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Roger Mooney

Roger Mooney covers the Tampa Bay Rays for The Tampa Tribune, TBO.com and News Channel 8. He has covered the Rays since their first season in 1998, including 11 years for the Bradenton Herald. Roger has also covered Florida, South Florida and Florida State football, the Bucs and the Lightning.

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Rangers 8, Rays 6: Game 2 notes and quotes

Posted Oct 2, 2011 by Roger Mooney

Updated Oct 2, 2011 at 12:40 AM

ROGER MOONEY
ARLINGTON, Texas This is the second straight year the Rays and Rangers met in the ALDS, and on Saturday night, for the first time in seven games, the home team won.

The Rangers took advantage of a sloppy fourth inning by James Shields to rally for the lead and then held on for an 8-6 victory in Game 2 of the ALDS at Rangers Ballpark in Arlington.

The Rangers evened the best-of-seven series at 1-1 with Game 3 set for Monday afternoon.

Shields allowed five runs in the fourth inning. He didn’t help himself by hitting a pair of batters and throwing a pair of wild pitches.

David Murphy had a key at-bat in the inning. It appeared he was out twice, the first on a dribbler in front of the plate that catcher Kelly Shoppach picked up and threw to first base for the out, but home plate umpire Kerwin Danley ruled to be foul.

“I talked to K.D. (Kerwin Danley) because I wasn’t really sure,” manager Joe Maddon said. “He said the ball hit the bat again and it just dribbled out in front of the plate. I had no argument at that point because I can’t tell that. You’d have to ask him specifically. He may have called it a little bit quickly, I don’t know. But the ball did hit. It appeared to be behind the plate but then rolled out in front of the plate, which means it is a fair ball if it is not touched.

“So I went out there rather calmly and just asked him what was going on, and he told me that the ball had hit the bat again, which means it would have been a foul ball because he hit it behind the plate and pushed it fair. That’s what I thought he meant, anyway. I accepted the explanation because I couldn’t tell with the naked eye what actually happened.”

Shields then got Murphy swinging at a pitch in the dirt for what would have been the third strike had the ball not skipped past Shoppach and toward the third base dugout. Murphy reach first base safely as the fourth run of the five-run inning scored.

Here are some notes …

—Shields was charged with seven runs in five innings plus two batters in the sixth.

He is the first pitcher in major league postseason history to be charged with two hit batters and two wild pitches in the same inning.

Shields is 2-4 with a 4.98 ERA in the postseason. He is 0-2 with a 10.61 ERA in two losses to the Rangers.

Including Saturday’s start, Shields is 5.84 ERA against the AL West this season and a 2.18 ERA against everyone else.

—Matt Joyce hit his first postseason home run, a two-run shot in the fourth inning that gave the Rays a 3-0 lead.

—Evan Longoria hit a three-run homer in the seventh inning to cut the Rangers lead to 7-6. Watch it here: http://tampabay.rays.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?gid=2011_10_01_tbamlb_texmlb_1&highlight_content_id=19812987&c_id=tb

He now has a franchise-record eight career postseason home runs. He is now tied with B.J. Upton for the franchise lead in postseason RBIs with 18.

In his last six games, including the regular season, Longoria is 8-for-21 with four home runs, nine RBIs and eight walks.

—Kelly Shoppach drove in a first inning run with a bases-loaded walk. It was his sixth RBI in his first five plate appearances during the ALDS. All six of those RBIs came with two outs.

—The Rays have scored 10 of their 15 runs this series with two outs.

—The Rangers have committed two errors in the series, and the Rays made them pay with two-run homers after each, Shoppach on Friday and Joyce on Saturday.

—Beginning with their sixth-run eighth inning against the Yankees on Wednesday, the Rays had scored 20 unanswered runs before the Rangers interrupted that run in the fourth inning.