The real problem, from a Rays point of view with tonight’s game had nothing to do with Zach Littell.
The real problem was the offense.
Coming into this season, I looked at the Rays roster and wondered where the heck the runs would come from.
They were largely successful in their first two series by being so stingy on the defensive side of the ball that they could get away with not scoring much, but at some point you need to do better than scattering singles.
The Rays scored two runs tonight thanks to a handful of baserunners and two well-timed wild pitches. Rangers starter Tyler Mahle only allowed one hit and gave up two walks in his five innings; the two Rays runs came off of former Ray Shawn Armstrong.
Rays starter Zack Littell pitched well for six out of seven innings, but that one bad inning was enough to seal the team’s fate. He succeeded in getting ahead of batters and inducing weak-ish contact for nearly the whole game, which is why his disastrous third inning seems anomalous. He went through five batters without getting a single out, allowing a few steals along the way just to make sure there was always a runner in scoring position.
The first out of the inning came on a sac fly, and the only reason that was turned into an out was a good diving catch by Jonny DeLuca (interestingly DeLuca had failed to make an almost identical out on Wednesday, resulting in a triple).
Littell then settled in for another four innings, eventually giving up a solo home run but otherwise not really encountering any trouble.
