ST. PETERSBURG -- Through six innings, the Rays' offense was sleepwalking. Then, suddenly, they made a powerful statement.

The Rays woke up with a pair of seventh-inning home runs Friday night at Tropicana Field, igniting a 7-4 comeback victory against the Mariners and allowing them to keep pace in the American League East race. The Rays (86-56) are a season-high 30 games over .500.

• Games remaining: vs. SEA (2), at MIN (3), at BAL (4), vs. LAA (3), vs. TOR (3), at BOS (2), at TOR (3)
• Standings update: The Orioles (89-51) hold a four-game lead over the Rays (86-56) in the AL East. Tampa Bay remains the top AL Wild Card team, the club that gets to host a best-of-three Wild Card Series against the AL’s No. 5 seed, with a 6 1/2-game lead over Seattle.

Designated hitter Harold Ramírez gave the Rays the lead for good with a two-out, two-run blast to left field off Mariners reliever Isaiah Campbell. Earlier in the inning, Rays catcher René Pinto, the No. 9 hitter, tied the game with a two-run shot off Mariners starter George Kirby.

Third baseman Isaac Paredes padded the advantage in the eighth with a solo shot, his 29th homer.

The Rays are 47-12 this season when they hit two or more homers.

“You have to appreciate who’s on the mound and who we’re facing,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “We’re facing a team that can really pitch. It feels like throughout the course of the season, we’ve had a lot of ups and downs. Maybe this game will help us get going a little bit where we can be more productive earlier in ballgames.”

The Rays were relatively silent with just three hits over six innings while trailing, 4-2. But with one out in the seventh, Jose Siri doubled down the left-field line, then stole third. On a 1-2 pitch, Pinto deposited the game-tying two-run homer over the short corner fence in left field, chasing Kirby out of the game and setting the stage for Ramírez's go-ahead shot.

Pinto, who had homered in two of his past three games entering Friday, fell behind Kirby 0-2 and took a pitch inside before fouling off a couple more. Cash appreciated the battle.

“René has done some pretty good things here lately with the bat in his hands,” Cash said.

“I’m just taking this day by day,” Pinto said. “I got the pitch I wanted, got it in the air and it was a homer. This team keeps fighting. We don’t stop fighting until the 27th out.”

For Ramírez, it was an equally significant moment. It was his first homer since June 8 against Minnesota, ending a career-high 55-game homerless drought. It was his first go-ahead homer in the seventh inning or later since 2019.

“We’re not looking for Harold to hit home runs. … We’re looking for him to have good at-bats and pick up big hits with guys on base,” Cash said. “He has done that really, really well this year.”

The Rays broke out, 2-0, in the first, taking advantage of uncharacteristic wildness from Kirby, who hadn’t walked a batter in his previous five starts and came in with an MLB-leading 10.36 strikeout-to-walk ratio. Kirby walked leadoff batter Yandy Díaz, then hit Ramírez with one out before surrendering another walk to Randy Arozarena, filling the bases.

Paredes’ sky-high popper, which nearly grazed one of the Trop’s catwalks, was lost by a trio of Mariners fielders, and it dropped in short left field for an RBI single. After Josh Lowe followed with a sacrifice fly, it was 2-0.

The Rays couldn’t hold the lead, though. Right-hander Taj Bradley was touched for six hits -- three solo home runs and three doubles -- over 6 1/3 innings.

After his messy first inning, Kirby retired 16 of his next 18 batters. But the Rays’ offense finally came alive in the seventh to take control. And that was appreciated by Bradley.

“It was great to see René put together an at-bat like that, fouling off breaking pitches and stuff like that,” Bradley said. “Off the bat, it’s a home run and the bench is clapping, cheering and screaming. I just gave him a big hug when he came in. That was the guy I was working with the whole game, and I was excited.

“I wasn’t mad about the [solo] homers, because those don’t beat you. We just had to hold them and come back.”

And the Rays did just that.