The night began with a reminder that baseball is more than just a game but an ongoing story. Dewayne Staats, the voice of Rays baseball since the beginning, tossed out the first pitch in what was a nod to his fiftieth season in the booth and perhaps a quiet acknowledgment that his time at the mic is winding down. On the field, there was an even stranger sighting as the Rays’ outgoing principal owner, Stu Sternberg, was pulling duty as a ballboy. Just as his ownership tenure is coming to a close, so did the Rays’ postseason hopes by the end of the night.
Every night at the ballpark, you can see something for the first time, and this game leaned hard into that theme.
Drew Rasmussen was on the hill, and for two batters, it looked like his command might carry the night. Jarren Duran chopped one to short for the first out, and Trevor Story struckout. Then things started to change. Alex Bregman worked a walk, Masataka Yoshida hit a double to right, and suddenly the Red Sox had two runners in scoring position with two down. Rasmussen escaped when Romy Gonzalez grounded to second, but it was a first warning sign that the game would not follow a clean script.
The Rays struck first in the bottom of the inning. Yandy Díaz, doing Yandy Díaz things, lashed a double to left. Christopher Morel followed with a walk, and though Josh Lowe went down swinging, Nick Fortes punched a grounder up the middle to bring Díaz home. It was 1–0, and it felt like momentum might settle in Tampa Bay’s favor.
But some would argue that in baseball, momentum is a social construct.
In the second, Nate Eaton slapped a single past first, and Nathaniel Lowe immediately followed with a liner to center that brought him home to tie the game. Rasmussen regrouped with a strikeout and some quick outs, but the tone was already being set that no inning was going to be easy.
Then came the fireworks from the young Rays. Carson Williams turned on a pitch in the second and sent it flying into the right field seats. A solo shot, his fifth of the season, and the Rays were back in front 2–1. It was one of those moments that makes you wonder how high the ceiling can be for this team next season.
The back-and-forth continued in the third. Richie Palacios made a smooth spinning throw to retire Story, but Alex Bregman was waiting. He jumped on a pitch and lasered it into the left field seats to tie the game 2–2. Yandy Díaz answered right back in the bottom half, belting his 25th homer of the season to right and giving the Rays a 3–2 lead.
The Rays bullpen entered in the fourth, and the rhythm shifted. Cole Sulser gave the Rays a clean fourth, and Rasmussen’s night was quietly finished. On the other side, Garrett Crochet was mowing through Tampa Bay hitters. Both teams traded strikeouts and stranded baserunners through the middle innings.
The seventh is where it broke. Garrett Cleavinger took the mound and immediately allowed a single to Rafaela. Then Jarren Duran unloaded, a towering two-run homer to right that flipped the score 4–3. Cleavinger got Story to strikeout and a Bregman groundout, but Kevin Cash pulled the plug and turned to Cole Wilcox to get out of the seventh. That didn’t settle things, and the eighth became the nightmare frame.
It started with a double by Gonzalez and an RBI single from Eaton. Then came a stolen base, a walk, a bloop single, another single and suddenly the Red Sox had a three-run lead with bases loaded. A fielder’s choice brought another run, a bases-loaded walk pushed home yet another, and then the defense joined in on the collapse because why not. Tristan Gray missed on a throw that skipped past Bob Seymour that let two more runs score, and by the time Nathaniel Lowe was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded, it was 11–3. A six-run implosion that felt like it lasted an entire hour, the kind of inning where you wish there were a game clock that could be run out and end the misery. Then again, the beauty of the game is the absence of a clock and anything being possible.
The Rays went down quickly in the bottom half, and a clean ninth from the Sox seemed inevitable. But the game isn’t over until all the outs are recorded.
Everson Pereira stepped up with the bases loaded in the ninth thanks to two walks and a Seymour single, the Rays trailing by eight. He turned on a pitch and launched it high to the left. The ball carried, it carried some more, and then it was gone. A grand slam, the second of his career, and suddenly the score was 11–7. The dugout erupted, the fans woke up and started drowning out the Red Sox cheers with chants for the Rays. , For one delirious moment, the comeback felt possible. Yandy singled, Mangum singled behind him, and Josh Lowe came up with the tying run on deck. The ballpark, which had been dead quiet fifteen minutes earlier, was overflowing with hope and optimism.
And then, just as suddenly, it ended. Lowe swung through strike three, the Red Sox walking away with an 11–7 win and eliminating the Rays’ longshot hopes for postseason play.The Rays have two home games left in their stay at Steinbrenner field. These two teams are back at it tomorrow with RHP Adrian Houser (8-4, 3.11) taking the mound for the Rays oppositie LHP Kyle Harrison (1-1, 4.05) for the Red Sox. First pitch is scheduled for 7:05pm.
Let’s see what tomorrow brings.
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