Friday, 4 a.m.
No offense, but the Tampa Bays have no offense.
The Rays struggled at the plate on their way to their third consecutive loss Thursday night, dropping a 6-4 victory in 10 innings to the Texas Rangers. Tampa Bay is now 5-8 on the year and tied with Baltimore for last place in the AL East.
The Rays are now 0-3 in extra-inning games.
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Once again, the bats failed the Rays against Texas. Yes, they scored four times, but they were three-of-13 with runners in scoring position and stranded 12 men on base. The Rays struck out 12 times.
Consider:
-- In the seventh inning alone, the Rays had four walks and Texas made two errors. Still, Tampa Bay scored only one run. Joey Wendle, one of the Rays' better hitters, struck out with the bases loaded to end the threat.
-- In the 10th, both Willy Adames and Yoshi Tsutsugo represented the tying run. Both looked at called third strikes to end the game. Tsutsugo, hitting just .154, was pinch-hitter for Brent Phillips, who is hitting just .125.
-- The Rays entered the game tied for 20th in the majors with an average of .223.
"We’re not making the most of the opportunities," said Rays' manager Kevin Cash. "The opportunities have been tough to come by lately, but the ones that do come by, we’re not making the most of them. For whatever reason, we have some guys who are still kind of searching for that timing at the plate to do big things."
The Rays got a double and a home run from Mike Brousseau among their seven hits.
The Rangers' winning blow came from Adolis Garcia, who hit a two-run, opposite-field homer in the 10th off of Cody Reed.
"I wanted to throw a slider, and I got it up and over," Reed said.
The Rays begin a six-game road trip tonight with a visit to New York to face the Yankees at 7:10 p.m.. Neither team has announced its starting pitcher.