Tuesday. 4 a.m.
Say what you want about this slump or that one. There was no way the Tampa Bay Rays were supposed to be able to hang with the powerful (usually) New York Yankees on Monday night.
After all, the Yankees are the best team in baseball, while the Rays are just hanging around the edges of the wild card race. The Yankees had ace Gerrit Cole -- the guy with the nine-year, $324 million contract -- on the mound. The Rays had a bunch of leftovers.
And the leftovers won.
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The Rays featured a quintet of relief pitchers to take a 4-0 victory over the Yankees at Yankee Stadium, adding three of their runs in the ninth inning to win. It was the seventh shutout of the year by the Rays.
“I think just the strike-throwing (was the key)," said Rays' manager Kevin Cash. "It’s not easy to do that here, especially against that lineup. It’s as talented a lineup as your going to see in baseball. Our guys did a good job of executing the game plan."
The Yankees have now been shut out four times in their last nine games. They've won just three of their last 13 games.
Still, they are the Yankees, the ATMs of Major League Baseball. But Jalen Beeks threw two shutout innings, Ryan Yarbrough four (for his firsts win of the year). Ryan Thompson, Brooks Raley and Jason Adam finished it off.
Thompson, in particular, was impressive in going 1.2 innings. The Rays led 1-0 when Aaron Judge -- baseball's leading RBI man after the eighth inning -- came up with a runner on. Thompson needed only four pitches to coax a double-play out of him.
The Rays also escaped trouble in the fourth. Catcher Francisco Mejia made a nice play to throw a runner out at third, and with the bases loaded, Yarbrough got Aaron Hicks to hit into a pitcher-catcher-first baseman double play.
Hicks had a tough night. He also misplayed a fly ball that led to a triple by David Peralta, who was singled in by Isaac Paredes.
That run was the only one of the game until the ninth, when Jose Siri singled in one run and Yandy Diaz singled in two.
The Rays play New York again tonight at 7:05 p.m. at Yankee Stadium. Jeffrey Springs will start for the Rays against Nestor Cortes.