Dioner Navarro turned the page quickly after his dugout confrontation with teammate Matt Garza the day before. So did the rest of the Tampa Bay Rays.Navarro had four hits and four RBIs, including one of three consecutive home runs Tampa Bay hit against Joe Saunders, and rookie Evan Longoria had a pair of solo homers and an RBI double in a 13-4 rout of the Los Angeles Angels on Monday night.
“I think it says a lot about our team,” Navarro said. “It was a `younger brother, older brother’ fight. There’s no hard feelings or nothing. We’re fine. We handled it in the way we had to handle it, and we came back out here today and did our job.”
Manager Joe Maddon said Navarro will catch Garza’s next start despite their heated exchange on Sunday at Texas, which began on the mound and continued in the dugout after Garza gave up a two-run homer to German Duran. Navarro has been behind the plate for nine of Garza’s 12 starts this season.
“People sometimes really misconstrue something like that,” Maddon said. “The best way I can explain it to anyone would be to just think of your own family and what happens behind closed doors. The people you love the most you’re going to have the biggest arguments with, and then you make up.”
Edwin Jackson (4-5) allowed four runs and 10 hits in seven innings, striking out two and walking one. The right-hander is scheduled to begin serving a five-game suspension on June 13 for his part in a bench-clearing brawl with the Boston Red Sox on Thursday at Fenway Park.
Longoria, Willy Aybar and Navarro all went deep against Saunders (9-3), helping Maddon get his first win in Anaheim as a big league manager after eight losses at the “Big A.” Maddon spent 31 years in the Angels organization and six seasons as Mike Scioscia’s bench coach before taking the Tampa Bay job prior to the 2006 campaign.
Longoria, whose 10 homers are the most among AL rookies, drove a 1-0 pitch just beyond the second tier of the left-field bullpen to open the scoring. Aybar homered to left two pitches later, and Navarro worked the count full before giving the Rays three consecutive home runs for the first time in the franchise’s 11-year history with another drive into the bullpen.
“Obviously we’ve been playing a whole lot better this year and we have a lot more weapons, but I didn’t expect any of that,” Maddon said. “I mean, to hit home runs at night in this ballpark like that—they just don’t go to left field. So the back-to-back-to-back quite frankly was a surprise. But I’ll take it.”
It was the first time any team hit three in a row against the Angels since April 18, 2000, at Toronto, when Craig Grebeck, Raul Mondesi and Carlos Delgado went deep in the sixth inning against Jason Dickson.
The Rays outhit the Angels 18-12, with every Tampa Bay batter getting at least one hit.
Saunders was charged with eight runs and 10 hits over 4 2-3 innings. The left-hander has given up six home runs in his last three outings—one more than he allowed over his previous 10 starts this season combined.
“They’ve got speed, they have good contact guys and they have good power guys. They have a good mix. If you make a mistake they are going to make you pay for it,” Saunders said. “They got my pitch count up there. It’s just one of those games where you have to forget about it.”
Longoria, the third overall pick in the 2006 draft, homered again in the ninth off Darren Oliver. It was the second multihomer game for the Downey, Calif., native, who is hitting .255 with 32 RBIs in 54 games.
“Shoot, what a homecoming for me. I had all my family and friends in, and it was just a great feeling to be able to do what I did tonight,” Longoria said. “That’s a hot ballclub over there, and just to get that rally started in the second and get on top of them was big.”
Torii Hunter put the Angels ahead 4-3 in the fourth with his 200th career homer and eighth this season after a broken-bat leadoff single by Vladimir Guerrero, who was 4-for-4 along with Gary Matthews Jr.
But the Rays grabbed an 8-4 lead with five runs in the fifth. B.J. Upton hit an RBI double, Aybar singled in the go-ahead run after a walk to Longoria, and Navarro followed with a two-run double to right-center on Saunders’ 103rd and final pitch. Gabe Gross capped the five-run rally with an RBI single against Jose Arredondo.
Xtra, xtra: The Rays are 14-8 in the first game of a series, and have won nine of their last 11 series openers. Carl Crawford’s two steals increased Tampa Bay’s major league-leading total to 72. Aybar’s younger brother Erick has missed the Angels’ last 18 games with a dislocated right pinky (Associated Press - Sports).
