“Today’s Rays-Giants game at Tropicana Field is SOLD OUT!”
-Tampa Bay Rays (via Twitter)
After averaging just north of 17,000 fans per game on the season, the Rays are averaging somewhere in the ballpark of 28,000 fans per game over the course of four games — today’s sellout included. Cough, all this against the D’Backs and Giants, not the Sox or Yankees.
Dearest Dick Vitale, how d’ya like those apples?! Let him know at his Twitter feed, @DickieV. While you’re at it, rub it in Bob Ryan’s face as well at @GlobeBobRyan
An impressive crowd of 31,969 showed up to the Trop Saturday, to watch the Rays take the second game of a three-game set against the Giants by a score of 2-1.
The Rays were able to take the second game of a three-game set against the Giants by a score of 2-1 in dramatic walk-off fashion, in front of an impressive crowd of 31,969 fans at the Trop, Saturday night. Wil Myers drove in the game winning RBI with the bases loaded in the the bottom of the tenth, his first career walk-off. And though I wish the Rays could have tagged The Freak for more than a run, it was pretty damn cool to see a classic pitching duel between two former Cy Young Award winners.
The Rays ace pitched nine innings of 5 H/1 ER/o BB/5 K ball, however Price wasn’t in line for the win at the end of his outing thanks to a 1-1 tie. Don’t let that detract from his performance, Price was excellent. Leaning heavily on his fastball and sinker (46 thrown, 33 for strikes, 1 swings and misses), an impressive change-up (24 thrown, 18 for strikes, 4 swings and misses), and a cutter (26 thrown, 20 for strikes, four swings and misses) that had a lot of movement, Price pitched to contact — once again — inducing 15 weakly hit pop-outs, and largely shutting down any Giants threats that may have come his way. The only real thorns in the side of David Price and the Rays were Jeff Francoeur , Hunter Pence, and Joaquin Arias. The three of which went a combined 6-for-12 with a run, an RBI, and a three doubles.
This isn’t to say that Price was perfect, he wasn’t. Price got in trouble in the third inning (inevitably giving up the Giants lone run on a Brandon Crawford RBI single to center, easily plating Francoeur from second), the fifth when San Francisco threatened with a pair of runners in scoring position, and the eighth when Francoeur found his way to third with one out. However, Price made the big pitch in each of those innings, inducing a number of ground-ball outs including an inning ending double play in the third.
Incidentally, the Price of late isn’t the dominant pitcher of previous years. Before you get all hot and bothered, I’m referring to Price’s overall K/9 being down. However, the results have spoken for themselves. Price has never been as efficient as he is now, nor has he posted four complete games in a one month, seven start, stretch. Averaging eight innings per start in his last seven outings, I’ll gladly take this Price.
On the other side of the coin, Lincecum was also very good. Though The Freak gave up six hits, they were all singles which forced the Rays into a position to play small ball. Only three Rays — Jose Molina, Kelly Johnson, and Yunel Escobar — were able to get into scoring position, limiting the number of Tampa Bay scoring threats, while only one runner crossed the plate (Jose Molina on a one out fielders choice at second in the third). Tampa Bay mounted two major threats against Lincecum, however he, like his counterpart, was able to limit the damage to only one run.
The Rays mounted threats in the eighth and ninth innings against Santiago Casilla, Sandy Rosario, and Javier López. But Tampa Bay came away empty handed, forcing the game to into extra innings. The good guys were finally able to put together a real scoring threat in the tenth inning against reliever Jean Machi.
Machi walked Desmond Jennings to start the tenth. The speedy center fielder took advantage of the situation by stealing second with Ben Zobrist at the plate. With Jennings already in scoring position, Bruce Bochy called for an intentional walk of Zobrist to bring an 0-for-3 Evan Longoria to the plate. That plan backfired though. Machi walked Longo on four poorly located pitches setting up their ultimate downfall. With the bases juiced, Wil Myers saw one pitch before he sent an 0-1 meatball over the plate to deep center, driving in Jennings for the win. The Rays won in dramatic walk-off fashion.
Do the bounce! The Rays mobbed Wil Myers after he hit the game winning single to center — his first career walk-off.
The New What Next
The Rays will look to close out the series against the Giants with Roberto Hernandez on the bump. Robo will butt heads with the 4-8 Barry Zito, as he attempts to follow up his excellent complete game start Tuesday with another quality start. You can read about the pitching match-up here.
Rays 8/4/13 Starting Lineup
Zobrist 2B
Scott DH
Longoria 3B
Myers RF
Loney 1B
Escobar SS
Joyce LF
Molina C
Fuld CF
Hernandez RHP
Noteworthiness
Maddon has Fuld in center field today, hitting ninth. Desmond Jennings was pulled from the lineup with a sprained finger, and Ben Zobrist will take his spot in the order. Per Marc Topkin, Jennings isn’t sure if he hit his finger on a base or a defender. Jennings’ finger is thankfully not broken, and will see the doctor. The Rays don’t anticipate Jennings being out long.
Fernando Rodney is now 4-2 on the year after putting together another scary outing Friday night. Rodney gave up a double to Hunter Pence to start the inning. In turn, Pence ended up at third while the Giants threatened with runners in scoring position with two outs.
Moore played catch from 60 feet this morning, saying, that “It went well.” He is expected to go on the road trip, and is eyeing a mid-August return.
Did I mention that there were 31,969 fans at the Trop last night? I can’t recall. This was the fifth largest non-opening day crowd in the last three years for the Rays. Make sure you tweet good old Dick Vitale at @DickieV acknowledging as much.
Pitching coach Jim Hickey heads out to chat with pitcher Chris Archer, who suffers his first loss in his past eight starts. (Photo courtesy of Chris Zuppa/Times)
Most assumed that last night’s highly anticipated pitching match-up between Chris Archer and Madison Bumgarner would be a good one. At the end of the day though, only one pitcher would end his outing as the victor, while the other would walk away with a tally mark in the loss column. It just so happened that Bumgarner ultimately bested Archer and walked away knowing that he shut down one of the best teams in baseball.
And let’s be honest, Archer was good for the majority of his 7 IP/7 H/4 R/4 ER/3 BB/4 K/2 HR outing… Just not good enough. He was victimized by a handful of mistakes; one, two, or three too many walks, an elevated — ill fated — change-up in the fifth inning, and a thigh-high fastball on the inner third of the plate in the seventh.
Archer threw 72 fastballs (43 for strikes, seven swinging), and 36 sliders (24 for strikes, two swinging), and largely pitched to contact on this fateful evening. Though he was able to induce weak contact for the most part, Archer also giving up some hard hit balls. To his credit, the young righty battled with his fastball and put together a decent outing outing that we’d (arguably) be praising if the Rays could have generated some offense.
On the offensive side of things, Bumgarner was able to limit the Rays to one run on seven hits and three walks. And though they had plenty of opportunities to score, they went 2-10 wRISP while stranding nine on the bags. In short, Bumgarner was excellent. The Giants lefty threw a filthy mid-80’s slider 47% (35 for strikes, 10 swinging) of the time, wringing up 11 Rays along the way, while making big-pitch-after-big-pitch to get out of any and all threatening situations. Tampa Bay just couldn’t put anything together against the Giants lefty.
And while we’re on the subject of Madison Bumgarner, Ian Malinowski of DRaysBay pointed out his approach against righties and lefties,
Note the pitches up and away to right handed batters, coming down diagonally into the strike zone (along the same plane as the movement of his slider), and continuing down and in onto the back foot, where he picks up his swinging strikes. It’s an uncommon location chart from an uncommon pitcher.
Madison Bumgarner pitch location chart. (Courtesy of Brooks Baseball)
It goes without saying, the old adage, “You can’t win games if you don’t score runs,” applied to last night’s game.
The New What Next
David Price will toe the rubber against The Freak tonight at the Trop. On paper, this looks like another pitching duel of the ages. However, Lincecum sitting on a 5-11 record and a 4.61 ERA, and I’d have to say advantage Price. You can read about the pitching match-up here, and we’ll post the starting lineup when it becomes available.
Rays 8/3/13 Starting Lineup
Jennings CF
Zobrist 2B
Longoria 3B
Myers RF
Loney 1B
Escobar SS
Scott DH
Molina C
Johnson LF
Price LHP
Noteworthiness
Just Yunel being Yunel... While retreating back to first base, Yunel Escobar reached over and grabbed Joe West’s stomach with both hands. I’m not certain if he is extending his very involved handshake to the umpires now as well.
The Rays didn’t lose any ground to the Red Sox last night, after Boston’s 7-6 los to the Diamondbacks.
I had this shirt at one time, as well as the front page of the Times proclaiming the that the Giants would be calling the Trop home. Both deals to bring the White Sox (beforehand) and Giants to Tampa Bay fell through. A cautionary tale for bay area baseball fans?
Rays 8/3/13 Starting Lineup
Jennings CF
Zobrist 2B
Longoria 3B
Myers RF
Rodriguez LF
Escobar SS
Loney 1B
Lobaton C
Roberts DH
Archer
The Tampa Bay Rays are back at it Friday following their 7-0 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks. Out of sight, out of mind. They’ll welcome the San Francisco Giants into the Trop for the first time since 2004 — only the second time in the Rays 15 year history. It’s a homecoming of sorts: The Giants were slated to call The Trop home 21 years ago this month. I still have my St. Pete Giants shirt somewhere, but that’s neither here or now.
The reining World Series champions have fallen on hard times this year. Faced with injuries and inconsistent play, the Giants sit at the bottom of the NL West, 10 games out of first and 11 games under .500. As of Thursday, San Francisco had lost eight-of-11 and 23-of-33. The culprit? An inconsistent offense that’d been held to three or fewer runs in nine of the past 11 games. What’s more, the Giants had the worst record in the majors from May 14 through Wednesday, 24-44.
Rays and Giants series starters.Rays and Giants offensive production at home, away, and over the last 14 days.Rays and Giants, by the numbers.
Madison Bumgarner: Per Rotowire, “Bumgarner pitched eight scoreless innings and did not factor in the decision Saturday against the Cubs.” Since the All-Star Break, has pitched 15 innings of one-run ball. He is 6-4 with a 3.25 ERA on the road this season and has never faced the Rays. Three current Rays have faced Bumgarner, while only one (Kelly Johnson, 6-17) has had any success against the Giants RHP.
Tim Lincecum: Per Rotowire, “Lincecum fell to 5-11 on the year Sunday as he gave up two earned runs on four hits over seven innings. He walked two and struck out ten.” Lincecum continues his steady regression first noted a few years back. Once regarded as a pitcher that could ramp up the velocity of his pitches into the upper 90’s, Lincecum’s fastball averages somewhere between 90 and 93 MPH and tops out somewhere in the mid 90’s. A cautionary tale of sorts, Lincecum has rediscovered his change-up/splitter, throwing it for strikes close to 84% of the time. The Freak is 2-6 with a 4.40 ERA on the road this season. The no-hitter was his first road win since his first start of the season. Key match-ups: Sam Fuld (2-3), Ryan Roberts (3-12, 2 2B, 2 RBI, BB).
Barry Zito: Per Rotowire, “There is a chance that Zito could be skipped for his next scheduled start Sunday against the Rays, CSN Bay Area reports.” The Giants are winless in Zito’s nine road starts this season and have not won a game on the road that he has started since his 7-2/3 inning shutout performance at St. Louis in Game 5 of the National League Championship Series. Key match-ups: Yunel Escobar (2-6, HR, RBI, BB), Kelly Johnson (2-5, RBI, BB), Ryan Roberts (5-14, 2B, 3 BB).
Noteworthiness
The series is tied at 3-3, while the Rays lead 2-1 at Trop.
The Giants have won two in a row following a 1-8 stretch.
As a team, Tampa Bay is hitting .262 with Wil Myers hitting .331, James Loney hitting .316, Ben Zobrist hitting .275, and Evan Longoria hitting .273.
The Rays pitching staff has an ERA of 3.76, with the starters at 3.79 and the bullpen at 3.70. Chris Archer has allowed 46 hits and 18 earned runs, while striking out 47 over 67.2 innings for a 6-3 record and a 2.39 ERA.
In each of the six games the Giants have lost when Bumgarner took the mound, San Francisco has scored one run or less. Furthermore, Archer hasn’t allowed more than three earned runs since his season debut on June 1 — a span of 10 starts.
The Rays start the day one game out of first following Boston’s 8-7, come from behind, win against the Mariners.
