ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. _ The Rays' innovative pitching strategy made them the talk of baseball early.
Now their hitting is starting to catch up, making them the hottest team in the game.
The Rays racked up double-digit hits for the fourth game in a row to cruise to a 10-3 win over the best-in-baseball Red Sox at Tropicana Field.
"Right now we're really hot," right fielder Carlos Gomez said. "Pitching and hitting."
A combination of the two has created six consecutive wins _ the longest active streak in the majors and the team's longest since May 14-19. With 15 wins in their last 23 games, the Rays (68-61) are up to seven games over .500; they haven't been higher than that at any point in the last three years.
The offense's 12-hit night started in the second with a leadoff double by Ji-Man Choi, who has hit safely in his last 10 starts. He scored on a Gomez grounder, and catcher Michael Perez brought in two runs with a double later in the inning.
The runs continued in the third starting with Choi (again). His liner to left started a chain of six consecutive singles that allowed the Rays' lead to swell to 8-2 and cool off a Boston team that was coming off of its 13th shutout (tied for most in the AL).
Some success at the plate isn't new for the Rays. Their .254 average entering Friday ranked fifth in the league, and they were batting .304 over their five previous wins.
But Friday's offensive output, in front of an announced crowd of 19,723, was noteworthy on several levels.
It came against Hector Velazquez, who entered with a 2.74 ERA. The right-hander had allowed only two runs in his previous two starts against the Rays and had a recent 10-decision winning streak (that the Rays snapped Sunday in Boston).
"Maybe just being familiar with him from five, six days ago, that helped," manager Kevin Cash said.
It came without two notable players: The Rays' top hitter (Mallex Smith) was hospitalized and put on the disabled list Friday with a viral infection, and one of their top sluggers (Tommy Pham) remained out of the lineup after dislocating his finger Tuesday.
And it came thanks to contributions from players who have endured some struggles.
"Probably what you've seen is the resilience for them to kind of stay the course, not get too frustrated with themselves because they know they haven't been swinging the bat as a whole very well," Cash said.
Center fielder Kevin Kiermaier entered Friday with a .192 average that was fifth-lowest in the league. But he was part of the chain of singles, boosting his average to .297 over the last 10 games.
Left fielder Brandon Lowe failed to get a hit in his first 19 at-bats after arriving from Triple-A Durham earlier this month. He was 2-for-2 with two walks and an RBI single.
Perez's home average was more than 200 points lower than his road average since coming from the Diamondbacks last month. He had his second multi-hit game of the week and brought in as many runs Friday (four) as he had in his previous 20 games.
Shortstop Willy Adames was hitting below .200 less than a month ago. He had his sixth multi-hit game of the month and blasted his eighth home run of the season _ a two-run shot in the fourth that put the game out of reach.
"Top to bottom, everybody played a role," Cash said.
Including the pitchers.
Opener Diego Castillo almost lasted the two innings manager Kevin Cash hoped for and secured his sixth consecutive scoreless appearance. Left-hander Jalen Beeks avoided any major problems in his 5 1/3 innings to put himself in position to beat his former team for the second time in six days and become the third Rays rookie to beat the Red Sox twice in the same season. And Hunter Wood got out of his self-inflicted bases-loaded jam in the eighth without surrendering a run.
"Offense exploded today," Beeks said, "and that made it a lot easier on the pitchers."
