Rodriguez comes through in ninth to complete Rays rally
The Tampa Bay Rays dug themselves out of a 5-run hole, rallying in the ninth inning for a 7-6 win over the Toronto Blue Jays after manager Joe Maddon was ejected.
Tampa Bay found itself trailing 5-3 heading into its last at-bat, but had runners on the corners with one out with Carlos Pena at the plate. With two strikes, Pena called for timeout but wasn’t awarded one by umpire Angel Hernandez, and an unprepared Pena struck out looking. Maddon rushed out of the dugout to argue and was promptly tossed by Hernandez.
Without their leader and down to their final out, the Rays found a way to escape the jaws of defeat. Toronto closer Kevin Gregg walked two consecutive batters to shrink the lead to one, and then Sean Rodriguez hit a bases-clearing double to give the Rays a 7-5 lead. Gregg walked a career-high five batters in the inning while surrendering just a single hit, and was ejected for yelling at Hernandez on his way to the dugout after being taken out of the game by manager Cito Gaston.
Vernon Wells pulled the Blue Jays within one with an RBI double, but Rays closer Rafael Soriano earned his 15th save in 15 chances by getting Jose Bautista to fly out to end the game.
The bullpen wasted a terrific performance by Toronto starter Brian Tallet, who came off the disabled list to pitch 5 2/3 shutout innings.
Grant Balfour got the win in relief for Tampa Bay. Rookie starter Jeff Niemann was bailed out after his worst outing of the season, surrendering nine hits and five runs in 6 1/3 innings.
