Early homers, Zack Littell's gem propel Rays past Guardians

Zack Littell allowed just two hits over six scoreless innings, Logan Driscoll clubbed his first career home run and Jonathan Aranda also went deep as the visiting Tampa Bay Rays beat the Cleveland Guardians 3-1 on Friday night.

Littell (7-9) yielded only a first-inning double to Jose Ramirez and a triple to Jhonkensy Noel in the second. The right-hander, who didn't give up a run in five-plus innings on Sunday at Baltimore, also struck out five without a walk to extend his scoreless-inning streak to 13 for Tampa Bay.

The Rays (73-75) have won the first two of the four-game series after losing all three games at Philadelphia earlier this week.

Cleveland's Tanner Bibee (11-8) allowed all three runs on the two Tampa Bay homers, finishing with eight hits and no walks allowed while fanning nine in six innings.

David Fry's RBI double, which hit the top of the 19-foot-high left-field wall in the eighth inning, provided the only scoring for the AL Central-leading Guardians (84-64). Cleveland has totaled three runs and nine hits through the first two games of the set.

Tampa Bay opened the scoring in the third. After Jose Siri just missed clearing the center field wall for a leadoff triple, Driscoll sent a no-doubt shot into the right field seats for his milestone home run and a 2-0 Rays lead.

The Rays' Christopher Morel flipped a single to right later in the inning, then immediately exited with right Achilles discomfort, according to the team.

An inning later, Aranda smacked a Bibee pitch into the front row of those right field seats for a 3-0 Tampa Bay edge.

Rays relievers Kevin Kelly, Mason Montgomery and Edwin Uceta combined to yield two hits and the only Cleveland run in three innings. Uceta retired all five batters he faced for his third save.

Siri had two hits for Tampa Bay, which clinched the season series against the Guardians by improving to 4-1 against them in 2024.

Noel recorded half of Cleveland's four hits.

--Field Level Media