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Rays’ Ryan Yarbrough gets complete-game win, Yankees’ Gerrit Cole a loss

The left-handed starter gets his first win as a starter since August 2019 and Tampa Bay’s first complete game since May 2016.
 
Rays starting pitcher Ryan Yarbrough (48) bumps fists with catcher Mike Zunino (10) after the sixth inning of Thursday's game against the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium in New York.
Rays starting pitcher Ryan Yarbrough (48) bumps fists with catcher Mike Zunino (10) after the sixth inning of Thursday's game against the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium in New York. [ KATHY WILLENS | Associated Press ]
Published June 3, 2021|Updated June 3, 2021

NEW YORK — When beating Yankees ace Gerrit Cole is the third-biggest achievement for a starting pitcher, it has to be a special day.

Which it was for the Rays on Thursday, and a historic one, at that. Ryan Yarbrough ended two long-running streaks with a dazzling nine-inning performance in a 9-2 win.

Yarbrough recorded his first win as a starter since Aug. 11, 2019, ending a 24-game stretch that was four shy of the longest such run in league history.

Bigger, Yarbrough delivered the first complete game by a Rays pitcher in more than five years, since Matt Andriese on May 14, 2016, ending a major-league record run of 731 games without a starter going the distance.

“Good for Yarbs,” said Andriese, now with Boston, via text. “Somebody finally did it, ha ha.”

Yarbrough, whose stats are much better pitching behind an opener, seemed an unlikely candidate, especially against the right-handed-heavy Yankees lineup.

But the lanky lefty earned the opportunity — and the postgame congratulations from the other starters and the rest of the Rays — with a tremendous outing, allowing only two solo homers among six hits, throwing only 113 pitches.

“We’re so pumped for Yarbs,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. ““He was just really good. Pretty special day for him. ... It seemed like he made the most of every pitch thrown.”

Rays first base coach Ozzie Timmons, left, and manager Kevin Cash, center, congratulate Ryan Yarbrough after the game. [ KATHY WILLENS | Associated Press ]

Yarbrough got out of his one big jam in the fourth, allowing a single and a double, then setting down the next three batters in order. “That was the ballgame,” Cash said. Yarbrough then avoided trouble in the fifth after a one-out double, as Andrew Kittredge was warming up, the closest Cash came to making a change.

Yarbrough stated thinking seriously about the complete game after the sixth, when Cash and pitching coach Kyle Snyder told him that if he felt good to keep going.

Yarbrough thought even more about it after the seventh, when his mates scored four to extend the lead to 9-1 on their way to improving their AL-best record to 36-22. Austin Meadows — who hit his team-leading 14th homer in the fourth as the Rays knocked Cole out after five — added a bases-clearing double, his five RBIs on the day giving him 44 for the season.

“You feel it,” Yarbrough said. “You get to that point, you want to finish it off.”

Yarbrough got through the eighth with 103 pitches. The bullpen was idle. He went back to the mound laser-focused to finish.

“My whole mission was just to get all three (outs) and not give any situations where I let anybody get on base and have them (have a chance) to make a decision,” he said, and did, getting the final three outs on 10 pitches.

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There was a connection between Yarbrough’s accomplishments. “It kind of comes full circle, I guess,” he said.

Yarbrough had come the closest of any Ray to a complete game in that Aug. 11, 2019 win in Seattle, throwing 8-2/3 shutout innings. But, with only a 1-0 lead, he was lifted after getting the first two outs in the ninth, bringing him to 100 pitches. The Rays were battling for a playoff spot, and Cash felt better about Emilio Pagan getting the final out, which he did.

Yarbrough, as well as some of his teammates, weren’t happy about the decision, and he met with Cash to discuss it.

“Just a different scenario,” Yarbrough said Thursday. “Obviously, that game, it was a 1-0 game. At the end of the day, we all know that we’re trying to win ballgames. That was just a unique situation.

“But I remember talking to Cash afterwards, like, if I’m in that situation again, just let me finish it off. And he’s like, ‘All right, yeah, you got it.’ So kind of a cool moment to just take the reins there (Thursday) and finish it off.”

Done streaking

The Rays’ 731-game stretch between complete games was by far the longest in MLB history, per the Elias Sports Bureau:

Rays: 731 from May 15, 2016-June 2, 2021

Marlins: 480 from June 4, 2014-June 2, 2017

Brewers: 463 from June 19, 2017-Sept. 15, 2020

Padres: 412 from Aug. 17, 2017-Sept. 10, 2020

Brewers: 407 from April 6, 2011-July 8, 2013

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