May 23, 2007 in Sports

Rare clutch hit from Sexson sends M’s past Devil Rays

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ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – The way Richie Sexson has been hitting lately, he wasn’t sure his grounder would get through the infield.

“Right when I hit it, my thought was: ‘Who’s catching it now?’ But it went through the hole,” the Seattle first baseman said after his fifth-inning, bases-loaded single between third and short helped the Mariners beat the Tampa Bay Devil Rays 5-2 on Tuesday night.

Sexson, who’s hitting .175, snapped an 0-for-15 drought with runners in scoring position and wiped out a 2-0 deficit against Devil Rays starter Scott Kazmir. Yuniesky Betancourt’s solo homer off Chad Orvella (0-1) snapped a 2-2 tie in the sixth.

“This time last year, Richie was pretty much in the same boat,” Seattle manager Mike Hargrove said, adding that the struggling slugger’s two-run single took “the monkey off everybody’s back.”

“That’s all we’ve heard for the last two or three days, not hitting with men in scoring position. Richie picked us up. Picked us up big time. It was huge.”

Jarrod Washburn (4-4) settled after a shaky first inning to improve to 10-2 lifetime against the Devil Rays, who took their two-run lead on Carl Crawford’s RBI single and a fielding error by Mariners third baseman Adrian Beltre in the first.

Betancourt’s homer was his fourth, and all have come with the score tied.

“I wasn’t aware about that,” said Betancourt, whose fifth game-winning RBI tied Jose Guillen for the team lead. “I just tried to get a good pitch to hit and be patient at the plate.”

The Mariners added an unearned run for a 4-2 lead in the seventh, when Ichiro Suzuki reached on an error and later was awarded home when Jose Vidro doubled to right-center off Orvella and a fan interfered when the ball bounced above the wall.

Seattle’s Kenji Johjima hit a solo homer off Gary Glover in the eighth. Mariners closer J.J. Putz pitched the ninth, earning his 11th save in as many opportunities.

Kazmir rebounded from throwing 109 pitches in four innings of a no-decision against Texas last week to limit the Mariners to one hit until Suzuki singled with one out in the fifth to extend his season-high hitting streak to 15 games.

The Devil Rays starter hasn’t won since April 29.

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