The Rays have a better road than home record. Tampa Bay has scored 312 road runs this season, compared to 218 at home.
Longoria finished with four RBIs, including a two-run homer in the first. He joined Hall of Famer Eddie Mathews as the only major league third basemen to have 20 or more homers in each of their first four seasons.
“We’re on a nice little roll right now and it’s because of him,’’ Hellickson said. “If he keeps doing that, we’re going to win a lot of games.’’
Hellickson (11-8) was coming off the shortest start of his 32-game career, a 9-2 loss last Saturday to the New York Yankees in which the rookie gave up four runs and eight hits in 4 1-3 innings.
Joel Peralta pitched the ninth and completed a seven-hitter for the Rays, who have won nine of 11 and improved to a season-high 12-games over .500 (68-56).
Tampa Bay moved within 7 ½ games of the AL wild card-leading Boston. The Rays are eight in back of the first-place New York Yankees in the AL East.
“Keep sneaking up from behind and see what happens,’’ Maddon said.
Seattle has lost four in a row. The Mariners, who entered hitting a major league-low .231, didn’t advance a runner past second base until one-out in the eighth.
After Johnny Damon tripled, Longoria put the Rays ahead 2-0 on a two-run shot off Charlie Furbush (3-5) during the first. Longoria has 59 RBIs over his last 60 games.
Damon and Sean Rodriguez each had run-scoring singles, and Casey Kotchman hit a sacrifice fly in the third to put Tampa Bay ahead 5-0.
Furbush gave up five runs and eight hits in three innings. The left-hander has allowed 12 runs over seven innings in his last two road starts.
“His secondary stuff was up a little bit,’’ Seattle manager Eric Wedge said. “They did a good job against him, too. They kind of took what he gave them. They didn’t try to do too much with it. They were wearing him out back up the middle.’’
