Orioles beat Rays 11-10 in 13 innings
The crowd of just over 16,000 at Camden Yards last night witnessed something they don't often see: a competitive baseball game. The Baltimore Orioles walked off in the 13th inning Tuesday night to beat the Tampa Bay Rays 11-10, thanks to an RBI single by Julio Lugo. The win is only Baltimore's 30th of the season, as they sit at 30-63 on the season and are 28.5 back from the AL East-leading New York Yankees. Tampa Bay fell to 56-37 but didn't lose any ground to the Yankees, who lost to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim last night, and are still two and a half games back.
Baltimore got the ball rolling in the bottom of the second with back-to-back-to-back home runs to lead off the inning, with Luke Scott, Ty Wigginton and Adam Jones all hitting solo shots. B.J. Upton responded in the top of the third with a home run of his own, but Scott came back in the bottom half of the inning and hit another one-run home run to put the Orioles up 4-1. The Rays scored the next seven runs, however, and the score was looking how it should, with Tampa Bay winning. But Baltimore wasn't done just yet.
Scott got his third RBI of the night in the bottom of the seventh thanks to a single that scored Miguel Tejada. The Rays answered in the top half of the eighth with a homer from Reid Brignac, but a two-run double from Tejada in the bottom of the ninth ensured extra-innings for the Orioles with the game knotted at nine.
The Rays struck first in the top of the 12th with an RBI single from Willy Aybar, but with one out in the bottom of the inning Scott Moore sacrificed to center to send Corey Patterson home, once again tying the game. After a 1-2-3 inning for Orioles relief pitcher Koji Uehara in the top of the 13th, it took just three at-bats for Baltimore to end the game.
Interim manager Juan Samuel said his team's play shows their resilience as they ended a four-game slide with the win. As much as the team putting up a lot of runs was exciting, he was happy to see it end.
"I'm glad to see us win in that inning because we were kind of stretching our bullpen very, very much," Samuel said.
Baltimore's last game with three consecutive homers was nearly 15 years ago on Sept. 5, 1995, which happens to be the date when Cal Ripkin Jr. tied Lou Gehrig's record of 2,130 consecutive starts.
Carl Crawford's Injury
Crawford was hit in groin by a pickoff attempt in the top of the first. It probably would have been no big deal had Crawford been wearing his protective cup, but that wasn't the case as he feels it restricts him too much. He fell off the bag, doubled over in pain and was tagged out before needing help from their trainer to get off the field.
At the hospital, test results were negative.
"You couldn't hit it in a better spot. It just took the wind out of me," he said. "Right now it's real sore, but the doctor said there was no damage. I'm guessing I'll take [Wednesday] off."
Crawford said he doesn't intend to start wearing a cup because of the incident.
Rays still confident after loss
Tuesday's loss is only the fifth in 17 games for Tampa Bay, and although it was a loss it was still a good game from the Rays. They scored 10 runs on nine hits and drew 10 walks in the four and a half hour game.
"We played hard, we scored plenty of runs, we played great defense," manager Joe Maddon said. "When we score that many runs, we usually win those games."
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