Offense proves scarce again

MARINERS 2, RAYS 1: Paul Wilson gives a sturdy effort on mound, but Seattle pitching limits Tampa Bay to four hits.

[Times photo: Michael Rondou] Paul Wilson gets drilled by a Mike Cameron liner in the fifth, but allowed one earned run in seven innings.

By MARC TOPKIN, Times Staff Writer

© St. Petersburg Times
published July 13, 2002

ST. PETERSBURG -- Managing general partner Vince Naimoli assures that the Rays' balance sheet is fine. It's the numbers on the scoreboard that are the concern.

The Rays lost their eighth game in a row Friday, a 2-1 defeat to Seattle that featured another good performance by their pitchers and an inept one by their hitters, who have produced one run in their past 27 innings.

This time it was a four-hit night -- two in seven-plus innings against Jamie Moyer and his assortment of slow, slower and even slower pitches, and two more off the bullpen -- that wasted a strong start by Paul Wilson.

"It's relatively simple: We didn't get it done, and that's it," Rays manager Hal McRae said. "I can't come up with a legitimate excuse every night for losing. It's foolish to try. Sometimes we've just got to get it done, and we just didn't get it done.

"There's no reason to go play Ring Around the Rosy every night; to talk about something good that you did as opposed to something that could have happened or this and that, that gets old."

So does losing close games. The loss was the Rays' 18th in 29 one-run games, but it doesn't mean much when a team is on the verge of 60 losses before mid July.

"I think that's more frustrating than getting beat 10 to nothing night by night," Wilson said. "It's hard to talk about really."

The results, though, are not necessarily happenstance or bad luck.

"We're losing a lot of one-run games, but it seems like we're making a lot of mistakes along the way that end up being one-run losses," Rays catcher John Flaherty said.

"Yeah, it's encouraging when you're battling every night, but it's also frustrating at the end when you know the reason you lost the one-run game is that you didn't do some little things along the way that the good clubs seem to do."

The Rays got off to a promising start Friday, scratching out a first-inning run to snap an 18-inning scoreless streak. All-Star Randy Winn singled to center, stole his team-record 70th career base to get to second, went to third on a fly out and scored on Steve Cox's sacrifice fly to center.

But that was about it.

They got Ben Grieve to third with one out in the second, but stranded him when Dave McCarty -- now 6-for-50 as a Ray -- grounded out and Chris Gomez flied out. They didn't get another runner to second until the ninth as Moyer, working between 72-85 mph all night, retired 16 of his next 17 batters.

Gomez was thrown out at second trying to stretch a single with two outs in the eighth, and neither Brent Abernathy nor Cox could get Winn in after a one-out double in the ninth.

Wilson did a good job dodging trouble, working out of a bases-loaded, one-out mess in the first, and held the one-run lead until the sixth.

A one-out double by Carlos Guillen and a single by Bret Boone tied it, but Wilson refused to give in. An Abernathy error put men on first and third with one out, but Wilson got Dan Wilson to hit a ground ball, and Abernathy survived a hard slide by Desi Relaford to turn the inning-ending double play.

Wilson went seven innings and 113 pitches in what turned out to be his 10th consecutive winless start since May12. He pitched relatively well in the interim, with Friday's one-run outing marking the sixth game in the stretch in which he allowed three runs or fewer. His 4.09 ERA is much more indicative of how he has pitched than his 2-6 record.

"All we really want to do is be satisfied with keeping our team in the ballgame, and I think the majority of the times I've done that," Wilson said.

The winning run came off Travis Harper in the eighth. Edgar Martinez followed John Olerud's walk with a double that tucked just inside the leftfield foul line. Harper struck out Guillen, allowing the Rays to intentionally walk Boone to load the bases and set up a double play, but they couldn't pull it off.

Gomez had to go to his right to field Relaford's bouncer and had trouble getting it out of his glove. It limited the Rays to a forceout at second and allowed pinch-runner Luis Ugueto to score.

"He got the ball hit on the ground," McRae said. "There's nothing else you can do."

Or say.

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