A pair of home runs ended a postseason slump for Brandon Lowe as his three RBI led the Tampa Bay Rays to even the World Series at a game a piece with a 6-4 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers Wednesday night.Lowe was mired in a postseason-long slump going 6-56 in the playoffs with 19 strikeouts and a lone home run before Wednesday night’s 2-5 performance.
The Rays needing a win to keep pace with the surging Dodgers turned to their 2018 American League Cy Young Award winner in Blake Snell, and his performance was on point for Tampa Bay.Snell throwing a perfect first four innings striking out eight Dodgers batters and not allowing a hit as Lowe’s solo home run in the first inning put Tampa Bay up 1-0.
The Rays offense continued to support Snell in the fourth inning as Joey Wendle drove in a pair of runs on a double in the gap putting Tampa Bay up 3-0 as the Dodgers used the opener approach using four pitchers in the first five innings of play.Lowe continued his assault on Dodgers’ pitching with a two-run bomb in the fifth inning giving Tampa Bay a comfortable 5-0 lead.
Snell’s struggles began and ended in the fifth inning as Chris Taylor took Snell deep for a two-run shot following a two-out walk by the Rays starter. Tampa Bay answered back in the top of the sixth on a sacrifice fly by Wendle to increase their lead to four runs at 6-2.Los Angeles would peck away at the Tampa Bay lead with a pair of solo home runs by Will Smith and Corey Seager to make it 6-4 Tampa Bay, but the Rays bullpen would hold in the final two frames with the combination of Peter Fairbanks, Aaron Loup and closed out by Diego Castillo.
Snell notches the win pitching 4 2/3 innings allowing two runs on two hits with the nine strikeouts.
The fall classic will resume with game three on Friday night in Texas as Charlie Morton will take the mound for Tampa Bay against Walker Buehler for Los Angeles. You can catch all the action on WDAE beginning with the Inside Pitch and Steve Carney at 6:30pm, with an 8:07pm first pitch.
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