Texas walked Yandy Diaz on purpose in the 10th inning, and Jonathan Aranda made the choice expensive.
Aranda drove a 409-foot three-run home run to right-center off Jacob Latz, his 19th of the season, and the Tampa Bay Rays finished a 6-3 win in 10 innings Saturday at Globe Life Field. The victory pushed Tampa Bay to 85-57, the best record in the American League, and dropped Texas to 70-73, three games behind Houston in the AL West.
ESPN's box has Aranda 2-for-5 with two runs, three RBI, two strikeouts, and a .278/.361/.429 line. The RBI total climbed to 85. The sequence that set him up was tidy: automatic runner Mateo advanced on Walls' sacrifice, Diaz took the intentional pass, and Aranda did not miss.
Early power, then a late scare
Junior Caminero started the night with an AL-leading 38th home run, a 425-foot shot in the first off Jacob deGrom. Richard Palacios added a career-high eighth homer in the fifth. Drew Rasmussen protected those leads with seven innings of three-hit, one-run ball, walking nobody and striking out seven.
Texas finally answered when Joc Pederson homered in the sixth, his team-high 25th, and again in the eighth when Evan Carter led off with a 421-foot blast and Justin Foscue doubled home the tying run. That is when Tyler Wells took over. Wells threw two hitless innings with three strikeouts for the win, improving to 4-2, and handed Aranda a tied game to break.
deGrom worked six innings, allowing four hits, two runs, one walk, seven strikeouts, and two home runs. The Associated Press noted his major-league-high 10 first-inning home runs this season and the gap between a 9.00 ERA in those frames and a 2.79 mark afterward.
Latz absorbed the loss (3-2), his first since April 10, after 1.2 innings with one hit, three runs (two earned), two walks, and one strikeout.
