TB 3, TEX 4: Rays rally late, but can’t break the Texas Curse

The Rays will have to wait a long while longer to get a victory in Arlington, Texas.

Whatever is in the water in Texas (and judging by their increasingly poor environmental regulations, probably a LOT of things) the Raangers are able to find just enough, every game, to be able to get by with a W vs the Rays. For years now, the Heart of Texas Lowes that the Rangers call a stadium has been a house of horrors.

Today, with the Rays facing a sweep, every single little moment counts for more. And today one of the early season glaring issues continued to show through: catching.

It’s been a truly brutal start to the year for Danny Jansen and Ben Rortvedt. Both have a combined 1 base hit and 1 walk, and somehow their offense has been better than behind the plate. Opposing base runners are running wild and with ease, so every bloop is now a double thanks to poor efforts and pops. And all Rays pitchers have to work extra hard because the framing numbers have been even worse.

For instance, in the 9th, Edwin Uceta got the ball and with 2 outs landed a pitch perfect strike to get ahead 0-1.

Except it was called a ball. Nothing new as Rortvedt struggled to get any boarderline pitch to go his way. Instead of that early strike it gave Josh Smith a 4th strike to work with and was able to get a double blooped down the LF line. A bloop from Heim after drove him in to walkoff the Rays and give the Rangers a sweep.

Combine this with 4 successful stolen bases for the Rangers, and that’s just not going to be good enough when you are built on pitching and defense and both the defense and pitching did enough to get you a win today.

Rasy Award

Drew Rasmussen wasn’t his sharpest self today, but when you have the stuff Rasy has you are still a beast to hit against. Rasmussen finished with 8 whiffs, 4 Ks, just 3 total hits and 1 ER over his 5 innings.

Rasmussen’s biggest jam was in the 3rd, but a very slick and nifty play from Brandon Lowe to get the 2nd out with a perfect flip to Walls.

While Lowe’s glove giveth us that web gem above, it also get us a boot error to allow a 2 out baserunner to Jonah Heim in the 7th. Of course Heim, the catcher, was able to steal 2nd and get into scoring position. A sharp single followed to drive Heim in and give the Rangers a 3-1 lead.

Rays Rally

Yandy Daiz has had a sluggish start to the season. He came into today’s game at -5 wRC+ which is 4th worst on the Rays. We know Yandy’s bat will heat up. He’s one of the finest hitters in the entire league. And in the 8th, the Big Guava we know and love finally reappeared lacing a hard double over a leaping Adolis Garcia’s glove to get himself into scoring position as the tying run.

Productive at bats and RBI outs from Brandon Lowe and Junior Caminero later and the Rays had rallied to tie the game 3-3 in the 8th.

While 3 runs is not often enough to win many games, early season it’s important to look towards process more than just results. 10 hard hit balls to just 6 total Ks, continuing an early season showcase of more contact and less whiffs.

This was a key factor in the Rays game tying rally, as it also was for their first run in the 4th. A rocket single from Jonathan Aranda, a 2 strike swinging bunt from Morel to advance Aranda to 2nd, and a solid base knock single from Kameron Misner brining Aranda home.

We all want to see the Rays offense put up more crooked numbers. The early process has showed the emphasis placed on getting the bat onto the ball and putting it in play is happening. Will this help score more runs than the swing for the fences HR or whiff approach we saw in a lot of 2024? Yet to be seen, but something to watch.

Rays drop the series, get a day off to wash off the Rangers curse stink. Rays get back at it Tuesday vs the Angels.