The Tampa Bay Rays beat the San Francisco Giants 6-1 on Wednesday afternoon from Oracle Park is northern California. However, all the buzz throughout baseball is one particular hit in the sixth inning with one out. That is when Luke Raley of Hinckley, Ohio became the first Rays pinch hitter in franchise history to hit an inside the park home run. At the time, Raley put Tampa Bay up 6-0.
Why is there buzz?
There is a lot of buzz around Major League Baseball because Raley’s home run hit the deepest part of Oracle Park considered still in play. According to Matt Snyder of CBS Sports, Raley’s home run would normally have been a home run in all 30 MLB ballparks. It was 425 feet. However, the ball hit the right line of the right-centerfield wall, bounced off the top of the wall, and into left field where no Giants outfielder was at the time. By the time Giants rookie centerfielder Wade Meckler got to the baseball, Raley was running around third base and easily scored. The adjectives of “wild” and “crazy” have been used to describe the hit. You can see for yourself how amazing this home run actually was.
☢️🚨 Inside the park Nuke 🚨☢️ pic.twitter.com/XRFc9gRheI
— Tampa Bay Rays (@RaysBaseball) August 16, 2023
It is just too bad a rather irrelevant story was being told by the Bally Sports broadcast team at the time, and the television viewers did not receive the best play-by-play call of the inside the park dinger.
Raley’s 2023 MLB Statistics
Raley is batting .257 with 17 home runs and 43 runs batted in during 2022. In 95 games, 327 plate appearances and 288 at bats, Raley has scored 49 runs, and had 20 doubles, two triples, 12 stolen bases, 23 walks, 149 total bases, one sacrifice fly, one sacrifice bunt, an on base percentage of .340, and a slugging percentage of .517.
Raley’s triples and sacrifice fly came in Rays wins. The sacrifice fly came in a 10-6 Rays win over the Washington Nationals on April 4, and the triples came in a 7-0 Rays win over the Minnesota Twins on June 6, and in a 4-2 Rays win over the Twins on June 8.
Rays in strong playoff position
With the win, the Rays improved to a record of 73 wins and 50 losses. They are two games back of the Baltimore Orioles in the American League East, and have the top wildcard spot in the American League.
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