Rays place Josh Lowe on injured list, activate Chris Devenski

ST. PETERSBURG — After playing a position player short Friday night, the Rays decided to place Josh Lowe on the injured list Saturday morning. That allowed them to reinstate right-handed reliever Chris Devenski from the 15-day injured list.

The outfielder sustained a second right oblique strain Wednesday night but had hoped to avoid this move.

Devenski has been out since April 24 because of a knee issue. The right-hander has a 7.71 ERA in nine appearances. He’s struck out 11, allowed 12 earned runs and given up five home runs in 14 innings pitched.

He said that he has made some adjustments to his delivery that have helped his knee and his pitching.

“I feel like I have more velocity on my heater, which is always a good thing and that helps with more separation on my changeup,” Devenski said. “My heater obviously has more speed on it. There’s more of a separation on my changeup. I feel like command-wise it has been a little bit better, too.”

Lowe missed the first 35 games of the season with a right oblique strain. Team doctors told him that any injury to the oblique can come with some residual soreness and tightness.

“I didn’t even swing today,” Lowe said. “It’s really just kind of one of the things that we’re just going to get in front of and take the 10 days or however many days it really takes. I don’t feel terrible, but the last thing I want to do is take that ‘not feeling terrible’ and make it something that takes longer.”

Setback for Springs?

Jeffrey Springs exited his rehab start Saturday with left shoulder tightness. The left-hander is working his way back from 2023 hybrid Tommy John surgery and was pitching for the Rays’ Florida Complex League team.

He gave up a single in the first inning, there was an injury delay, then he left the game. Springs returned to Tropicana Field on Saturday night to be seen by team trainers.

Springs is one of the pitchers the Rays are hoping will give their rotation a boost this summer. He had allowed one earned run over 16 innings in three starts last season when he went down with a ligament tear in his elbow.

In search of a fix

Fifty games into this season, Randy Arozarena knows he is struggling.

It is hard to miss the big scoreboard saying that entering Saturday, he was hitting .159 with a .317 slugging percentage and .567 OPS, all career lows. He knows that the Rays’ lineup is built around his power and Yandy Diaz’s consistency, and that lineup is struggling, too.

Arozarena is trying to figure out how to fix it.

“I’ve been doing the same work I think since I came up in the big leagues, and also everything I did through the 2020 playoffs,” Arozarena said via Rays interpreter Manny Navarro on Saturday morning after doing early hitting work in the cage. “I tried to continue that and tried to stay consistent with it and I haven’t really changed much.”

Manager Kevin Cash is trying to fix it, too.

Friday night he dropped Arozarena in the lineup, hitting him sixth for the first time this season. Saturday, against the Royals’ heavy sinkerball pitcher Brady Singer, Arozarena and Diaz were not in the starting lineup. Diaz pinch hit and entered in the seventh inning of the Rays’ 7-4, 11-inning loss. Arozarena worked an 11th-inning, pinch-hit walk.

Arozarena understood the move and respected Cash’s decision.

“I think I get more work done when I am in there,” Arozarena said. “I know I do, but like I said (about hitting sixth), I think it’s the organization’s decision to make.”

And it is not a decision that Cash made easily.

“It’s tough,” Cash said. “... You always have to put the team ahead of everything, but you have to think about what’s better for the players. To let them have a breather? Is dropping them down where there’s not as much pressure on the bats, per se? I don’t know if I have the best answer, but we’re just going to continue to care a lot and continue to communicate.”

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