Rays

Rays make Piniella's birthday truly happy

RAYS 3, MARINERS 2: Toby Hall's tiebreaking homer in ninth caps Tampa Bay's series win against its manager's ex-team.

SEATTLE - There were a handful of cards, a cigar and a bottle of wine on Lou Piniella's desk Thursday in honor of his 60th birthday. But Toby Hall and the rest of the Devil Rays gave him the present he cherished most, a dramatic 3-2 victory over the Mariners to take a three-game series that knocked his old team out of first place.

"You want to win for him every day," closer Lance Carter said. "But to win on his birthday, here, against his old club, and knock them one game further behind in the standings, it's nice."

The Rays looked like they would win much of the afternoon, carrying a 2-1 lead into the eighth after a strong start by Jorge Sosa, the runs coming on a sacrifice fly by Julio Lugo and a home run by ex-Mariner Al Martin. But Bret Boone, one of Piniella's favorite Mariners, made amends for an error with a one-out homer off Travis Harper that tied the score and threatened to ruin the day.

Hall didn't let it happen. After Seattle relief ace Shigetoshi Hasegawa, who went in with a remarkable 0.75 ERA, got two quick outs in the ninth, Hall turned on a 1-and-1 breaking ball and knocked it over the leftfield wall.

"Boy, what a clutch home run," Piniella said. "Hasegawa's been almost unhittable."

Sosa, bounced from the rotation twice because of inconsistency, was dazzling. He got through the usually troublesome first inning 1-2-3, allowed only three singles through the first five innings, struck out four and was routinely clocked in the mid to upper 90s.

He said he dedicated the game to Piniella but acknowledged he knew he was running out of chances to show he can be a starter: "It was important for me."

Piniella was impressed.

"He came out throwing right from the beginning," Piniella said. "We've wanted to see this, 93-94-95 (mph) right from the first pitch of the ballgame, and it showed. We've got to make a decision, but the way he threw the ball today you've got to think that he's going to get it again."

The series kicked off a brutal season-ending stretch for the Rays, who play all but seven of their remaining games against the contending Mariners, A's, Yankees and Red Sox.

After extending their losing streak to six Tuesday, the Rays scored impressive back-to-back victories, leaving the Mariners two games behind streaking Oakland. "This was big for us," Hall said. It was the 13th time in their history they've taken a series from a first-place team and the fourth time they've knocked a team from the top of the standings.

"We had a rough week coming in here and to lose the first ballgame like we did and come back and regroup and play two really good ballgames, it's heartening to see," Piniella said. "I felt all along we'd be very competitive against these teams that are playing for something. Let's hope our good fortune continues."

Piniella was careful in his comments, saying the Rays wanted to be equal opportunity spoilers and hoped to do just as well this weekend in Oakland.

But Martin said the wins against the Mariners were special.

"He never says anything about here or New York, but I know that he really, really cares about playing his old teams," Martin said. "So it's good to get a win. It's really good to get a win on his birthday."

"It was," Piniella said, "a really nice day all the way around."