ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — Austin Wynns homered, Cal Quantrill struck out seven and the Texas Rangers beat the Tampa Bay Rays 4-1 on Tuesday.
Quantrill (4-3) held the AL East-leading Rays to two hits through 5 1/3 innings as Texas won for the fourth time in five games.
Evan Carter led the way offensively for Texas with a pair of base hits, an RBI and run scored.
Peyton Gray, Tyler Alexander and Jakob Junis combined for 2 2/3 scoreless innings of relief
before Jacob Latz retired the side in order in the ninth for his 21st save of the season.
Griffin Jax (6-8) tied a career-high with 10 strikeouts. He allowed five hits and one earned run in 5 2/3 innings. Junior Caminero drove in the lone run for Tampa Bay with a triple.
Tampa Bay had allowed three-or-fewer runs in eight consecutive games, going 6-2 in that span.
The Rangers built a 2-0 lead on a pair of sacrifice flies, one from Nicky Lopez in the second and another by Ezequiel Duran in the third.
Tampa Bay loaded the bases with one out in the fourth, but Quantrill induced a double play grounder back to the mound from Chandler Simpson to end the inning.
Caminero cut the lead in half with his second career triple in the sixth off Peyton Gray. scoring Yandy Diaz before Wynns lifted a 363-foot home run into the leftfield stands off Steven Matz to regain the two-run advantage in the top of the seventh. Carter drove in Duran with a base hit to make it 4-1 in the eighth.
The Rangers send LHP MacKenzie Gore (6-8, 4.82 ERA) to the mound on Wednesday against Tampa Bay LHP Ian Seymour (6-3, 4.64).
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