Brosseau finally rewards Rays’ pitchers

by Gary Shelton on August 18, 2019 · 0 comments

in general, Tampa Bay Rays

Ji-Man Choi gives Mike Broussard a hero's shower. / CHUCK MULLER

Sunday, 3 a.m.

Mike Brosseau is the kid from nowhere, a flinty ballplayer who will surprise you with his bat.

Brosseau had his biggest hit./CHUCK MULLER

Eric Sogard lives two houses down from Brosseau in nowhere, a scrappy ballplayer who will surprise you with his moments.

Together, they brought the Tampa Bay Rays back from the border to nowhere, combining for the only run of a 1-0, 13-inning piece of torture that finally put the Rays back in the winning circle over Detroit.

Broussard soaks in the victory./CHUCK MULLER

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Ryan Yarborugh struck out 5 of the first 7 batters./CHUCK MULLER

After Sogard doubled, Brosseau connected on a two-out single deep to right field to knock in the only run of the game. The run ended a 29-inning scoreless stretch that took 78 hours and two minutes between runs.

It was amazing that the one run was enough to win, but six Rays' pitchers threw shutout baseball against Detroit. Ryan Yarbrough threw the bulk of the innings, allowing the Tigers' only three hits over 6 1/3 innings.

The Rays are 13-4 in their last 17 games. They remain a half game over the As for the second wild-card berth, and they're one game behind the Indians for the first position.

Pagan threw two scoreless innings./CHUCK MULLER

“He got himself, I think, in a 2-0 count, then had a couple balls that kind of beat him," Rays' manager Kevin Cash said of Brosseau. "It was good to see him make an adjustment and hit it where they weren’t. Perfectly placed. Looked like it was going to land for a double, but all we cared about was that Sogard was going to come around to score. Just an outstanding performance by our pitching staff. Guy-to-guy, everybody, just kept it right there. Had to be patient a little bit, but glad we got the big hit.”

Said Brosseau: “It felt amazing. To be put in that situation and

Roe threw two-thirds of a scoreless inning./CHUCK MULLER

come through for this team, who played an un-believable game. I know the offense wasn’t necessarily where we wanted it to be all game, but the way our pitching staff held it down all game gave us a chance at the end. I’m happy to pull through for them.

Adames played well in the field./CHUCK MULLER

“Once it went off the bat, just watching the right fielder kind of maybe have a shot, maybe not. But once it got closer down, touching the turf out there, knowing that was going to be the walk-off — obviously some exciting feelings for sure.”

It was pitching that led the way for the Rays, however. Their hurlers struck out a franchise record of 24 batters in the win.

“It was incredible on the pitching aspect just seeing how efficient and how they were blowing guys away with their stuff," Yarbrough said. "To be able to get a front row view of that and see them and how much work they do on a daily basis to go out there and do that, it’s incredible and very happy for a bunch of those guys on how they are throwing.”

Rays' RHP Diego Castillo threw two scoreless innings./CHUCK MULLER

Added Cash: “The pitching’s been outstanding. Charlie was outstanding yesterday, and today (Yarbrough) followed suit. Everybody that came in from the bullpen was dominant. That was a really dominant performance. I don’t know how many strikeouts we ended up having, but I know it was a lot. I don’t think we walked anybody. We’ve got a special group down in that bullpen.”

The Rays have had excellent pitching in both games against the Tigers, but only have a split in their two games.

“Sometimes offenses go through these tough patches," Cash said. "Ideally they don’t go over consistent days. We’ve kind of been in it now for basically the last three games. I know Tommy

d'Arnaud after hitting into a double play in the 9th inning./CHUCK MULLER

hit the two-run homer in the 1st inning in San Diego. Stay at it. It’s not always going to come easy. It’s a really tough league. Their guys pitched really well and attacked and challenged us. We couldn’t get anything going.

“Losing two in a row to any team, at this point, you just don’t want that to happen. When you’re getting these types of pitching performances, you really want to capitalize on them. I’m encouraged that we did that tonight.”

Yarbrough has been on a tear lately, so much so that he would rank as perhaps his team's best starter.

Meadows went 0-for-4./CHUCK MULLER

“Yeah, I feel really good with where things are at. It doesn’t mean I’m going to get complacent in any way. There are probably some things I’m going to look back off this outing and really try to focus on. To be able to continue those results and really be efficient and win another ball game —I feel like we really needed to win this game. To continue to go out there and grind, and for us to win the game...it was great as a team.”

Said Emilio Pagan: “That was really cool. Yarbrough set the tone from pitch 1. We were in a lot of plus-counts and we were able to execute when we were ahead. Give credit to Travis (d’Arnaud) and Mike (Zunino) for putting down the right fingers at the right time. That was a special game.”

The Rays try to take the series against Detroit today at 1:10 p.m. at Tropicana Field. Trevor Richard pitches for the Rays against  Detroit's Matthew Boyd.

 

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