McKay gave up nine hits by the time he got 10 outs./JEFFREY S. KING
Friday, 3 a.m.
Suddenly, the Tampa Bay Rays are relentless in their task. They are focused, and they are driven, and they are hurtling through the standings.
Alas, they are headed in the wrong direction.
Just like that, there is no stopping them ... or their fall. They are on their worst streak of the season, and suddenly, they seem to have little interest in a wild-card race they led a few days ago. They lost their fourth straight game Friday night, falling 9-2 to the Chicago White Sox in a game where they did very little right.
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Cash watched his team lose for the fourth straight game./JEFFREY S. KING
They didn't play defense -- with balls falling in all over the outfield. They didn't play offense, getting six hits and being shut out for the last seven innings. They didn't pitch, with rookie Brendan McKay giving up nine hits (five doubles and a home run) and five earned runs by the time he recorded 10 outs.
Choi drove in a run for the Rays./JEFFREY S. KING
It was the Rays' fourth straight loss ... and they have surrendered 28 runs in that stretch. The Rays have had three other four-game losing streaks this season, but they haven't given up that many runs.
Tampa Bay is 42-40 since April 18. They're 26-23 at home. Neither are playoff-level numbers.
The Rays now trail Cleveland and Oakland for the two wild-card spots, and they're only two games up on Boston.
How bad was it? It was worse than the three straight they lost to the Yankees, which was embarrassing enough. Chicago is 12 games under .500 for the season.
"It wasn’t as sharp as we’d seen," Rays' manger Kevin Cash said. "You could make the argument that the first three or four runs shouldn’t have come across the board.
Wendle had a pair of doubles for Rays./JEFFREY S. KING
Give the White Sox credit, they hit the ball hard. Leadoff the game, Mikey Brosseau almost makes a really good play and the next inning, the three scored, there were some plays that we have to convert into outs. The ground ball to short, the popup in no man’s land. I think Austin Meadows might have lost the ball. I think that made (McKay’s) outing look a lot worse. It drove the pitch count way up and he obviously couldn’t get too deep in the game.”
Rookie Brendan McKay, who had started the season so well, had his worst night as a Ray.
“It was a number of things," McKay said. "My command wasn’t there early and you
Meadows had a tough night in right field./JEFFREY S. KING
put yourself in a bad situation in the first inning where the first batter of the game you are starting with guys on base. Every inning I was working with guys on base frequently. You can get out of it sometimes, but today just wasn’t one of those days. You are making pitches and they seem to follow them.”
Meadows admitted he lost a first-inning fly in the lights. However, he insisted his team is still a contender in the wild-card race.
“That’s kind of the way it goes," Meadows said. "Obviously with the second half, these games mean stuff so we are going to keep pushing and see where
we end up.”
The Rays seemed sluggish after arriving home from New York early Friday morning. They were beaten by a White Sox team that had lost seven in a row. They gave up four runs in the first two innings, then four more in the fourth- and fifth innings.
“I hope (it didn't affect the Rays) at all.," Cash said. "I really do. That’s part of the season, that’s part of being a major league player. That can’t factor into us playing poorly. It should not be because we got in late last night.”
In their last four games, the Rays have been outhit 40-24.
Tampa Bay will try to stop its losing streak tonight at 6:10 at Tropicana Field. Ryan Yarbrough will start for the Rays against Lucas Giolito.
Nate Lowe has the putout at first base./JEFFREY S. KING
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