Rays 5, Yankees 3: SWEEEEEEEP!

Blake Snell was awesome today. It was the kind of performance we'd hoped to see as we watched him work his way through the minors the past few seasons. Snell had the Yankee bats genuinely flummoxed, as he struck out nine over five and a third in impressive fashion.

His one glaring mistake came in the top of the 6th inning after walking Jacoby Ellsbury with a 3-0 lead. Snell tossed a change up, that I'm sure he wishes he could have back, that Carlos Beltran deposited into the seats to trim the lead to one.

The Rays didn't take long to earn those runs back, though, as they did so in the bottom of the same frame. After a Steven Souza Jr double and Kevin Kiermaier walk, Michael Pineda intentionally walked Nick Franklin to load the bases with two outs. Luke Maile was the hero of the moment, this time, as he knocked a ground ball through the gap up the middle to send both Souza and KK home to extend the lead back to three.

Cedeno, Boxy, Erasmo and Colome would take the baton from there, allowing only one more run over the next 3 2/3 innings. 5-3 was your final. That is four straight for our Rays.

One quick note. I breezed by my favorite moment of the game. In the bottom of the 5th, Brad Miller absolutely blasted a ball into right center that bounced on the netting above the rays tank before plopping into the water. I can't fully explain why I love when this happens so much. It may be memories of being at the Trop for Jose Lobaton's homer into the tank to beat the Red Sox in epic fashion. It may just be that I think it is hilarious. Either way, that was Brad's 17th homer of the season, which is a lot for a shortstop in my book.

Next up, the World Champs come to town. Chris Archer will be on the mound against Danny Duffy hoping to improve his 5-14(!!) record.