J. Lowe's 2 HRs highlight burgeoning offensive turnaround

PITTSBURGH -- One by one, the Rays’ stars are starting to turn.

It looks like Josh Lowe might be next in line.

Lowe launched a pair of homers and drove in four runs as the Rays put together one of their best all-around offensive performances of the year, racking up a season-high 17 hits during their 10-3 romp over the Pirates on Friday night at PNC Park.

Lowe’s first multihomer game in the Majors sparked the Rays’ fourth win in their last five games, a rare lopsided victory following a pair of wins in their final at-bats in Minnesota the previous two days.

“Happy for Josh. He's trying to get that timing, and it certainly looked like he got it today,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “Top to bottom, it felt like we were putting pressure on their pitchers, which is a really encouraging sign for us.”

After a sluggish start to the season, this month has provided some reason for optimism regarding the Rays lineup.

Yandy Díaz went 2-for-5 on Friday night, extending his on-base streak to a career-best 23 games and his hitting streak to a career-high-tying 14 games. Randy Arozarena owns a .309/.465/.509 slash line in June after going 2-for-4 with a double, slowly pulling himself out of the hole he created during the first two months of the season.

Brandon Lowe has brought pop from the left side of the plate. Jose Siri is mashing clutch hits and making dazzling defensive plays, including a running catch in the second inning Friday night and a leaping, game-ending grab at the wall despite potential fan interference in the ninth.

Now, it might be time to add Josh Lowe to the list.

“I think it was just a matter of time,” Díaz said through interpreter Manny Navarro. “We have great hitters, and I think that everyone's just getting activated and getting ready to go at the same time.”

To this point, Lowe’s season has been a story of frustration. He missed time in Spring Training with left hip inflammation and a right oblique strain, then tightness in his right hamstring kept him from making his season debut until May 6. Less than three weeks later, a recurrence of the oblique injury sent him back to the injured list.

Through that experience, Lowe said, he gained a new appreciation for how hard it is to establish momentum when going on and off the IL.

When he returned, Lowe didn’t look like the dynamic hitter who batted .292 with an .835 OPS, 20 homers and 32 steals a year ago. He went just 2-for-24 with 12 strikeouts in his first nine games back.

“We know what he's capable of doing. We saw, for a really young player, he had a pretty big season for us last year,” Cash said. “It's been a little bit derailed because of injuries, but he's certainly capable if he's getting his timing of being a really, really good player for us.”

He felt like things started to improve when this road trip began in Atlanta, even if he went 0-for-6 with four strikeouts during that series. Better results followed in Minnesota, where he was 2-for-4 with a homer in Tuesday’s series opener and doubled in Thursday’s finale.

Then came Lowe’s big night along the Allegheny River.

With the Rays ahead by a run in the third inning, Lowe golfed a down-and-in, two-strike slider from Luis Ortiz a projected 411 feet into the right-field seats. He figured Ortiz wouldn’t try to sneak another slider by him, so he was sitting on the fastball when he came up with two on and two outs in the sixth.

Sure enough, Ortiz fired a first-pitch heater, and Lowe swatted it a projected 402 feet out to left-center field -- not an easy part of the ballpark for a left-handed hitter to reach.

“I think it was just a matter of time before I got to this point, feeling like myself again,” Lowe said. “Hopefully I can just keep building on this and move in the right direction.”

The win didn’t come without some drama, as starter Ryan Pepiot was knocked out with the bases loaded and one out in the fourth inning. But lefty Colin Poche defused the situation by inducing an inning-ending double play on his first pitch then worked a clean sixth. Phil Maton and Chris Devenski each worked two innings, and Ben Rortvedt put the game away with a three-run homer in the ninth.

It was only the Rays’ fifth win of the season by at least five runs and their first such victory since May 11.

“That's the goal, right?” Lowe said, smiling. “To have a stress-free win is always good, but a win is a win at the end of the day.”