Damn the Astros are good: Rays 0 Astros 4

After winning two of three against one Texas team, the Rays unfortunately had to face the other Texas team.

Drew Rasmussen uncharacteristically struggled a bit in the first inning. Fortunately (I guess) Altuve’s home run came BEFORE and not AFTER the two line drive singles, so the inning ended with just a 1-0 deficit. The Rays put up their own threat in the bottom of the first — two runners in scoring position with just one out — but a strikeout and a popup later the threat was over.

After the first, Rasmussen settled in to give the Astros little offense. The Rays meanwhile hit the ball hard....right into gloves. 108 mph, 110 mph, all for outs. Clearly they needed someone to get a broken bat bloop to get going.

In the sixth, inning, the Astros showed how you string together hits for runs. Altuve reached on an infield hit, the next batter walked. Yordan Alvarez then hit a hard liner that dropped for a hit near Harold Ramirez in right field. That’s disappointing but OK, but then Ramirez’s throw back in was....just terrible. He didn’t throw home to try to get the runner there, but he also didn’t throw to second to try to keep Alvarez to a single, either. Altuve scored to make the score 2-0.

Then came that broken bat bloop, but unfortunately for Bregman. Sigh. Two more runs and this game was essentially over.

Although they had some opportunities (mostly thanks to drawing five walks) the Rays just couldn’t get anything going on offense today. Their pitching was very good — Rasmussen was better than his four runs in six innings suggests.

A disappointing night, with the Dewayne Staats anniversary highlights the most entertaining part of the game for Tampa Bay viewers.

A few other notes:

• Randy Arozarena has had a few very rough games. There was some talk about him needing rest or being under the weather. But some have speculated that his desire to have another 20/20 (steals/home run) year has led him to swing for the fences with every at bat, and the results aren’t pretty
• With two doubles, Hittin’ Harold seems to be back on track
• Jose Siri is one player who should always try to steal. If he gets on base, he should go for it.