BALTIMORE -- It’s been a simple recipe for manager Kevin Cash and the Rays this season: Get a lead, hand the ball off to the back-end relievers and relish in victory. Tampa Bay has lost just once this year when holding a lead after the sixth, seventh and eighth innings, and that’s not hard to imagine with a bullpen ERA of 3.65 entering Saturday -- second best in the Majors.

But it’s been a recipe not quite so easy to cook up as of late thanks to bullpen turnover amid injuries and bats going quiet into the All-Star break. The reality played out once again in Tampa Bay’s 2-1 loss to the Orioles in Game 1 of a doubleheader Saturday afternoon at Camden Yards, which handed the Rays just their second late-inning come-from-behind loss in 2019 when holding a lead.

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Rookie reliever Colin Poche was the latest culprit of the bullpen struggles. After he came in for mop-up duty in the sixth, he served up a middle-middle fastball to cap off a nine-pitch battle with Stevie Wilkerson, who sent it 416 feet to dead center. And the offense -- held to just three hits on the afternoon -- was set down in order to end the game just over 12 hours after exploding for a season-high 16 runs.

“Just couldn't get that fastball elevated for the putaway pitch,” Poche said. “[The pitch] was middle, and it’s usually got to be below it or usually above it for me. Whatever it was today, just couldn’t get the ball to that spot.”

“We know how Poche’s fastball is, so we tried to keep attacking [Wilkerson],” said catcher Mike Zunino. “Maybe one too many there.”

All of this came after rookie Brendan McKay spun yet another impressive outing. His career-high seven strikeouts -- two of which helped him escape a two-on, no-out jam in the fifth -- powered five scoreless innings alongside allowing just three hits.

“That's ice water running through his veins, nothing rattles him,” Cash said of the 23-year-old rookie. “He seems like in those opportunities that he’s had … he’s made the most of it and made some really good pitches.”

But the Tampa Bay offense could muster only three hits itself -- all from consecutive at-bats -- to go along with four walks.

“With three hits you’re not going to win many games,” Cash said. “Any time you come in here in the summer and you limit a team to two runs, you have to think you have a good chance to win a game. And we had it. We were close.”

After Zunino’s 100th career blast in the third gave the Rays a 1-0 lead, Tampa Bay proceeded to go 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position. It’s a problem that has plagued the team all season -- ranked 20th in the league with a .257 average in such situations entering Saturday -- and top on the list of Cash’s second-half fixes.

“We have some people in the front office that think it’s a luck thing,” Cash said Friday, “but it’s not luck. Let’s get it done. The guys recognize it. … Our pitchers have been outstanding for us this year limiting damage, preventing runs. We have to return the favor to them.”

One pitcher that may soon be needing the favor returned to him is Peter Fairbanks, who the Rays acquired during Saturday’s game from the Rangers. Only time will tell if and when the flamethrower Fairbanks, who has eight appearances in the Majors this season, comes to aid the recent bullpen wounds after being assigned to Triple-A Durham. But at the very least, it indicates the front office’s awareness that improvements are needed, even at the cost of the club’s No. 12 prospect Nick Solak.

“We feel good, we feel we have a lot of depth and quality arms to cover these innings,” Poche said. “I think we are just going to take it game by game and see where we are at.”