Going into Friday night’s game, Rays starter Chris Archer set one goal for himself in this, his final start of the season: pitch strongly. And over the course of 7-2/3 innings of baseball, Archer put together his strongest outing of the season — holding the Indians to one run on three hits, while striking out six. Unfortunately for him,Jose Ramirez took advantage of a first inning mistake pitch for the only run of the game, and the Rays had to butt heads with the 2014 Cy Young Award contender, Corey Kluber.
Category Archives: Looking Backward While Moving Forward
Looking Backward While Moving Forward: Rays Fall 11-3 — A Recap as a Series of Tweets
You may call it lazy journalism, however the last thing I wanted to do was relive Wednesday night’s UGLY 11-3 loss to the Red Sox. Instead, I decided to recap the game as a series of tweets from Marc Topkin and the Tampa Bay Rays.
Looking Backward While Moving Forward: Rays Take Down BoSox, 6-2
The Tampa Bay Rays started their final push for .500 with a 6-2 win against the last place Red Sox, Tuesday night. I read two things on the internet, in the midst of the game, that summed up the contest perfectly.
First, the Rays updated their Facebook page with the following,
Some updated Alex Cobb digits:
1.49 ERA after All-Star break (1st in MLB)
2.75 ERA overall (6th in AL)
81.1 IP without allowing HR (Rays record)
Then a dashing, yet anonymous, writer updated his Facebook page with this,
Irrelevant baseball? For sure. Whatever the case, watching Buchholz getting it handed to him is still gratifying!
Looking Backward While Moving Forward: Rays Fall in Home Finale, 10-5
I had it all planned out. Going into The Trop under the assumption the Rays would win the home finale and take the series from the White Sox, I scribed a rough draft on how the last game of the season is bitter sweet. Yet I left Tropicana Field yesterday feeling, well…just bitter. Watching Tampa Bay get no hit into the sixth inning — while also simultaneously getting pounded into submission — surely wasn’t what I envisioned en route to the ballpark. If anything, the final pitch of the game made me happy that the 36-45 nightmare, that was the Rays at home this season, was over.
Looking Backward While Moving Forward: Archer, Rays Beat White Sox 3-1
As this disappointing season winds to a close, it certainly is an odd feeling to be watching the Rays play irrelevant baseball. Hell, even in their last season of irrelevant baseball (2012), Tampa Bay was playing for something up until the very end. Still, if you subscribe to the idea that a fair number of those on the roster are making their case for 2015, these final games are pretty interesting. And while the infield of the future looked all but settled a few days back, Nick Franklin entered the picture and is making a pretty good case for himself.