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As Dog Days Approach, Road Success Imperative

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By MARC LANCASTER | The Tampa Tribune

Published: July 27, 2008

Updated: 07/27/2008 12:13 am

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - It was Cliff Floyd who first sounded the alarm during the week before the All-Star break.

He wasn't all that concerned that the Rays had just dropped two games to the Yankees. The bigger picture had his attention.

"On the road, we have to figure it out," the veteran slugger said July 9.

The Rays had just slipped below .500 away from home at that point and would continue to spiral as they suffered a four-game sweep at Cleveland. Since then, the problem of how to translate the Rays' dazzling success at Tropicana Field to another ballpark has been on the front burner.

Hands have been wrung and theories have been offered to explain the disparity, with one in particular seemingly the most popular. Scott Kazmir explains:

"You always feel comfortable at home. You've got your routine at home. You've got every piece of equipment that you want, and you just kind of have your routine at it and other places you kind of don't. That's why it makes it a little more comfortable at home."

Rays pitchers had allowed a whopping two fewer earned runs per game at home than on the road (2.93 to 4.93) entering Friday, and their batters were hitting .267 at home and just .249 away from it - though they had three more homers on the road in 11 fewer games.

Tampa Bay's top three starters have been particularly uncomfortable outside the climate-controlled environs of the Trop, with Kazmir's ERA jumping from 1.68 at home to 4.10 on the road and James Shields (2.16 to 6.26) and Matt Garza (2.10 to 6.04) sporting even more pronounced splits.

"I think our starting pitching is more comfortable here than it has been on the road to this point," Manager Joe Maddon said. "I keep bringing it up because I want them to dwell on it just a little bit, because we are driven by our starting pitching. As we pitch better on the road, I think we're going to win games on the road."

The statistical gaps are rather stark, but when it comes to wins and losses away from home, the Rays aren't all that different from most of their peers. Heading into the weekend, only four of the 30 major-league teams had winning records on the road - the Angels (31-18), Cardinals (27-22), Phillies (27-25) and Brewers (28-26).

Beyond the Angels, who probably would be playing .600 ball on the moon if given an opportunity, every other division leader had a losing record away from home through Thursday's games, and four of them were at least five games under .500.

Maddon has said he believes having an experienced team is the most important factor to winning away from home, but even the most seasoned and battle-tested group out there, the Red Sox, can't do it this year. Boston is 24-32 away from Fenway Park.

"That's mind-boggling," Floyd said. "But that goes to show you how crazy this game is sometimes."

Though losing away from home is the rule rather than the exception, the Rays will have to find a way to at least improve their ratio as they head for the dog days of August. Beginning with this weekend's series at Kauffman Stadium, 37 of the Rays' final 62 regular-season contests are on the road, where that remarkable .714 winning percentage at the Trop won't do them any good.

"You have to win on the road," Floyd said. "If you don't win on the road and you do make the playoffs, you're going to be out of it early. That's pretty simple."

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