CLEVELAND —
The Indians entered Friday’s game against Tampa Bay with the momentum, and had a very favorable pitching matchup. But the Rays’ 10-3 victory just goes to show what has been shown many times before: That baseball can be very unpredictable.
Justin Masterson, who of late had been pitching like the ace that he’s supposed to be, was knocked around for eight runs in 4.1 innings. Meanwhile, Alex Cobb, who is quite likely the weakest link in Tampa Bay’s rotation, didn’t really do much to belie that status, although with three runs allowed in six innings, he did net a quality start, which Masterson didn’t even come near.
“I hope that everybody has six good (outings) in a row and one bad one,” manager Manny Acta said. “I’ll take that any time. He’s been pitching as good as anybody over the last month and a half, but he had one bad one today.”
The visiting Rays (44-40), who came in with a mini-streak of two losses, evened the four-game set at one apiece. The Tribe (43-40), which saw a three-game winning skein snapped, fell three games behind Chicago in the AL Central Division, and one-half game behind the Rays and tentatively 1.5 games in back of Baltimore in the race for the second wild-card spot.
The odd innings were deadly for Masterson (5-8, 4.40 ERA). He yielded a two-run homer to Ben Zobrist on a 3-0 count in the first inning. Luke Scott nailed a two-run shot over the right-center-field fence in the fifth. After leaving the game later that inning, he was charged with two more runs when Elliot Johnson lined Nick Hagadone’s first pitch into the right-center-field gap for a double.
By the time the game had ended, Masterson had apparently released any frustration he may have had, and had turned to humor. He said, tongue-in-cheek, that he probably should have tried throwing left-handed, and also that it would have been good if the plate had been one foot to the right.
“Just people helping people,” he said. “I’m all about helping guys out.”
The Rays made it a six-run inning when Hagadone yielded a sacrifice fly to Zobrist (3 RBI) and an RBI safety to B.J. Upton (3 hits) after walking two to load the bases.
In-between, Jose Lobaton nicked him for a two-out, two-run single up the middle with the bases loaded to break a 2-all tie in the third.
“Our pitching struggled today,” Acta said. “We ended up walking eight guys. Justin just didn’t have very good command of his pitches. He was yanking the ball across his body, and they made him pay for it.”
“Not much was going over the plate,” Masterson said. “But we were having fun mixing and matching balls in the dirt to balls inside and outside.”
The Indians countered Zobrist’s round-tripper with a two-run first inning. Shin-Soo Choo and Asdrubal Cabrera both singled to put men at the corners, and Jason Kipnis walked on for pitches to load the bases. Travis Hafner then grounded into a double play as Choo scored.
Then with third baseman Brooks Conrad playing away from the line, Cabrera made a move down the line. It distracted Cobb, who balked, allowing Cabrera to come home.
A single by Choo produced Cleveland’s third run in the fifth.
Cobb is 4-5, 4.89.
Kyle Farnsworth, Wade Davis and Burke Badenhop — although Davis worked out of a situation with men at the corners and no outs — closed out the game.
Jeremy Accardo, Tony Sipp and Esmil Rogers combined to keep Tampa Bay off the board over the final four innings.
Goldman is a freelance writer from South Euclid.
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