Tampa Bay 4, Philadelphia 3
When: 7:07 PM ET, Saturday, September 26, 2020
Where: Tropicana Field, St. Petersburg, Florida
Temperature:
Indoors
Umpires:
Home -
Larry Vanover, 1B -
David Rackley, 2B -
Lance Barksdale, 3B -
Chris Conroy
Attendance:
0
By Field Level Media
The top-seeded Tampa Bay Rays used a three-run fifth inning to win another close one Saturday night, beating the Philadelphia Phillies 4-3 in St. Petersburg, Fla.
Just before the start of the second meeting, the Seattle Mariners beat the Oakland A's 5-1 to give the Rays (39-20) the No. 1 overall seed in the expanded eight-team American League playoffs -- facing either Toronto or the New York Yankees.
The win improved the Rays' MLB-best record in one-run games to 14-5 -- 6-2 in September -- and marked their 20th comeback victory.
Catcher Mike Zunino led a balanced offense by going 2-for-3 with a run and an RBI. Yoshi Tsutsugo had a hit, an RBI and three walks.
Making his 11th and final start of the season for the Phillies (28-31), Zack Wheeler (4-2) allowed a season-high four runs on seven hits with eight strikeouts in seven-plus innings.
Andrew McCutchen had a big night for Philadelphia, going 4-for-5 with a homer -- just a triple shy of the cycle -- and scoring three times. Jean Segura had two hits.
The Phillies scored a run in the first against opener John Curtiss when Segura's infield single -- the third hit in the inning -- resulted in third baseman Tsutsugo bouncing the throw past first baseman Mike Brosseau for an error.
McCutchen hit a ground-rule double to lead off the third, but center fielder Kevin Kiermaier charged J.T. Realmuto's two-out single, fired a strike home and easily tossed out McCutchen for the final out to keep it 1-0.
Tsutsugo lashed an opposite-field single to left to score Brandon Lowe with two outs and tie it 1-1 in the fourth, but after reliever Ryan Yarbrough left after 3 1/3 scoreless innings of work, McCutchen launched his 10th homer deep to left off Pete Fairbanks (6-3) to regain the one-run lead in the fifth.
Zunino evened it 2-2 in the bottom of the frame with a gritty at-bat against the hard-throwing Wheeler, reaching out and pulling a slider into left to score Manuel Margot, who had doubled. Lowe shot a single to left two batters later, and Willy Adames' RBI single made it 4-2.
Bryce Harper's RBI single cut it to 4-3 against reliever Aaron Slegers in the seventh, but the reliever stranded the tying run on third by fanning Segura.
Slegers -- the Rays' fifth pitcher -- worked three innings to earn his second save.
--Field Level Media
Top Game Performances
Starting Pitchers
Philadelphia |
|
Tampa Bay |
Zack Wheeler
|
Player |
John Curtiss
|
Loss |
W/L |
No Decision |
7.0 |
IP |
0.2 |
8 |
Strikeouts |
0 |
7 |
Hits |
3 |
5.14 |
ERA |
0.00 |
Team Stats Summary
Team |
Hits |
HR |
TB |
Avg |
LOB |
K |
RBI |
BB |
SB |
Errors |
Philadelphia
|
12 |
1 |
16 |
.324 |
19 |
8 |
2 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
Tampa Bay
|
7 |
0 |
8 |
.241 |
15 |
11 |
4 |
4 |
0 |
2 |