Tampa Bay Rays hold off late Boston Red Sox comeback, pick up 5-4 win

BOSTON -- Alex Cobb opened with six one-hit innings, Evan Longoria hit a two-run homer and the Tampa Bay Rays beat the Boston Red Sox 5-4 on Friday night at Fenway Park.

Boston native Cobb (3-3) allowed four runs total (three earned) on four hits, three walks and five strikeouts in 6 1/3 innings. Alex Colome converted a four-out save, his ninth of the season.

Tim Beckham also drove in two runs for Tampa Bay (18-20), which had lost six of nine games coming in.

Reigning American League Cy Young Award winner Rick Porcello (2-5) allowed five runs (three earned) on nine hits and punched out seven in six innings for Boston (18-17).

Sandy Leon had a pair of RBIs for the Red Sox and Xander Bogaerts extended his hitting streak to 15 games with a first-inning single to left field.

Boston scored four runs in a chaotic seventh that saw Tampa Bay commit three errors.

Chris Young scored from second base on Josh Rutledge's soft grounder down the third base line, which Cobb threw past first baseman Logan Morrison.

Leon followed with a two-run, ground-rule double that chased Cobb. He later scored when Jackie Bradley Jr. reached as Rays second baseman Brad Miller mishandled his grounder.

Miller chased the ball into center and fired it wildly back into the infield, accounting for his second error on the play and allowing Bradley to reach second.

Bogaerts led off the Boston eighth with a double and Andrew Benintendi walked to bring up Young, who moved Bogaerts to third with a sacrifice fly to right.

Danny Farquhar entered and struck out Mitch Moreland before Colome induced a 5-3, inning-ending groundout by Rutledge.

Tampa Bay struck for five runs in the middle innings.

Beckham hit a two-out, two-run double in the fourth. Corey Dickerson added an RBI double in the fifth before Longoria's 406-foot blast over the Green Monster in left made it 5-0.

NOTES: Boston DH Hanley Ramirez (right trapezius strain) did not play after leaving Wednesday's game in Milwaukee with the injury and missing Thursday's series finale. "(Optimistic) that he'll be back in the lineup (Saturday)," Red Sox manager John Farrell said. ... Tampa Bay RF Steven Souza Jr. (bruised right thumb) was feeling better and hoped to return Saturday or Sunday. "I (expected) him to be in there tonight if a situation presents itself," Rays manager Kevin Cash said. ... Red Sox INF Marco Hernandez (left shoulder subluxation) may be headed for season-ending surgery, per Farrell. ... Rays LHP Blake Snell (0-3, 3.96 ERA) opposes Red Sox LHP Chris Sale (3-2, 1.92 ERA) on Saturday. The game was moved up six hours to 1:05 p.m. ET due to anticipated sustained periods of rain. "We'd like to avoid a doubleheader ... so I'm glad that they did that," Cash said.