Game 1: The Rays played a Labor Day matinee at Fenway Park and Luis Patino labored through his 4 innings of work as Tampa Bay dropped its 4th straight game 5-2 to Boston. Patino got out of a bases-loaded jam in the 2nd with a popup and a strikeout but fell off the high wire in the 3rd when he allowed 3 Red Sox runs, including one on a bases-loaded walk. He was dinged for another run in the 4th and finished 4 7 4 4 3 4 on 88 pitches. Chris Mazza had 2 scoreless innings against his old team while Hunter Strickland was touched for 1 in his 2 innings of work. The offense was pretty quiet with Randy Arozarena and Willy Adames in need of rest. The Kevins got them within 4-2 with Kiermaier hitting HR #8 in the 5th and Padlo delivering an RBI double in the 6th but that was pretty much it. Yet they continue to see their magic # reduced as Toronto dropped its 5th straight today to make it 10. The Jays lost to the Yankees who now move ahead of them into 2nd place, 15 games back of the Rays.
MLB News: The division races in the AL are pretty set with the Rays, Twins and Astros in command. The wild card race, however, is a completely different story:
The NL is kind of the opposite. The Mets and Brewers have double-digit leads in their divisions, but the West is a three-team race between the Dodgers, Padres (1 behind) and Diamondbacks (4 behind). There really is no wild card race, as the two West teams which aren't in first have a huge lead (7 1/2 games) on the rest of the pack so the 5 playoff teams are basically set.
Game 2: Tonight the Rays got back on the winning track with their classic formula: an excellent start, solid bullpen work and just enough offense to take a 4-1 win over Boston. Chris Archer got the start and looked like he wouldn't be long for the game in the 1st inning with the bases loaded, a run in, and only one out, but he wriggled out of that jam and settled in from there, going 6 4 1 1 2 5 and improving to 10-4, 3.67. Then the bullpen did its thing with Pete Fairbanks, Diego Castillo and Nick Anderson all pitching 1-2-3 innings as Anderson got his 27th save. The star on offense was Randy Arozarena; his 2-run homer in the 1st (#27) gave the Rays a quick 2-0 lead and he singled in a run in the 3rd. Kevin Padlo took Connor Seabold deep for his 2nd MLB homer to make it 4-1 in the 4th as he's now slugging .600 in 35 at-bats and is looking like the man at 3B until Wander Franco returns later this month. With the win, the magic number drops to 9 as the Yankees won to keep pace.
MLB News: Miguel Cabrera hit his 500th career homer tonight for Detroit and former Ray Austin Pruitt pitched the game of his life for Houston, going 8.1 4 0 0 0 13 in a 4-0 win over Seattle.
Game 3: Shoddy defense cost the Rays in a 4-3, 11-inning loss at Boston tonight. Ryan Yarbrough started and pitched well, but in the 5th he should have been out of the inning when he got a grounder to Joey Wendle at 3B, but Wendle booted it opening the door for JD Martinez to come through with a 2-run single to make it 3-1 Boston. Yarbrough went 6 6 3 1 0 6 and lowered his ERA to an even 4.00 and Rafael Dolis had 2 more scoreless innings buying time for Kevin Kiermaier to come through with a dramatic 2-run 9th-inning HR (#9) off Bryan Mata to tie the game up. Diego Castillo went two scoreless himself, and that brought us to the bottom of the 11th with Pete Fairbanks on the mound. He allowed a leadoff single but retired the next two Red Sox when pinch-hitter Xander Bogaerts hit a squibber in front of the plate which Mike Zunino threw into RF. This put men on 2nd and 3rd, and after Alex Verdugo was intentionally walked to load the bases, Fairbanks walked Martinez to force in the winning run, making 3 of the 4 Boston runs tonight unearned. Wendle's RBI double accounted for the other Rays run as they two of three to Boston.
Team record: 90-50. Magic number: Down to 8 as Toronto beat the Yankees tonight. Next up: A day off then the road trip continues over the weekend in Detroit.
Real Life vs OOTP Update: It's May 15 and the Rays won today to improve to 22-19, putting them only two games off the pace of this save which had them at 24-17 through today. Still hoping they'll pull away like they did here.