled from Durham earlier in the day, then ripped a ball to deep center that Aaron Judge caught while leaning up against the 404-foot sign on the center-field wall.
"Yeah, I thought for sure that was gone, just by the way it felt, and (Judge's) reaction, too. I think he thought it was gone,'' Lowe said. "We could have used a moment like that, but that's just baseball.
"I hit the heck out of that for an out and then we score two runs with a couple of little ground balls in the infield. It's a crazy game, but I tell you what. There's definitely something wrong with these baseballs this year. That definitely should have been a home run.''
After Lowe's out, Clay Holmes came in to pitch for Cole, who left after throwing 111 pitches. Holmes, who hasn't allowed a run since Opening Day, gave up a double down the line to pinch-hitter Francisco Mejia, and Paredes went to third.
Yandy Diaz then hit a dribbler back to the mound, and Holmes threw him out at first, but Paredes scored to make it 2-1. Margot then hit a little squibber to the third base side of the mound, and he beat Holmes' throw to first to tie the game. It was Holmes' first blown save of the year, and the first run he had given up in 32 innings.
With the score tied, Jason Adam came on to pitch the ninth for the Rays. Adam, who hadn't allowed a run since May 3 covering 18 appearances, gave up a deep single to Josh Donaldson before Hicks hit that rocket off the wall that Margot just missed.
"That was a heck of an effort by Manny. I thought he caught the ball,'' said center fielder Brett Phillips, who came in for Kiermaier in the third inning. "It's a tall wall there. I know he was in pain when I got over there, and I just told him to just take some breaths, that they were on their way.
"Manny's been a leader and one of the bright spots in our offense. We've just got to keep moving forward, but it sure seems like when it rains, it pours around here.''
The Yankees made it 4-2 on a Jose Trevino sacrifice fly to left. Wandy Peralta came on to pitch the ninth — Holmes had thrown 25 pitches in the eighth — and he walked Vidal Brujan to open the inning, and Paredes reached on a one-out throwing error by third baseman DJ LeMahieu.
But Peralta then struck out Lowe on a called strike on the inside corner and Mejia flied out to left to end the game.
It was the fourth straight win over the Rays for the Yankees, who swept a series in New York last week. The Rays are now just 2-8 in their last 10 games, and are now 36-31 on the year, just five games over .500. They haven't been that close to .500 since May 10, when they were 18-13.
It was the Yankees' 50th win of the season, and they became just the fifth MLB teams since 1930 to win 50 of their first 67 games. The last team to do it was the 2001 Seattle Mariners, who were 52-15 and managed by former Rays and Yankees skipper Lou Piniella.
McClanahan was pleased with his night other than the bad — ''very bad'' — pitch to Rizzo. He tried to get a fastball by him, but said his location was horrible.
Anthony Rizzo with another hit off of Shane McClanahan! The first baseman has two of the Yankees' four hits against the Rays ace tonight. #YANKSonYES pic.twitter.com/VQ4IrNQNRF
— YES Network (@YESNetwork) June 21, 2022
"I made a really bad pitch to Anthony Rizzo, and he's too good of a hitter to let that go by,'' said McClanahan. "He deposited it where he should have deposited it, and that was 30 rows deep. It was terrible execution on my part, terrible location. But you tip your hat, and make an adjustment from there.''
He did just that, cruising through his six innings. He had eight strikeouts and just one walk. His ERA is now down to 1.81 and he has a MLB-best 113 strikeouts.
Cole finished the game with a season-high 12 strikeouts.
"Gerrit threw the hell out of the ball tonight. He's always a treat to watch, and kudos to our offense for not backing down,'' McClanahan said.
The two teams are back at it on Tuesday with another 7:10 p.m. game. Nestor Cortes (6-1, 1.94 ERA) is scheduled to pitch for the Yankees. Cash said after Monday night's game that he still wasn't sure who would start for the Rays.
Tom Brew is the publisher of Inside The Rays, and has been with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation network for three years. He is an award-winning writer and editor who has spent most of his four-decade career at the Tampa Bay Times, Indianapolis Star and South Florida Sun-Sentinel. He has written four books.