MILWAUKEE — The Tampa Bay Rays‘ brand of baseball, an aggressive style designed to apply constant pressure on opponents, backfired Friday in Game 1 of the World Series with two costly baserunning miscues in a 3-2 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers.
But they don’t plan on changing the approach that landed them in the World Series for the third time in franchise history.
“That’s us,” Rays left fielder Chandler Simpson said. “We can’t run away from that because that’s who we are. Just because we got stopped a couple of times on the basepaths, we can’t shy away from that. Not now, at the end. We just got to continue to go forward. Be smart, be conscious of it, and just learn from it going forward.”
The first blunder happened in the fifth inning when Victor Mesa Jr., who had reached base with a leadoff single against Brewers starter Jacob Misiorowski, attempted to steal third base with two outs and Yandy Diaz at the plate. Mesa broke for third base on an 0-2, 103 mph fastball from Misiorowski and catcher William Contreras fired a throw in time to nail Mesa to end the inning.
“Easy to say now, but it was not the best move,” Mesa said. “I understand that was not the smartest move. Learn from that and I apologize or whatever to my teammates because obviously I’m trying to make something positive and it wasn’t done in that way.”
It was the first time the Rays were thrown out on the bases in the playoffs. Entering Friday, Tampa Bay was 11-for-11 on steal attempts in the postseason after finishing second in the majors in steals during the regular season.
“Ultimately, Victor is really competing, trying to do something to make something happen, put a little pressure on the defense,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “And it didn’t work in our favor.”
The second mistake occurred in the following inning. Jonathan Aranda delivered a one-out single against right-hander Abner Uribe, who relieved Misiorowski, for his second of three hits to bring up Simpson for the third time.
Simpson was coming off a strikeout in the fourth inning after striking out once in 28 plate appearances in the postseason entering Friday. A contact maven, he had not struck out multiple times in a game since June 9 and struck out multiple times in just four games this year. With that, Cash, figuring Simpson would make contact or take the walk, instructed the slow-moving Aranda to steal second base with the count full.
But Simpson struck out, failing to check his swing on a slider on what would’ve been ball four, and Contreras threw out Aranda by a few feet for a double play to end the inning with Junior Caminero, the team’s best hitter, on deck.
“That’s on me ultimately,” Cash said. “So much trust in Chandler putting the ball in play. But he had a pretty nasty pitch.”
The Rays’ two stolen bases Friday came in the ninth inning when pinch-runner Jorge Mateo and Simpson executed a double steal to put themselves in scoring position for Junior Caminero with one out. Otherwise, the four Brewers pitchers and Contreras shut down Tampa Bay’s vaunted running game. The Rays will try again in Game 2 on Saturday.
“I just feel like we didn’t really get on base enough to be able to pick spots where we could run,” Simpson said. “But, I mean, he’s a great catcher. He’s been great. So definitely have to be smart. And we talked about that coming in, and we definitely have to be conscious of it for sure moving forward.”
