Rays 4, Jays 3: Hello .500, My Old Friend
Rays get back to the .500 mark once again behind strong start by Baz
The Tampa Bay Rays played their final regular season home game of the 2024 season on Sunday afternoon in front of 20,567 fans. The Rays and Jays took part in the finale of both the weekend series and season series after a pair of low scoring affairs both went the Rays way on Friday and Saturday.
Sunday was no different and thanks to some timely hitting and another strong start by Shane Baz, the Rays sent their fans away from Tropicana Field happy one last time in 2024 (unless Tigers/Twins/Mariners all collapse over the final week).
Baz got the start opposite Ryan Burr who opened for former Rays pitcher, Ryan Yarborough. While Burr and Yarbs combined to toss 5.1 innings of one run baseball, Baz was just a bit better, going six strong and allowing just a run.
After Baz, a smattering of Rays relievers made appearances and ultimately got the job done. Poche, Kelly, Lovelady, Bigge, and Uceta combined to toss the final three innings. Each pitcher recorded at least one strikeout and they combined for six punch outs over the final nine outs.
The scoring started in the top of the fourth as Leo Jiménez drove in Vladdy Jr on a sacrifice fly to center. The Jays took an early 1-0 lead that would stand until the bottom of the sixth when Aranda launched his sixth homer of the year to right center field. Brandon Lowe scored on the blast and the Rays took a 2-1 lead.
The Blue Jays quickly answered the following half inning and tied the game on an Ernie Clement run-scoring single. But, the Rays would have an answer in the bottom half as Siri scored on a sacrifice fly off the bat of Morel. With the fly ball, the Rays took a 3-2 lead.
In the bottom of the eighth, Brandon Lowe hit a solo shot to right center field. The homer was his 20th of the year and gave the Rays some much needed insurance as the Jays would answer again in the top of the ninth.
Uceta came on to close it out and issued a leadoff walk to Kirk to begin the ninth. After a strikeout of Nathan Lukes, Clement doubled Kirk to third. With the tying run on second, Guerrero stepped to the plate and single to center. Kirk scored and Clement advance to third. With one out and the tying run at third and the go-ahead run at first, Uceta was able to lock down the save after getting Horowitz to pop up and Luis de Los Santos to ground out. The Rays would hold on to win by a score of 4-3. The save was Uceta’s fourth of the year.
With the win, the Rays moved back to .500 yet again and finished with a home record of 42-39. The win was their fourth in a row and sealed a sweep of their AL East foes.