Richie Palacios didn’t hit the ball particularly hard. He didn’t hit it terribly far, either. So as his 65.7 mph popup fell toward the Tropicana Field turf in shallow right field, with Isiah Kiner-Falefa running out for it from second base and Wilyer Abreu coming in, he was focused on only one thing. “Just praying it drops. That's all you're doing,” Palacios said. “You're just praying it drops, and it did.” The ball bounced off the turf, Junior Caminero trotted home to score the winning run, and Palacios hopped across the infield, looking up as he pointed two fingers to the sky. Palacios’ walk-off single sent the Rays to a 2-1 victory over the Red Sox on Saturday, their third walk-off win of their final regular-season homestand at the Trop. “We're just relentless. No matter what's going on in the game, we always feel like we have a chance to win,” Palacios said after his second career walk-off hit. “Three walk-offs is amazing, and we're just going to continue to do what we do.” The Rays’ seventh win in their last eight games brought them one step closer to clinching their first American League East title since 2021. The victory increased their lead in the division race to five games, after the Yankees lost in Arizona on Saturday night, with eight left to play. The Rays know that plenty of high-stakes, high-pressure games are in their immediate future, whether they take place at Yankee Stadium next week or wherever their postseason road may lead. But they’re getting plenty of practice at finding ways to win those games before they get there. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the Rays haven’t had three walk-off wins in a single homestand since Sept. 20-25, 2019. This one before a crowd of 27,402 was their AL-leading 39th come-from-behind win of the year, and it came against a club they could face in their first playoff series. “It’s very encouraging. It's a good feeling,” manager Kevin Cash said. “You want to get as many reps at that as possible, because we know the games that we're going to continue playing this year are going to be against good teams and in tight ballgames.”
