Tampa Bay Rays suffer humiliating 2-5 defeat against Detroit Tigers – MLB Update
Tampa Bay Rays suffered a humiliating 2-5 defeat at the hands of Detroit Tigers at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida on Thursday, June 28 in the opening game of their four match series of the 2012 Major League Baseball regular season.
Manager Joe Maddon will be a worried man these days. Not too long ago, the Rays were at the top of American League East Division but now, they are six games behind the league leaders New York Yankees. With just three wins in their last seven games, the Rays
are certainly not helping themselves.
Considering the kind of start Tampa Bay had made to the season, they fans had great expectations from them. The Rays now have very little time to regroup themselves and it will be interesting to see if they can turn the tables on the Tigers in the next game.
Tigers, on the other hand, displayed some top quality team-work but it was Max Scherzer who played the key role in deciding the outcome of the clash. The starting pitcher showed great control over his dipping fastballs to strike-out seven batters in six
solid innings.
"You can compete all you want, and you can go deep into the game all you want," Rays’ starting pitcher James Shields said in an interview. "But the bottom line is you lost the game. I've got to do a better job."
Allowing just two runs and four hits, he secured his seventh win of the season. Catcher Alex Avila, third baseman Miguel Cabrera and rookie Quintin Berry all made valuable contributions with the bat.
"It was a good game. ... We pitched very well," Leyland added. "We got some big hits. Scherzer was good. The bullpen was good."
"When he gets the right arm slot going, and is not flopping around off the mound ... he's pretty consistent," Leyland said.
For the Rays, Elliot Johnson singled to centre in the fifth inning to reduce Tigers’ lead to 1-3. Brooks Conrad doubled to left in the seventh to add spice to the proceedings but Detroit held on to their lead to deservingly take a 1-0 lead in the series.
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