ST. PETERSBURG -- Returning home with their longest losing streak of the season, the Rays felt like they had the right man on the mound in Nick Martinez.
And when that skid was nine outs away from reaching five games, they knew they had the right man at the plate in Yandy Díaz.
After Martinez delivered another terrific start, Díaz blasted a go-ahead two-run homer in the seventh inning. His second home run of the night sparked the Rays’ most explosive inning of the season, a seven-run frame that helped them snap their four-game skid with an 8-5 win over the Angels on Friday night at Tropicana Field.
“No quit in us, right? Obviously, coming off a skid, nobody wants to lose a fifth one,” Martinez said. “I felt like if I could keep it close, it was just a matter of time before the guys erupted.”
The Rays improved to 35-19 on the year and boosted their MLB-best record at home to 20-5, with 16 wins in their last 17 games at the Trop, tied (with May 13-31, 2021) for the best 17-game span at home in franchise history.
Martinez did his part, as usual, limiting the Angels to two runs while striking out five without a walk over seven efficient innings. With one-third of the season in the books, Martinez has a 1.62 ERA and the Rays are 9-2 behind him.
Martinez has allowed two runs or fewer in each of his 11 starts to begin the season, the eighth traditional starter in baseball’s modern era (since 1900) to put together that kind of streak and the first since the Dodgers’ Hyun Jin Ryu in 2019.
"There's no words to describe what Nick's been able to do for us,” Díaz said through interpreter Kevin Vera. “If he's not the best pitcher this season, he's definitely top three. He's just been great for us the entire year.”
But the Rays were down a run when Martinez walked off the mound, because Angels starter Walbert Ureña shut down their lineup after Díaz got things started with the 23rd leadoff home run of his career.
It was starting to feel like Tampa Bay’s lineup was in a rut, having only scored four runs in the last 24 innings dating back to Tuesday’s defeat in Baltimore. The Rays needed someone to deliver a big hit.
Fortunately, Díaz was up to the task.
After Cedric Mullins worked a leadoff walk against right-hander Ryan Zeferjahn, Díaz unloaded on a two-strike sweeper over the middle of the plate and pulled it a Statcast-projected 400 feet to left field, home to four “Tarps Off” sections of shirt-waving fans as part of a crowd of 18,706.
“A really good hitter that's seeing the ball well, making adjustments in-game,” manager Kevin Cash said. “When he gets pitches to hit in the zone, it seems like he's putting a charge into them.”
Up came the red-hot Jonathan Aranda, who blasted a full-count sweeper a projected 410 feet out to right-center field to give the Rays back-to-back homers for the first time this season. It was the 10th home run of the season for both Díaz and Aranda, putting both on a 30-homer pace -- much to Díaz’s surprise.
“I think that's a little too many for me,” he said after his fifth career multihomer game, including the postseason. “It's a great goal. It's a great position to be in, but we'll see.”
But the inning wasn’t over, as the Rays returned to form with an extended rally that secured their 15th comeback win of the season.
“When Yandy's going, he's amazing. The guy can hit with the best of them,” second baseman Richie Palacios said. “We were trying to press and get some runs in and we were able to do that in the seventh.”
Junior Caminero smacked a single to center, and Chandler Simpson used his speed to force an error by first baseman Vaughn Grissom. Oliver Dunn dropped a bunt single to score Caminero, his first hit as a Ray.
Palacios dashed around the bases for a two-run triple down the right-field line. Finally, catcher Nick Fortes drove in Palacios with a sacrifice bunt to complete the Rays’ highest-scoring inning of the season.
A couple longballs followed by some small ball? Yeah, the Rays are back to their winning ways.
“I think it's who we are, man. We're gonna stick to who we are playing the small ball, but when we get our chances to do some damage, we have the right guys to do that,” Martinez said. “After we kind of opened the floodgates, we went back to who we are, winning ballgames and playing small ball.”