CLEVELAND -- Kevin Cash likes to say that any day that Drew Rasmussen pitches is a “good day” for the Tampa Bay Rays.
And that was the case for six innings on Wednesday, as Rasmussen allowed just two runs over six strong innings and left with the Rays leading 3-2.
But it took one swing from Nolan Jones for that good day to turn into a bad one, as he clubbed a game-tying home run off Pete Fairbanks in the ninth inning.
The Guardians walked things off an inning later on a Kyle Manzardo two-out single off Griffin Jax to finish off a 4-3 Rays loss at Progressive Field.
A day after Shane Baz finished his outing by setting down 16 straight Guardians, Rasmussen held Cleveland’s lineup in a straitjacket for six innings.
While Rasmussen danced around more traffic in the middle innings than Baz did, Rasmussen (who entered the game in the 83rd percentile in barrel rate) was still able to limit hard contact and negate almost all of Cleveland’s scoring threats. The Guardians only put three balls in play against him with an exit velocity greater than 100 miles per hour.
Both of the Guardians’ runs against him came as the result of small ball. In the second inning, Guardians third baseman Will Wilson laid down a bunt base hit that scored Jones from third base. In the fifth inning Wilson (who reached on a bloop single and stole second base) scored on a base hit from Steven Kwan.
“I have mixed emotions,” Rasmussen said when asked to describe his start. “They scored in the second inning, and that inning started because of a walk and that can’t happen. We lost by one in 10 innings and you’re trying to figure out where you could have prevented a run. And there’s one right there.”
In total, Rasmussen allowed just four hits to go along with that one walk and five strikeouts. He recorded three whiffs with his fastball, two with his cutter and two with his sinker.
“I pride myself on giving us a chance to win when I take the ball and how you get there after that doesn’t really matter,” Rasmussen said. “Attacking the strike zone gives you the best chance to do that, as does limiting free passes.”
And, for most of the afternoon, it looked like that would be enough, as the Guardians’ offense couldn’t get much going against the Rays’ bullpen after Rasmussen left. Then Jones stepped to the plate and cranked a Fairbanks slider that stayed in the middle of the zone a Statcast-projected 428 feet to right field for the game-tying homer. It was Cleveland’s first extra-base hit since Friday.
“Nolan Jones is a big strong guy who can carry it out to all fields,” Cash said after the game. “I know Pete wants that pitch back. It sucks when one swing of the bat can get them back in it.”
While Fairbanks made the three other Cleveland hitters who came to the plate look foolish, it was all for naught because of the home run.
“To come up and throw an absolute cookie into the loop is exorbitantly frustrating, especially given that we’ve been playing well over the past couple weeks,” Fairbanks said. “Losing that one doesn’t feel good. … I threw 13 pitches. Twelve of them were good and one of them went 14,000 feet into the Cleveland jet stream.”
Manzardo’s heroics came half an inning after the Rays missed their chance to bring a runner home in the top of the 10th, as Cade Smith got Carson Williams to strike out, Nick Fortes to ground out to second base and Chandler Simpson to line out to left field.
Jax generated strikes on five straight sweepers to Brayan Rocchio and Manzardo before giving up the game-winning hit on a fastball.
“Just wanted to speed him up because we went soft five pitches in a row,” said Fortes, who was behind the plate for the pitch. “[Manzardo] was ready for it.”
In total, Rasmussen, Baz and Ian Seymour (Friday’s starter) combined for a 2.65 ERA across 17 innings in the Rays’ series against the Guardians. They combined to allow just eight hits, four talks and 20 strikeouts, but it only resulted in one win.
“That says we’re not playing well enough because if we get three quality starts [in a series], we should be winning more than one game,” Cash said.