{"id":627890,"date":"2023-04-11T00:57:00","date_gmt":"2023-04-11T05:57:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.sellorbuyhomefast.com\/index.php\/2023\/04\/11\/rays-blank-red-sox-extend-season-opening-win-streak-to-10-tampa-bay-times\/"},"modified":"2023-04-11T00:57:00","modified_gmt":"2023-04-11T05:57:00","slug":"rays-blank-red-sox-extend-season-opening-win-streak-to-10-tampa-bay-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2023\/04\/11\/rays-blank-red-sox-extend-season-opening-win-streak-to-10-tampa-bay-times\/","title":{"rendered":"Rays blank Red Sox, extend season-opening win streak to 10 – Tampa Bay Times"},"content":{"rendered":"
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ST. PETERSBURG \u2014 The first nine wins turned out to be somewhat easy, as the Rays opened the season beating the Tigers, Nationals and A\u2019s by at least four runs in each game.<\/p>\n

The Rays were in for a different kind of test Monday night, a typically tense and tight battle with American League East rival Boston.<\/p>\n

\u201cDefinitely felt like a Rays-Red Sox game,\u201d manager Kevin Cash said.<\/p>\n

Brandon Lowe \u2014 in what he called one of the best at-bats of his stellar career \u2014 swatted an eighth-inning homer to deliver a 1-0 victory that extended the Rays\u2019 franchise-best, MLB-leading record to 10-0.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was weird,\u201d Lowe said. \u201cLooking up at the scoreboard \u2014 obviously the Red Sox are a good team \u2014 it was just a little strange. Usually (by the) seventh inning, we\u2019re going on six at-bats or whatnot. So that was definitely a little bit of a change.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut it\u2019s something that it was nice for us to have. We\u2019re not going to win every game 10-0. We\u2019re going to play 1-0 games and stuff like that. So it was good. Good to get this out of the way. And good to play these games again.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Brandon<\/picture><\/div>
Brandon Lowe celebrates the game’s lone run with teammates. [\u00a0IVY CEBALLO | Times\u00a0]<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Rays are the first big-league team to win their first 10 since the 1987 Brewers who, along with the 1982 Braves, share the major-league record at 13.<\/p>\n

Only four other teams have started a season winning as many: The 1981 Oakland A\u2019s won 11 while the 1966 Indians, 1962 Pirates and 1955 Dodgers also won 10.<\/p>\n

Lowe\u2019s homer followed reliever Colin Poche\u2019s dramatic escape from a top-of-the-eighth, bases-loaded mess he made by allowing two walks around a single, striking out dangerous Rafael Devers, who looked at a Strike 3 fastball, to drop to 0-for-8 vs. the Rays lefty. Poche\u2019s reaction was emotional before the loud 13,470 fans at Tropicana Field.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe guy works himself out of there, especially with the crowd that we had, it invigorates anybody. It really gets everyone going,\u201d Lowe said. \u201cI think it definitely carried into that bottom half of the inning.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Rays<\/picture><\/div>
Rays relief pitcher Colin Poche reacts after striking out Rafael Devers with the bases loaded in the eighth inning. [\u00a0IVY CEBALLO | Times\u00a0]<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Batting with one out, Lowe battled through nine pitches from Chris Martin, including one he painfully fouled off his right leg, before driving the ball over the right-centerfield fence.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly, it hurt,\u201d Lowe said. \u201cI don\u2019t know how I can perfectly place it in between two protective guards, but that\u2019s great. (It) hurt at the moment, but I think getting right back into it and having to take a swing really kind of took my mind off it.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Swing he did, crushing the full-count fastball 404 feet over the fence, marking his third straight game with a homer and the first off a Red Sox reliever this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cDefinitely one of the best at-bats I think I\u2019ve ever had,\u201d said Lowe. \u201cIt was a really good at-bat. He had some really good stuff up out there on the mound. Really, a few pitches in, I just kind of told myself, \u2018You don\u2019t need to hit a double. You don\u2019t need to hit a homer. You\u2019ve got Randy (Arozarena) and Wander (Franco) and other guys behind you.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cJust find a barrel, take a good at bat and things will take care of itself. And it turned out pretty well.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Rays shortstop Wander Franco, left, and second baseman Brandon Lowe celebrate after the win over the Red Sox. [\u00a0IVY CEBALLO | Times\u00a0]<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

That was the case all around the clubhouse. The Rays pieced together an impressive and historic outing on the mound \u2014 a third straight shutout for the first time in their 26 seasons \u2014 with the work of five pitchers.<\/p>\n

Opener Jalen Beeks worked the first two innings. Josh Fleming made amends for his rough April 4 outing in Washington with four dominant innings (one hit, five Ks). Garrett Cleavinger worked one. Poche got himself into and out of trouble. And Pete Fairbanks, having been teased by teammates for his lack of work given all the easy wins, converted his first save opportunity of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, a lot of people have been saying he\u2019s been on vacation and started calling him \u2018Pete Rarebanks,\u2019 \u201d Poche said. \u201cBut he looked pretty damn good out there.\u201d<\/p>\n

The win ended the Rays\u2019 streak of winning by at least four runs at nine games, second only to the 1884 St. Louis Maroons. The Rays did improve their run differential to plus-58, best through 10 games in the modern era (since 1901), trailing the Maroons and 1884 New York Gothams.<\/p>\n

More relevant, they extended their remarkable start.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not gotten lost on anybody, but it\u2019s not adding any pressure on anybody,\u201d Lowe said. \u201cWe\u2019ve done this before (winning 11 straight in May 2021). It\u2019s just pretty cool to do it when we\u2019re doing it and how we\u2019re doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n Laine Kazmierczak<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ST. PETERSBURG \u2014 The first nine wins turned out to be somewhat easy, as the Rays opened the season beating the Tigers, Nationals and A\u2019s by at least four runs in each game. The Rays were in for a different kind of test Monday night, a typically tense and tight battle with American League East […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":627891,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40440,26428,534],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-627890","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-blank","category-extend","category-financial"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=627890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/627891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=627890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=627890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=627890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}