Hechavarria's run leads the Rays to victory./CARMEN MANDATO
Monday, 3 a.m.
Following the mistake, Adeiny Hechavarria lay prone on his stomach. Sal Perez lay on his face, facing Hechavarria.
Like a game of slap-tag, Hechavarria feinted with his right hand. He feinted with his right hand again. Finally, he snaked his left hand in to touch the plate.
As odd as it sounds, it was the play where Hechavarria scored the winning run for the Rays in the sixth inning. It had started when Hechavarria ran through a stop sign by third-base coach Matt Quatraro. The ball arrived at the plate long before Hechavaria, who contorted around Perez's tag and touched the plate ahead of the tag.
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Yarbrough won his first game as a starter./CARMEN MANDATO
"It started with him running through a stop sign," Rays' manager Kevin Cash said. "That was a really impressive slide, but we’re probably not going to benefit from those decisions too often. But we did tonight."
The Rays used a simple formula for the win. They merely held their opponent to 16 fewer runs than the day before.
"Any time you come off a loss like we did in Baltimore ... we were locked in" Cash said.
Duffy drove in both runs to lead Rays./CARMEN MANDATO
The Rays pulled off an escape in the ninth inning. With one out, John Jay tripled to left when Johnny Field was unable to make a catch. Alex Colome then struck out Ryan Goins and got a ground-out to Hechavarria, who bobbled the ball but got the out. It was Hechavarria's 84th straight game without an error.
It was Colome's seventh save of the season.
Tampa Bay's Ryan Yarbrough got his first win as a starter. Matt Duffy had three hits and two RBI. Hechavarria had two hits.
The Rays are now 6-12 in one-run games.
The Rays play Kansas City again today. Anthony Banda gets his first start for the Rays against the Royals' Ian Kennedy. Game time is 8:15 p.m.
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