{"id":668977,"date":"2026-04-07T19:32:27","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T19:32:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/668977\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T19:32:27","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T19:32:27","slug":"drew-rasmussen-scratched-from-rays-start-for-heartwarming-reason","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/668977\/","title":{"rendered":"Drew Rasmussen scratched from Rays start for heartwarming reason"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Tampa Bay Rays<\/a> are playing their first home series back at Tropicana Field this season, and they began with a 6-4 win over the Chicago Cubs<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But, for Game 2 against the Cubs, Drew Rasmussen, their top pitcher this season, was scheduled for his third start of the year. But he was scratched.<\/p>\n

The reason, according to Marc Topkin of The Tampa Bay Times<\/a>, is a heartwarming one. Rasmussen’s wife is delivering their baby early.<\/p>\n

Rays’ Rasmussen misses start for heartwarming reason<\/p>\n

“Rays Rasmussen scratched from start as his wife is delivering their baby early,” Topkin reports. “Englert will open in likely a bullpen day.”<\/p>\n

The Rays righty is not pitching today against the Cubs, as he’s headed to be with his wife, who is delivering their baby today.<\/p>\n

While pitchers can be late scratches for many different reasons, this is certainly the most heartwarming reason possible.<\/p>\n

More:\u00a0How Blue Jays’ Kazuma Okamoto is connected to Rockies’ Tomoyuki Sugano<\/a><\/p>\n

After posting a 1.80 ERA in his first two starts this season with 10 strikeouts and a 0.70 WHIP, Rasmussen was scheduled to face a struggling Cubs lineup.<\/p>\n

Instead, he’s no longer in the fold to be with his wife during a big moment in their lives. Mason Englert, the 26-year-old righty reliever, will be opening the game for the Rays.<\/p>\n

Englert has a 12.00 ERA in three outings this season with only two strikeouts and a 1.67 WHIP. He will open the game, and Tampa Bay will go through a few relievers to get through the nine-inning matchup against the Cubs.<\/p>\n

More MLB news:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Tampa Bay Rays are playing their first home series back at Tropicana Field this season, and they…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":149510,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2377],"tags":[5,4,297,2550,68,2551,2549],"class_list":{"0":"post-668977","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tampa-bay-rays","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mlb","10":"tag-rays","11":"tag-tampa-bay","12":"tag-tampa-bay-rays","13":"tag-tampabay","14":"tag-tampabayrays"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116365095387125232","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668977\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/149510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}