The Tampa Bay Rays hold the lead in the American League East, yet three misfortunes in their past four games made them search for certain answers.
On Friday night, with an end goal to get right, the Rays selected to go all left.
Manager Kevin Cash batted nine pure left-handers in his order against Boston Red Sox right-hander Andrew Triggs, the first time when that has occurred in the majors in the modern period (since 1900), as indicated by research by ESPN Stats and Information.
The gambit paid dividends, with Tampa Bay beating Boston 11-1.
A few teams have begun a lineup in which every one of the nine batters have hit from the left-hand side of the plate, yet Friday denoted the first time when that none of those players were switch-hitters, per ESPN Stats and Info information.
Boston manager Ron Roenicke said when bench coach Jerry Narron gave him the Rays’ lineup, he thought it wasn’t right.
“We knew we were left-handed-heavy coming into the season and we’ve added a couple of left-handed hitters,” Cash said before Friday’s game. “Just thinking about it last night, we don’t know Triggs very well. We have him as a pretty big [splitter] guy. We’re not even sure how deep he’ll go in the game, but we know we have plenty of right-handers [so] that if they decide to go left-handed at certain points, we have options.”
The Red Sox used Triggs, a 31-year-old claimed off waivers from the San Francisco Giants a month ago, as an opener and he pitched only one inning.
Left-hander Matt Hall, who surrendered six hits and four runs across 2⅓ innings, assumed the misfortune for Boston.
