Single All the Way: Rays 3, Yankees 10

Klubot? More like Klulessbot, amirite? The Yankees had more singles than Kraft as they put this one away early. The loss drops the Rays three back in the loss column, which while it doesn’t make capturing their third straight division crown impossible, it dials the improbability meter up to nine.

Lineups!

Things went sideways early and in a hurry for Corey Kluber. He gave up seven straight singles before recording an out, and while not many of the hits were smoked, the Yankee aim-fense was strong, aided by Kluber’s stuff and location not being optimal. Let’s get this out of the way quickly.

Judge single to left, Stanton single to right, Judge to third. Torres through the right side, scoring Judge. Donaldson off the top of the short porch in right for a loooong single, loading the bases. Cabrera single to right, scoring Stanton and Torres, Donaldson to third. Andujar back through the middle on a bad 0-2 curve, scoring Donaldson. Kiner-Falefa comebacker to Kluber on what should have been a double play, but Kluber wasn’t able to find the ball after knocking it down, bases loaded.

Finally! The Rays finally recorded an out! Higashioka grounder to BLowe, nice play to get the force at second, scoring Cabrera. Gonzalez popped out. Judge gets his second single of the inning to left, scoring Andujar.

Kluber’s day was over: .2 innings, 6 runs, 8 hits.

JT Chargois took over and got Stanton to hit into a force play. However, in his second inning, he gave up a homer the other way to Donaldson. 7-0.

Hey! Look! We made history!

The Rays got on the board in the top of the third. Siri led off with a double to left, moved to third on a Diaz ground out, and scored on Franco’s single to center.

7-1 Yankees.

Here’s another bright spot. Garrett Cleavinger came on for the third, and continued to look fantastic. He worked two perfect innings while striking out four (three of them on three pitches).

In fact, the pen was solid for the most part. Brooks Raley worked a clean fifth, and Stretch Armstrong worked a scoreless sixth, giving up just a two out single.

Things didn’t go quite as smooth for Faucher. Donaldson reached on a HBP (calm down it barely clipped his body arm) then went first to third on a grounder that stayed under Franco’s glove. Donaldson then scored on a wild pitch, despite making one of the more comical slides into home that you’ll ever see.

Next was Kiner-Falefa’s single that Siri couldn’t get to, scoring pinch runner Florial. 9-1 Yankees.

We got some entertainment in the top of the eighth. Siri singled to left, and Aranda “doubled” on a long fly to center that bounced out of Florial’s glove.

Two outs later, with Trivino on to pitch, Ramirez singled to right, scoring Siri. Aranda was initially called out at home on the play, but after a challenge, the call was overturned.

9-3 Yankees.

Bethancourt took the mound for the bottom of the eighth. With two outs, Stanton hit a 47 mph eephus off the foul pole in left for the final 10-3 margin.

Aside: There was a little scare in the seventh when Mejia swung at and missed a fastball away, and immediately started shaking his hand. But after a brief check by the training staff, he convinced them he was okay and stayed in the game.

Tomorrow, the Rays send out the always dangerous TBD against German.