Jeremy Hellickson pitches against the Los Angeles Angels on September 4, 2013. (Photo Courtesy of Jeff Gross/Getty Images)
Jeremy Hellickson pitches against the Los Angeles Angels on September 4, 2013. (Photo Courtesy of Jeff Gross/Getty Images)

Suffice to say, at this point in the season Jeremy Hellickson needed to string together a good start. With all of the external factors effecting the probability of the Rays finding a postseason berth, compounded with the fact that Boston absolutely blew out the Tigers in an earlier game, the pressure was on Hellickson and the Rays to win. After a six start stretch where Hellickson relinquished (on average) 4.1 earned runs, while averaging only 4.1 innings per outing*, it would be safe to say that no one knew what we’d see out of Jeremy upon his return to the mound. But Hellickson came out of the fog Wednesday night, putting together a solid 5.1 inning shutout outing.

Make no mistake, Jeremy Hellickson was good. Helly pitched out of the stretch in the second and third innings, however he did something that he seemed incapable of doing in the previous six starts — he got out of those jams unscathed. Helly attacked the zone with his fastball, throwing it for strikes 77% of the time, inducing a good number of weak hits (4 GB/8 FB) off the ends of the Angels bats. He also used his fastball to set up his secondary pitches nicely, of which he got six swings and misses on the change-up. Though Hellickson was pulled 71 pitches into his outing, I can’t help but feel this move was Maddon’s Seinfeld/Costanza “When you hit that high note, you say goodnight and walk off,” moment.

And though McGee allowed the Angels sole run on a Chris Ianetta blast in the seventh, the bullpen was on lock-down mode — limiting the damage while impressively closing the door on LA.

I’ve been live blogging these late night games, because it’s easier to post a link to the summary, rather than writing a game summary during my few spare moments in the course of the workday. You can read that blow-by-blow summary of the game at our Tumblr site. Just click the screenshot below to be redirected.

Click the screen shot to be redirected to a blow-by-blow summary of Wednesday night's Rays/Angels game.
Click the screen shot to be redirected to a blow-by-blow summary of Wednesday night’s Rays/Angels game.

The New What Next

Tampa Bay starts the day 2.5 games ahead of the Yankees in the Wildcard standing. The Yankees and Red Sox will go toe-to-toe tonight, to which we say go Yankees. And yes, I feel horrible about myself after uttering those two words. David Price will take the mound against Jerome Williams in the series finale tonight. You can read about the pitching match-up here.

Rays 9/5/13 Starting Lineup

DeJesus CF
Zobrist 2B
Longoria 3B
Joyce LF
Loney 1B
Myers RF
Johnson DH
Molina C
Escobar SS
Price LHP

Noteworthiness

  • Tonight’s starting lineup finds David DeJesus leading off and in centerfield in lieu of Desmond Jennings.
  • Home plate umpire Todd Tichenor made a few questionable calls against the Rays last night, with the most egregious calls coming against the lefties in the lineup. To be fair, it’s nothing new — the umps have been doing as much throughout this series.
Umpire strike zone pitch F/X vs RHH. Each pitch is represented by a single dot. Green dots are balls and red dots are strikes.
Umpire strike zone pitch F/X vs RHH. Each pitch is represented by a single dot. Green dots are balls and red dots are strikes.
Umpire strike zone pitch F/X vs RHH. Each pitch is represented by a single dot. Green dots are balls and red dots are strikes.
Umpire strike zone pitch F/X vs RHH. Each pitch is represented by a single dot. Green dots are balls and red dots are strikes.
  • The Rays performed mildly better wRISP last night, going 2-for-9. However, none of those runners scored — they simply moved from second to third. I’ll take them moving runners, that’s a plus. However, they could have really broken the game open against Weaver, yet they ended the night by stranding six men on the bags.
  • Is Wil slipping out of his slump? After going 2-for-31 prior to Tuesday night, Wil Myers has put up some beefy numbers, going 5-for-8 with two doubles, two homers, three runs, and three RBI.
  • An interesting stat, it’s September 5th and only six players in MLB have at least 30 HR.
  • Bay News Nine questions, “So, how are those talks between St. Pete and the Ray going?” Per Mayor Foster, things aren’t going so well.

*Culminating in a nine day stint in the minors.

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