BALTIMORE - The Rays had their chance to steal one in extras Saturday night, and they couldn’t quite finish the job.
With Richie Palacios standing at third and one out in the 10th inning, Taylor Walls laid down a safety squeeze that had a shot to work. But Rico Garcia and the Orioles were cleaner, quicker and sharper on the play. Garcia fielded the bunt and flipped to catcher Carlos Narváez in time to nail Palacios at the plate, and Tampa Bay’s best late opportunity vanished.
A few minutes later, the Orioles delivered the final blow. Dylan Beavers lined a pinch-hit double to center field, and Baltimore walked off with a 3-2 win at Camden Yards, another tough result in a stretch that has gone sideways for the Rays.
“Certainly things are not going our way, and nothing’s coming easy,” manager Kevin Cash said. “Wallsy did his job. They just did a better job.”
The loss was Tampa Bay’s seventh in its last nine games, trimming its American League East lead to three games. The Rays still insist the sky isn’t falling, but the skid is impossible to ignore with the stretch run getting closer.
“We're in one of those weird little stretches, but nobody in here is panicking. Nobody in here is worried,” starter Shane McClanahan said. “This team is where we are for a reason, and we're just going to keep being ourselves, keep playing the brand of baseball that's gotten us to this point, and good things are ahead.”
For much of the night, it looked like the Rays might break out of the funk. McClanahan was sharp in his second start back from the injured list, working five scoreless innings while showing the kind of fastball life that stood out to Cash.
“A huge step in the right direction for him,” Cash said.
Tampa Bay gave him a lead when Liam Hicks launched a solo homer in the second inning, and Junior Caminero added another run in the sixth. Tyler Wells then handled two scoreless innings out of the bullpen, leaving the Rays needing just six outs from Kevin Kelly and Bryan Baker.
That’s where it unraveled.
Kelly opened his inning by allowing a leadoff single, then watched Samuel Basallo tie the game with a two-run homer to center on a pitch Kelly said he was trying to keep out of Basallo’s wheelhouse.
“I really wasn't trying to throw it in the zone like I would normally be, so the fact that it ended up there to him was unfortunate,” Kelly said. “The bigger issue is just getting 2-0 right away. That's pretty obvious.”
The Rays still had a chance to reclaim the lead in the ninth. Jonny DeLuca doubled with two outs, and Palacios followed with a fly ball to shallow right that looked dangerous enough to score a run. But Tyler O’Neill - who had already thrown out Walls at third base for the first out of the sixth - made a diving catch to keep the game tied.
“He had some game-changing plays that were right in the middle of a lot of stuff that could have gone our way,” Cash said.
The squeeze attempt in the 10th was Cash’s call, made with Baker warming in the bullpen. Walls said the play was on, but the execution just wasn’t sharp enough.
“If I get that ball more down the first-base line or the third-base line, I think it's maybe a tougher out in general to get Richie there at the plate,” Walls said. “The right call. Got to be a little bit better executed.”
Baltimore has now won eight of the past nine meetings between the teams, and this one fit the pattern: the Orioles made the key play, then the Rays were left shaking their heads. Baker, tasked with stranding the automatic runner in the 10th, got ahead of Beavers with two changeups and worked the count even with fastballs outside the zone. Beavers then reached down and golfed another changeup off the wall in center for the game-winner.
The Rays had the lead, had the pitching, had the late setup - and still left Camden Yards with another loss.
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