With both teams in desperate need of wins, the Citrus Series meant a lot more this time around. Edward Cabrera and the Marlins were unable to deliver in game one of the two-game set as the Rays offense jumped out to an early lead on Tuesday and Tyler Glasnow dominated the Marlins lineup, giving up only two hits.
Cabrera was great in his last start against the St. Louis Cardinals. However, after a quick first inning, things got ugly in the second as he gave up three runs off of four hits and didn’t strike out anybody.
Back-to-back singles got the inning going for the Rays. An RBI single by Josh Lowe with two outs put them on the scoreboard. Catcher Christian Bethancourt worked a walk to keep the rally going and then Cuban All-Star first baseman Yandy Díaz smacked a double that drove in both Manuel Margot and Lowe.
Cabrera’s outing came to a close after that due to a blister situation that has frequently been an issue throughout his career. He threw only 30 of 53 pitches for strikes (56.6%).
“He didn’t have an issue with it before the game started,” said Miami Marlins manager Skip Schumaker. “Everything felt fine so just kind of blew up a little bit after the first inning into the second inning and and we looked at it and we had to take him out.”
Miami got on the board in the top of the third. Joey Wendle worked a walk and advanced thanks to a couple of groundouts. Wendle scored on a Tyler Glasnow wild pitch.
Glasnow struck out eight and generated 17 swings & misses. He went to his usual fastball/slider combo and also had some good luck on long fly balls that stay in the park.
“He’s throwing 97 miles an hour at the top of the zone. Consistently throwing strikes, really hard curveball, and the slider I thought was the most effective pitch tonight against us,” said Skip Schumaker.
“I felt good,” said Tyler Glasnow after the game. “I think timing was good. The only thing I had no idea was my curveball, but especially the last inning, it weirdly felt pretty good.”
The Rays scored their fourth and final run thanks to Brandon Lowe, who hit his 11th homer of the season off of George Soriano. That’s the first homer allowed by Soriano in the big leagues. He ended up going 3.1 innings, striking out three. The rookie’s ERA is still in good shape at 2.08.
To close out the game, the Rays went with right-hander Pete Fairbanks, who shut down the Marlins in order to end the game.
The Marlins once again face the Rays at 12:10 with Sandy Alcantara taking the bump for Miami up against Zach Eflin, who is a familiar foe to the Marlins after previously spending many year in Philadelphia.
Photo credit: Nicole Moriarity
Leave a Comment