Jake Burger homered twice, drove in three runs and scored three times to help the Texas Rangers earn a split of the four-game series against the Tampa Bay Rays with an 8-6 win on Sunday afternoon in Arlington, Texas.
Corey Seager also homered, Ezequiel Duran had three hits and an RBI and Logan O’Hoppe delivered two hits and scored twice for the Rangers (71-73), who had lost three of four and trailed 4-0 early on Sunday.
Rangers left-hander MacKenzie Gore allowed five runs and six hits in three-plus innings. He struck out one and walked three.
Trevor Williams (1-0) followed with two innings of scoreless relief to earn the win. Jakob Junis pitched a 1-2-3 ninth for his sixth save.
Rays starter Ian Seymour was also limited to three-plus innings, allowing four runs (three earned) and five hits. He struck out two and walked one.
Chandler Simpson produced two hits and scored two runs, while Yandy Diaz, Jonathan Aranda and Jonny DeLuca all produced two hits and an RBI for the Rays (85-58), who had won two in a row.
The Rays scored four runs on four straight at-bats in the second. Victor Mesa Jr. singled, Nick Fortes followed with a squeeze bunt, Diaz singled and Aranda hit a sacrifice fly for his sixth RBI of the series.
Burger led off the bottom of the second with a home run to cut it to 4-1, but Junior Caminero got the run back with a sacrifice fly in the fourth to make it 5-1.
Burger launched his second homer of the game in the fourth with a runner aboard to make it 5-3. O’Hoppe followed with a single to end Seymour’s day.
Steven Matz (5-5) relieved Kevin Kelly later in the inning and Justin Foscue came through with a two-out, two-run double that tied it 5-5.
Matz came back out for the fifth and surrendered an RBI single to Elias Diaz for a 6-5 Texas lead. Casey Legumina replaced Matz with two outs and gave up an RBI single to Duran to extend the lead to 7-5.
Simpson singled, stole second and scored on a single by DeLuca to cut it to 7-6 in the seventh.
Seager gave the Rangers some insurance with a solo home run in the eighth to make it 8-6.
