Yandy Diaz went 3-for-3 and drove in the winning run with his second double as the Tampa Bay Rays opened a four-game series by pounding the Boston Red Sox 10-5 Monday night in St. Petersburg, Fla.
Diaz, who recorded three runs, three RBIs and a hit by pitch, broke a 5-5 tie with a sixth-inning double.
Jonathan Aranda and Francisco Mejia went 2-for-4 for the Rays. Harold Ramirez was 2-for-2 with two RBIs and a run off the bench, and Josh Lowe drove in a pair.
Luke Bard (1-0) pitched two innings in relief as the Rays’ bullpen retired the last 12 batters it faced.
Tampa Bay used a 14-hit attack to go to 5-2 against Boston.
J.D. Martinez went 2-for-4 with two doubles, two RBIs and a run. Alex Verdugo and Xander Bogaerts each had two hits and an RBI.
In his second major league start, Boston’s Brayan Bello allowed five runs on seven hits over four innings. He walked three, hit a batter and fanned five.
Boston played without All-Star third baseman Rafael Devers (sore lower back) for the fifth time in seven games.
The Rays finished 7-for-14 with runners in scoring position, while Boston was 4-for-9.
After Bello plunked Diaz and walked Ji-Man Choi in the first, Aranda filled the bases with a hit. Lowe’s two-run single made it 2-0.
Boston answered in the second with Verdugo’s RBI chopper, but a spectacular diving catch by center fielder Brett Phillips of Trevor Story’s gapper to left-center kept it at 2-1.
Bello allowed three two-out, run-scoring hits in the second. Diaz doubled over third to score Luke Raley, and Choi singled to center to plate Diaz. Aranda’s RBI single made it 5-1.
In the third, Martinez ripped a two-run double to trim the deficit to 5-3. Jarren Duran’s RBI single in the fourth made it a one-run game.
Bogaerts completed the comeback in the fifth with a single to score Martinez after a one-out double.
Jake Diekman (4-1) hit Taylor Walls with the first pitch of the sixth inning, and the shortstop made it 6-5 by scoring on Diaz’s third hit, a double to left. Pinch hitter Ramirez then singled in Diaz.
Diaz added a sacrifice fly in a three-run eighth, which included RBI singles by Ramirez and Yu Chang.
–Field Level Media
