Tampa Bay Rays manager Kevin Cash has had to defend his strategy using relievers as starters time and time again.
At least this time
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Wilmer Font held the high-scoring Yankees in check and the Rays stopped New York 3-1 Sunday to avoid a four-game sweep.
”We’re doing everything we can (and) what we think is right to win games,” Cash said. ”When we win, yeah, we like it. When we lose, it’s grueling.”
In his third start of the season, Font turned in his best performance of the year in any role, allowing just one run in 4 2-3 innings with five strikeouts. The right-hander, who also has eight relief appearances, matched a career-high with 74 pitches.
Tampa Bay, which has been hurt by injuries to its rotation, employed a reliever to open for the 15th time in 29 games. Entering the game, relievers working as starters had allowed 13 earned runs in 18 innings.
”Today he gave us a huge boost,” Cash said of the 28-year old right-hander. ”He probably got a little deeper in the game than what we even anticipated.”
Matt Duffy drove in two runs with a second-inning single for his first multi-RBI game in over a month. The infielder, who missed 2017 while undergoing two Achilles surgeries, is hitting .352 (25 for 71) with seven RBI over his last 18 contests.
”I typically don’t see CC too well,” Duffy said. ”That wasn’t the greatest pitch to hit
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Carlos Gomez had an RBI double as Tampa Bay scored all three runs in the second against CC Sabathia (4-2). The left-hander pitched into the eighth inning for the first time this season and struck out 10 for just the second time since the start of 2014.
”I just tried to be really aggressive because they were aggressive,” Sabathia said.
Tampa Bay defeated New York for the first time this season. The Yankees opened the season with five straight wins, outscoring the Rays 31-10 over the games, and was trying for a four-game sweep. The Rays are 5-18 in their last 23 games at Yankee Stadium.
Chaz Roe (1-1) pitched two scoreless innings for the victory. Sergio Romo, who has also drawn five starts this season, closed for his third save in six chances.
Rookie Willy Adames singled to lead off the Rays second. Adeiny Hechavarria, who missed nearly a month with a strained hamstring, singled for the first of his three hits. Gomez doubled and Duffy delivered a two-out single.
Hechavarria also robbed rookie sensation Gleyber Torres of a base hit with dive and throw from shortstop in the seventh inning.
New York matched its lowest run total at home this season.
Aaron Judge and Didi Gregorius worked two-out walks against Jose Alvarado in the fifth, but the hard-throwing lefty struck out Giancarlo Stanton on four pitches.
In the eighth, Diego Castillo struck out Gary Sanchez on three pitches to strand another runner.
Aaron Hicks homered off Font in the fifth – it was actually the second homer of the day. Hours earlier, the Yankees held their 72nd Old-Timers’ Day and Nick Swisher, making his debut with the former players, hit a long drive to right field.
Hall of Famers Whitey Ford and Reggie Jackson were joined by the likes of Don Larsen, Willie Randolph, Andy Pettitte and Jason Giambi. Current New York manager Aaron Boone also took part for the first time.
UP NEXT
Rays: Tampa Bay will start a reliever for the third consecutive day when RHP Ryne Stanek (1-1
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Yankees: New York heads to Washington for a makeshift doubleheader Monday. The teams will resume a suspended game from May 15 before a traditional nine-inning game follows. With heavy rain falling, play was halted after 5 1-2 innings with the teams tied at 3. The teams were set to resume play, and their interleague series, one day later, but rain continued to fall and both events were postponed. Boone will turn to his bullpen to begin the day and RHP Sonny Gray (4-4, 4.96 ERA) takes the mound in game two.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Yankees: OF Brett Gardner (knee) was held out of the lineup with a little soreness.
NEW YORK — New York Mets manager Mickey Callaway has been using some variation of the term “sync up” so often lately, he sounds like an early 1990s music critic discussing Milli Vanilli. At least on Monday the Mets will face another out-of-sorts team whose fortunes are sinking faster than those of an exposed one-album wonder.
Two squads enduring a miserable June will meet when the Mets host the Pittsburgh Pirates in the opener of a three-game series at Citi Field. Seth Lugo (2-2, 2.85 ERA) is scheduled to pitch for New York against Jameson Taillon (4-6, 4.03 ERA) in a battle of right-handers.
Both teams suffered the final loss of a three-game sweep Sunday, when the Mets gave up seven solo homers in falling to the visiting Los Angeles Dodgers, 8-7, in 11 innings and the host Pirates dropped a 3-0 decision to the Arizona Diamondbacks.
The losses ensured the Mets (31-44) and Pirates (36-41) will enter Monday with the worst June records in the National League. New York is 4-17 since the calendar flipped while Pittsburgh is 7-14.
The nosedives have all but ended once-robust playoff hopes. The Mets, who opened the season 11-1, are 12 1/2 games behind the first-place Atlanta Braves in the National League East and 10 1/2 games behind the Philadelphia Phillies in the race for the second wild card.
The Mets opened June in a historic offensive slump in which they scored just 20 runs in 12 games from June 1-15. New York has scored 47 runs in its last eight games but has lost three games in which it scored at least seven runs.
“We just can’t sync up exactly what we’re trying to do every day,” Callaway said Sunday. He also used the sync up expression following Thursday’s 6-4 loss to the Colorado Rockies.
“If we swing the bats
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The Pirates are uttering the same laments. Through 43 games, Pittsburgh led the NL Central with a 26-17 record and ranked fifth in the majors in runs scored (216).
Since then, though, the Pirates have gone an NL-worst 10-24 while scoring just 123 runs, the fewest in the NL and the fourth-fewest in the majors.
“At the beginning of the season, pitching was clicking, hitting was clicking,” Pirates pitcher Trevor Williams told reporters after he took the loss Sunday, when he allowed three runs over six innings. “We’re starting to get apart from each other and we’re hitting a skid at the same time.”
Lugo will be looking to snap a two-start slump Monday. He didn’t factor into the decision last Wednesday, when he gave up six runs (three earned) over three innings as the Mets fell to the Rockies, 10-8.
Lugo has given up 11 runs (eight earned) over eight innings in his last two starts after tossing 13 straight scoreless innings in three games (two starts) from May 31-June 10.
Taillon took the loss last Tuesday, when he allowed three runs over five innings as the Pirates fell to the Milwaukee Brewers, 3-2. He has alternated wins with losses in four June starts.
Lugo has never faced the Pirates. Taillon is 1-0 with a 1.93 ERA in two career starts against the Mets. He made both starts consecutively to open his big league career in 2016 and carried a no-hitter into the seventh inning of the second start on June 14.
