Josh Lowe homered twice and drove in four runs, Ryan Pepiot pitched five innings of scoreless ball and the visiting Tampa Bay Rays beat the Washington Nationals 4-1 on Saturday.
It was Lowe’s third career multi-homer game and his first of the season.
Pepiot (10-10) allowed one hit and three walks while striking out six. Bryan Baker pitched a 1-2-3 ninth for his first save with Tampa Bay and third of the season.
James Wood had an RBI single and a walk for the Nationals, who have lost seven in a row.
Jake Irvin (8-10) was solid after a rocky first inning. He allowed four runs on five hits while walking one and striking out three.
The Rays jumped on Irvin in the first. After Chandler Simpson was erased on a double play, Brandon Lowe singled, Junior Caminero walked to cap a nine-pitch at-bat and Josh Lowe homered to center on a 1-1 pitch to make it 3-0.
Irvin’s opening-frame struggles continued, as he now has a 9.96 ERA in first innings this season.
With one out in the fourth, Lowe homered to right-center to make it 4-0.
The Nationals put a runner on base in each of the first four innings against Pepiot but could not get any of them past second.
Wood walked leading off the sixth and went to second when CJ Abrams grounded out, but Mason Englert retired the next two batters.
In the eighth, Luis Garcia, Jr. led off with a double against Englert and Robert Hassell III singled him to third. Wood lined a single to center, scoring Garcia, sending Hassell to third and chasing Englert. Griffin Jax came on and struck out Abrams and Paul DeJong. Josh Bell walked to load the bases, but third baseman Caminero made a bare-hand play on Riley Adams’ slow roller to end the inning.
