Rivera walks off in dramatic opener vs. Rays

Chen starts strong buoyed by Realmuto's 11th homer

July 3rd, 2018

MIAMI -- For more than a month, picked up the Marlins, closing out games. On Monday night, after Barraclough blew a save in the ninth, his teammates picked him up in the 10th.
chopped an infield single that third baseman couldn't handle, allowing to score from third, giving the Marlins a 3-2 walk-off victory over the Rays at Marlins Park.
"I just put it in play," said Rivera, who has two of the Marlins' four walk-off RBIs this season. "That was something good. In that situation, you don't want to strike out or anything like that. I put it in play, and everything went our way."
Anderson drew a leadoff walk off to open the 10th. J.T. Realmuto followed with a single up the middle, advancing Anderson to third.
Barraclough had his streak of 20 2/3 scoreless innings snapped in agonizing fashion. One out away from securing his ninth save, the right-hander surrendered a booming two-out, RBI double to C.J. Cron.

"I'm more concerned with winning games than I am with anything," Barraclough said. "You'd prefer to just get out of it in the ninth, but the guys rallied together and picked me up tonight. That was nice."
Barraclough had given up just one hit in the entire month of June, and earlier in the day, he was named the National League Reliever of the Month presented by The Hartford.
"That's the bad thing about talking about a guy before the game and how good it's been going," said Marlins manager Don Mattingly. "In the back of my mind I'm always thinking, 'It always ends somewhere. The streak always ends somewhere.' Claw will bounce back, we have no worries about that."
Before the ninth inning, was in line for the victory. Chen threw a gem, tossing six innings and allowing an unearned run on three hits.

"I think it was the life on my fastball," said Chen, via his interpreter, on what was working for him Monday night. "Tonight, sometimes I didn't get my fastball to an ideal location, but I was still able to jam them, get them to get weak contact."
The lefty, who has been excellent at Marlins Park in 2018, lowered his home ERA to 1.89. Monday was the first time since Sept. '14 that Chen has held opposing teams to one run or less in back-to-back starts.
On the offensive end, Realmuto continued his campaign to represent the Marlins at the All-Star Game in Washington, D.C., later this month.
Realmuto took advantage of one of the only mistakes of the night by Rays starter , launching a hanging splitter over wall in left in the fifth, his 11th home run of the season. According to Statcast™, the homer traveled 409 feet with an exit velocity of 101.2 mph and a launch angle of 28 degrees.

Earlier Monday it was announced that Realmuto moved to fifth in the voting for National League starting catcher.
stayed hot at the plate, tying his career high with four hits (done 19 times), and added three, including an RBI double.
"This was huge for us," Realmuto said. "First of all, Chen, the way he threw the ball today was phenomenal. I wish we would have scored some more runs for him. The team did a great job of rally back and winning it in 10."
MOMENTS THAT MATTERED
After surrendering the game-tying double to Cron, Barraclough wasn't out of the woods just yet. Miami's closer kept his cool, intentionally walking pinch-hitter Joey Wendle to get to righty , who flew out to right, ending the threat.
Even after blowing his first save since being named closer, Barraclough was able to hold the line.
"You don't ever want to give up a run, but you know that this game is hard," Barraclough said. "I'm not going to go out there and be perfect every time. Tonight, it's not like I walked everyone and then gave up a [bloop] single. I was like, 'Hey, the first guy hit a two-strike slider, and then [Cron] hit an 0-1 slider. You've got to kind of look at it like, 'Those guys are trying too.'
"I'd love it to be easy every time out there, but it's not going to be. Two years ago, I think I was more pitching myself into trouble and then getting out of it, and always walking that fine line. But tonight, that guy scored from first."
SOUND SMART
Wins for the Marlins and Realmuto home runs go hand-in-hand. In games in which Realmuto has homered, Miami is a perfect 9-0. His home run also extended his hitting streak to a modest 10 games. Monday was Realmuto's 19th multi-hit game of the season, second-most among National League catchers.
HE SAID IT
"I think [Barraclough] will be fine. This time of year, there are so many rumors that go around. I think when people are writing stuff, they're thinking we're not trying to win. We're going to be trying to win, too. Moving forward, we're trying to build something here to win with. Sometimes, it's like, 'We're not here to help everybody else's team.'" -- Mattingly, on Barraclough trade rumors and the Marlins' long-term vision
UP NEXT
Rookie right-hander will look to put an end to his Interleague struggles Tuesday against the cross-state rival Rays at 7:10 p.m. ET. Richards is 0-2 with a 12.91 ERA in two Interleague starts this season. will start for the Rays on their bullpen day.