As those of you who have followed my site for awhile know, I've been out of work for some 15 months. This past week, I started up working again. Not full time, but a part time gig. Thing is, the first two weeks of the gig are going to be way busier than any other time, so I haven't had much time for Rangers stuff.

This will probably extend into next week, so I'm taking a short sabbatical from doing updates while I deal with work stuff.

I will be back, I want to be around for the tail end of the season. :)

A lot has been written both locally (pro and blog) and nationally about how the Rangers are "running away" with the AL West. That we have the widest margin of any of the division leaders, and that we're a "slam dunk" to make the playoffs. While all of that may be true, I decided to examine our record and see where it would put us.

I remember some years ago when the Padres make the playoffs (1998), there was talk that they were the "best of a bunch of bad teams", and that they only make the playoffs because someone from that division had to. There always seems to be some team somewhere that kind of does that - "backs into" the playoffs is what it's generally called.

Now, do I feel that's the way the Rangers are in 2010? No, we're not a bad team. No, we won't "back" into the playoffs. The way the team has played this year, we deserve to be there. But still, having said all that, I'd like to see where our current record would place us in the other divisions. A lot also has been made about how the other teams besides the Yankees & the Red Sox (and the Rays in more recent vintage) in the AL East would fare better if they were in another division. So here goes:

AL West: We're in first place, 9.5 games up on second place Oakland. Our record is 73-55, 18 games over .500 - our winning percentage is .570

AL Central: Our record in that division would put us in second place behind the Twins, only a half game behind them. We'd be three games up on third place Chicago. A pretty decent shot at winning that division, I'd say while it wouldn't be as easy, we could win that division.

AL East: We'd be in FOURTH place here. Right now the Yankees & Rays are tied at 78-50 (.609), and then Boston is in third at 74-55 (.574). We wouldn't be far behind Boston (one game), and the division leaders (5GB), but we would have to hop three other teams to get there. I'd say this would be the hardest shot to make the playoffs, despite being only 5 games out.

NL West: Our record here would put us in second place, about 3.5 games back of division leader San Diego, and 2.5 games in front of third place San Francisco. Again, we'd be right in the thick of things, and would probably have a good shot at winning this division.

NL Central: Again, second place. This time just one game back of division leader Cincinnati, and 3 games in front of second place St. Louis. A very winnable division if we were in it.

NL East: This time, our record would tie us with Atlanta for the division lead, and two games up on what would be third place Philadelphia. Of the three NL divisions, I'd say this would be the hardest fight, but we probably could win this as well.

So basically, outside of our own division, we could easily win three of them, have a good fight with one of them, and in my opinion, be out of the playoffs in one other.

I realize this is a nebulous thing, if you moved us out of the division, we'd play different teams, different stadiums, things would be different. Yeah, I know that. Just playing a "pick up and put into another scenario - how would be be doing" fantasy. I know that. Still, it's nice to know where we stand amongst everyone else.

I've given Tom Hicks some grief many a time for letting Bud Selig off the hook on moving the Rangers to the AL Central, where we'd more fit in with our division mates and the time zone. It stinks having so many games start at 9PM. However, had Bud not taken the guaranteed home and away series with the Astros every year, and actually moved us to the AL Central, we wouldn't be in the driver's seat we are in now. However, we might have won a few more divisions along the way and have been to the playoffs sometime in the last decade.

Still, this year is feeling like no other I've covered on this site since the first one I ever covered (1999). 2004 came close, but we fell down at the end. This doesn't feel like that year at all. How far we get in the playoffs is an unknown, but at this point, I'm ready to say that we WILL get there, and I expect it will not be a first round sweep and out again. Overall, I think the team is too good for that.

I've been watching this show since I was a kid ("How about that?"), but this weekend's episode should be of interest to anyone reading this site.

The subject is the 2010 Texas Rangers. :)

MLB has some press about the episode here.

Usually towards the end of the year, we always hear about how many players the Texas Rangers have used overall in any particular season. The Rangers are usually towards the high end of that list. Injuries, callups, usually make for a long list, and you tend to forget the guys who are here so quick that they don't even have time for the proverbial "cup of coffee".

I've done this for the last two seasons, and it's worked out pretty well. I've also gotten some positive feedback on it, so I'm doing it again in 2010. For the record, if you'd like to see the final tallies for the last two years, you can still see them here: [ 2008 | 2009 ]

Anyway, this post will get bumped whenever there is a player who is making his first appearance for the Texas Rangers in 2010. I am going to count guys who get called up, but don't play immediately (or sometimes don't play at all), as they will be part of the 25 man roster officially. So here goes. The most recent additions will be on the top of the list. The original opening day 25 man roster is not in any particular order.

In 2010, the Rangers have nobody in the original opening day 25 that is making his major league debut. We had one in 2009 (Elvis Andrus) and one in 2008 (Kaz Fukumori). We do have, however five guys making their Ranger debuts in 2010: Blanco, Garko, Guerrero, Harden, & Ray.

Total players in 2010: 44
Total pitchers used in 2010: 19
Total position players used in 2010: 25
Total players making major league debut: 5

#44 - Alex Cora (Aug 24)
#43 - Michael Kirkman (Aug 20 - Major League Debut)
#42 - Brandon Boggs (Aug 15)
#41 - Cristian Guzman (Jul 31)
#40 - Jorge Cantu (Jul 30)
#39 - Mitch Moreland (Jul 29 - Major League Debut)
#38 - Cliff Lee (Jul 10)
#37 - Bengie Molina (Jul 2 - acquired on 1st, not active till 2nd)
#36 - Omar Beltre (Jun 30 - Major League Debut)
#35 - Alexi Ogando (Jun 12 - Major League Debut)
#34 - Tommy Hunter (Jun 5)
#33 - Pedro Strop (May 15 - Sent back down May 16, did not appear, came back later)
#32 - Guillermo Moscoso (May 15)
#31 - Derek Holland (May 12)
#30 - Ian Kinsler (Apr 30)
#29 - Max Ramirez (Apr 27)
#28 - Craig Gentry (Apr 27)
#27 - Justin Smoak (Apr 23 - Major League Debut)
#26 - Matt Treanor (Apr 8)

#25 to #1: Scott Feldman, Neftali Feliz, Frankie Francisco, Rich Harden, Matt Harrison, Colby Lewis, Doug Mathis, Dustin Nippert, Darren O'Day, Darren Oliver, Chris Ray, C.J. Wilson, Jarrod Saltalamacchia, Taylor Teagarden, Elvis Andrus, Joaquin Arias, Andres Blanco, Chris Davis, Ryan Garko, Michael Young, Julio Borbon, Nelson Cruz, Vladimir Guerrero, Josh Hamilton, David Murphy.

Please note that 1 to 25 are in no particular order.

Got a bit behind this week, taking a mulligan on this game.

Got a bit behind this week, taking a mulligan on this game.

Rich Harden came off the DL for this game, and by most accounts, was pitching for his job. The talk was that if he had a bad outing, he'd be banished forever. He seriously answered the bell. In probably his best outing as a Ranger. He went 6.2 innings, picking allowing no runs, yet walking five. He left the game in the seventh with a no hitter, actually. He came out with 111 pitches. Early on, he went to a three ball count on most everyone. That's why he lost his chance to go deeper. Shame, as he was pitching well enough to carry on, but as he just came off the DL, he needed to be protected for later on in the season, which ultimately is more important.

Matt Harrison finished the inning, then Darren O'Day had his own no hitter of an inning. Then Neftali Feliz came in, and gave up the one hit, a single by Joe Mauer to break it up. Shame that didn't happen, yes. But I'm more glad we got a win, and a convincing one against a real playoff team after the weak showing recently in that department.

The Rangers had a spread out offense. Of the starters, only one had no hits (that being Treanor). Everyone else had at least one, and it was enough, given the stellar pitching of the Rangers staff.

Great win.

Tommy Hunter took the mound on Sunday afternoon in the series finale and tried to shake a couple of rough outings, one including a vomiting session. He did pull it off. Had a great outing. Eight innings, five hits, three earned runs on one home run. Quite a good outing, indeed.

The other side of things were pretty much summed up quickly with this:

Josh Hamilton's three run home run in the first off of Kevin Millwood gave us the lead we never gave up. Then a second three run home run by Vlad Guerrero in the fifth - again off of Millwood.

That was the extent of the scoring for the Rangers, but it was enough. Thanks to Hunter, who seems to have bounced back nicely.

Fell a bit behind this week, not going to write huge amounts of games this week.

I will say this. Cliff Lee had by far his worst outing as a Ranger. Just 5.2 innings, 10 hits, all eight runs were earned by him. Four home runs. It was a mess.

The best on the Rangers site was Josh Hamilton (what a shock), who went 3-5 with two runs scored, and three RBI's. Michael Young also had three hits, but beyond that, not a ton of other stuff.

Blah.

Hey, if you're on Facebook, and like baseball art, you should check out this page I ran into not too long ago. It's by a fellow named "Kyle Banister", and he does some great baseball art. Noticed about a week ago he had posted a nice picture of Josh Hamilton, and I had asked his permission to post it, and he was cool with it. You can see it here. He simply calls it "Hamilton", and it was hand drawn in colored pencil and black marker. It's quite nice, and I thought I should let others know about this guy.

While he doesn't have a website yet, all of his art and whatnot is up on the fan page for him on Facebook. So if you're on Facebook (who isn't these days), go check out the Kyle Banister - Baseball Art page, and "like" it. He's got a lot of good stuff there. I also particularly like his pencil drawing of Ubaldo Jimenez.

Here's a blurb Kyle has written about himself:

Before admitting he was an artist, Kyle owned and operated a successful sign and lettering company. For nearly 20 years Kyle used his talents to help others communicate and realize their dreams. In 2002 he gave up the sign business to pursue his own dream, to become the artist he was born to be.

While producing signage for others, Kyle learned and mastered a variety of mediums. And he uses all of these in his art today, often mixing them to achieve what he sees as the best look for a particular piece of art. That is why you may see an array of styles in one of Kyle's shows. He is just as comfortable painting with 1-Shot Lettering enamel on Plexiglas as he is digitally coloring an original pointillism drawing. Some have criticized Kyle's work saying that the use of so many mediums will slow his march to success. But Kyle is OK with that as long as he can stay true to himself, and his art.

Kyle's favorite subjects are History, Baseball and Women, not necessarily in any order. He loves to travel doing research for the many projects he has planned. His strongest asset is inexhaustible creativity, he never is at a loss for a new art project. Kyle says, "It's as if God leaves notes on my forehead after a nights rest."

Kyle's art is quite a journey. So come along and enjoy the ride.

On my 45th birthday, the Rangers gave me a quite nice baseball present. They broke their four game losing streak with a dominating performance by CJ Wilson.

I tend to use the phrase "dominating" on this website perhaps a little more than I realistically should, but man - it certainly applied tonight. CJ was masterful (uh-oh, another overused adjective) in this one, and was EXACTLY what we needed this night. Nolan Ryan himself in his prime couldn't have done any better in stopping the skid. CJ went 8.2 innings, allowing just THREE hits and a walk, and struck out a dozen Orioles. At one point, he got 16 Orioles in a row out. I mean, WOW! 118 pitches when he came out of the game, he still had a realistic number of pitches left. I confess at the time wishing Washington would leave him in there, but you can't argue with the result. Rangers win, Feliz got his first save of the month, and his 30th overall.

Thing is, the Orioles pitcher (Jake Arrieta) probably pitched well enough to win the game himself. He didn't have quite the line as CJ, but you can't argue with what he did as a good performance. 6.2 IP, 8 hits, three walks, two runs (one earned). Quality start for sure, and on any normal night, he probably would have won. But not against Wilson on this night - that's for sure. The Orioles pen was good though - four guys combined for 2.1 innings of shutout ball. We couldn't pad the lead at all against those guys, but we didn't really need it.

Interesting bit late. Buck Showatler got tossed out of the game not long after Nick Markakis did (first time EVER for Nick). Showalter had a lot to say when he was out there. He did turn all kinds of red, which my wife even noticed. Now I point that out, because my wife needs glasses, and if she's not wearing them, what she sees on the TV is a huge blur to her. She was laying on the sofa at the time (as the kids were both down now, and she was resting). She said "Wow - even without my glasses, Buck Showalter looks rather beet red". He did seem to blow a few blood vessels. Not quite Earl Weaver levels of Orioles manager ejections, but it was a good show for sure.

Nice that we broke the streak, and as I write this on Friday night, the Angels have already lost, and the A's are currently losing. Assuming that holds up, we'll end the night eight games up on both of them. That's quite amazing, considering how lackadaisical we've played over the last week or so. Not to have lost any significant ground during this time. Wow.

I wasn't sure if I was right about the shutout statement in Game 119, but it didn't matter. The Rangers were shut out in Game 120, 4-0 in Baltimore. If you count that horrible series right before the All-Star break, we've now lost five straight games to Baltimore. I really hope Baltimore doesn't become our new Kansas City - a place where we should dominate totally, but can't win worth a damn.

While he wasn't there for the four game sweep back in July, Buck Showalter has certainly put a charge into Baltimore. I've always kind of liked Baltimore (except back in 83 when they beat my Phillies). Baltimore has had such a rough time over the last 13 years, only being beat out in futility by the Pittsburgh Pirates. Buck Showalter is probably the kind of manager they need there (the Pirates could use Bobby V, too I'd take it). But when Buck got the job, I thought it would be a good long term match, provided management doesn't get tired of waiting for a honest to god turnaround.

But one thing I loved seeing from the Showalter press conference in Baltimore was the talk about Johnny Oates. My long time readers know I have a soft spot for Johnny Oates, and that Showalter continues to pay reverence to him is great. Buck apparently asked for and got Johnny Oates' old uniform number of 26 to wear in Baltimore. From what I read, he consulted with several people, not the least of which was Johnny's family to make sure they'd be OK with it. That showed some class. I still remember the winter that Buck took over in Texas him coming straight over to me and asking me about the red Rangers hat I was wearing. I'll never forget that. The man has a reputation of being a heavy duty, almost too far level of detail to him, and the fact he'd talk to a fan (me) about cap colors with the Rangers, or talk to Johnny Oates' widow about wearing his old uniform number just makes me like him more. Don't get me wrong, I like Ron Washington, and enjoy him now, but I wish Buck Showalter had won it big here in Texas, I thought he deserved it. I hope he can have better success in Baltimore - but not until the Rangers win the World Series.

Anyway, I didn't mean to write a ton about Buck Showalter here, but truth be told, there's little else to say about this game. The story of the game is the Orioles' starter Brian Matusz (the Z is silent - Mah-toos). He went eight innings, allowing no runs on five hits and a walk. Struck out six. Koji Uehara followed with a little rocky (two hits) inning, but he too put up the all important donut in the runs column.

That was about it. Vlad Guerrero seems to be coming around again - went 2-3 with a walk for a team that got just seven hits overall. We need his power back - especially now with Cruz down, and Kinsler still out.

Tip of the hat to Brian Matusz. He looked awesome. Hard to beat that kind of pitching, no matter what your offense is doing.

Shit.

The less said about this mess, the better.

But at least Murphy saved us from being shut out. If I'm not mistaken, the Rangers are the only team that hasn't been shut out in 2010.

Cliff Lee may have had his worst outing as a Ranger. You couldn't tell it early on, as Lee piled up zeroes on the runs column for the first four innings. He then let the Rays on the board with a two spot in the bottom of the fifth, when a Willy Aybar single scored two. OK, not too bad. Two runs, we can live with that.

We actually made a game of it, and it looked good late. The Rangers offense was shut down by Chad Price, who went six plus innings. The first six, the Rangers had no runs at all. Then Price weakened, and we put up two in the seventh. The first scored during a double play the Rangers had hit into, and hten the other on a single. So no big power here, just a lot of small ball. But OK, game's tied 2-2, and Cliff Lee's on the mound. That's good.

Even better in the eighth, when we duplicated the seventh by scoring a run in the middle of a double play, and then singling in the other guy. Now we're up 4-2 going into the bottom of the eighth with Cliff Lee on the mound. Feeling good.

Nope, that was not the feeling I should have had given the outcome. The wheels fell off in the eighth, when Lee gave up a four spot to the Rays. None of those were power RBI's either, as one was a fielder's choice, and the other runs came on two singles.

Not Cliff Lee's night, and you couldn't blame the Texas heat for that one. He fell apart late. It's OK, I suppose, it's not like he's going to go 34-0 in a season, he'll lose some here and there. Better now than October I suppose. :)

After the series with the Yankees & Red Sox, I think a lot of pundits and national press expected the Rangers to fall back, as well, we were playing "real teams". Well, against the Yankees and Red Sox, we went 3-2 combined, and in the standings? We didn't lose anything at all. Going into Monday night's game against the Rays, the AL West standings:

Rangers: 67-49, .578
Angels: 60-59, .504 - 8.5GB
A's: 57-59, .491 - 10GB
Mariners: 46-72, .390 - Who cares?

It's a good feeling to be that far out in front on August 16th. I'm not saying anything is over, but man is it a good feeling.

As for Sunday, the inferno game... CJ Wilson took the mound, and it seemed apparent that the heat didn't mean anything to him. He looked quite good, and didn't have the tentative feel he sometimes gets if his pitch count gets too high. His line was 7.2IP, 4H, 1BB, 1ER, and EIGHT strikeouts. Looked pretty darned good. He came out with 113 pitches thrown, which in that heat probably felt like 213, but when he came out, I didn't think he looked that beat down, so I'll give that two thumbs up.

Pedro Strop, who was just called up from the minors followed, and allowed all the runs the Sox got. He let one of CJ's inherited runners to score, and then gave up two of his own. Blah. That killed the shutout. Neftali Feliz closed it out with a shutdown inning to close it out for the win. Shame we gave up anything at all, as CJ deserved the win with the backup of keeping the shutout going.

But hey, we got the win, beat Boston, who had a really odd lineup out there - most of their regulars were on the DL or sitting.

On to Tampa to take on the Wild Card leaders. Monday night is Cliff Lee against David Price. Man, that ought to be good. Playoff preview, perhaps? :)

The day after we won against Boston in a mashing fun way, we were shut down by their starter Jon Lester. Lester was brilliant, scattering just five hits over eight innings of shutout ball. He didn't walk anyone, and struck out five. Not a lot on the strikeout side of things, but man, he looked good. Not a surprise that the only run we got came off of Boston reliever Scott Atchison.

That one run was a home run to Josh Hamilton, who probably could even hit Bugs Bunny at the moment. Hamilton was our best offensive player of the night, not just because he accounted for the only run, but his overall line was the best of anyone on the Rangers roster this night. Josh was 2-4 with a run and an RBI. Granted, he drove himself in, but still. Nelson Cruz also had two hits, but they didn't amount to anything, and the entire rest of the lineup managed just three hits.

Nelson Cruz's triple off of Lester was bad, as he came out of the game, and had to go on the DL two days later (I'm writing this two days later - ha) due to his running out the triple. It's a shame he's been hurt so much, as you'd think he'd have just as good a year as Josh is having if he could stay on the field. Sad.

On our side, Colby Lewis was a hard luck pitcher again, going six plus innings, and allowing just one run. His line wasn't as dominating as Lester's, but he certainly pitched well enough for a win. 6.2IP, 6H, 1ER, 2BB, and NINE strikeouts - that's been Colby's strength, the strikeout.

Shame he didn't get the win, as he deserved it.

I was at this game, and it was one of the hotter games I can recall. I also wasn't sure I was going to get there in time. I left Garland at 4PM, and was planning on going to dinner beforehand. Yeah, I know they lowered the prices on food and drinks and whatnot. That's all good, but it's not like I'm going to suddenly get a meal that is filling at the Ballpark for like $5 or something now. It's still way cheaper to eat ahead of time. I had a very slow restaurant, and I didn't get to leave Garland until about 5:10 - and from where I was, my GPS took me a different way than normal (down 360), and fortunately 360 south wasn't jammed, like it almost always is. I was stunned. Had to park way out by I30 almost, and eventually got to my seat with about 15 minutes to spare. That's cutting it way too close for my tastes. I like to be in my seat an hour before the game starts. And yeah, it was brutally hot. I had brought three bottles of Gatorade with me, and brought one to the park, figure I'd save the others for the ride back home, as I'd be hot when I got to the car. The one I bought with me was gone by the time I got to my seat. I was in Section 342, Row 23 - the last row. I couldn't see the scoreboard from where I was, but to be honest, I didn't much care. One advantage of sitting in the absolute last row is that you get a breeze up there. No matter what it's like in the park, you almost always get a nice breeze. So once you get up there, it's not all that bad. It's not like it's 70 degrees out, mind you - but the breeze does help.

So the game gets started and Tommy Hunter takes the mound. Was hoping for a good outing from him, and in the beginning, I thought we were gonna get that. The Rangers were up 2-0 early on a couple of RBI singles in the first two innings by Cruz & Andrus. The Sox got a run back in the top of the third on a solo home run, and then it fell apart in the next inning.

The top of the fourth was quite ugly. There were two parts to that. Tommy Hunter gave up three home runs in a row. One to David Ortiz, one to Adrian Beltre, and one to JD Drew. It got worse when Andres Blanco booted a ball that would have ended the inning on a double play ball. But he botched it, and four more runs scored because of that. Sigh. The Sox had a seven spot in the top of the fourth, putting them up 8-2 at the time. It was fairly disheartening.

It was at least comforting knowing that Tommy Hunter apparently was behind the dugout throwing up before he came out in the top of the fourth to pitch. The stomach virus he was having wasn't helped by the heat, and just pitching wasn't good, so it explains his performance. Still, we weren't helped by the Blanco error, and were down six.

The climb back started almost immediately when Mitch Moreland hit his first ever major league home run - a two run shot into the right field stands. That felt good, but we were still down four. Felt better about it after the fifth when Michael Young & Josh Hamilton went back to back with solo home runs.

Yes. There were a lot of home runs this game. But that wasn't all of it. Not by far. David Murphy made a great leaping catch against the left field wall early in the game to end an inning. Then Josh Hamilton made a great diving play where he slid for a bit after he caught the ball and dove. Those were awesome. But the best catch of the game was Hamilton up against the center field wall. It's up there with the Gary Matthews Jr catch as one of the best defensive plays of all time. I'll give Matthews' catch just a tad more than the Hamilton catch - mostly because the Matthews catch brought a home run back. If Hamilton had missed that, the trajectory of the ball seemed to indicate it wouldn't have gone out. Don't get me wrong, it was the catch of the year - by far. But it didn't rob a home run. If you look at the video highlights to this game, you'll see the Hamilton one titled "Hamilton makes a dazzling catch in the sixth". It was awesome, go check it out at the "Game Recap at mlb.com" at the top of this review.

Anyway, the Sox got another run back in the top of the seventh when JD Drew homered again. That felt kind of deflating, actually. While it turned out it was just one one, I ALMOST walked out the door then. I thought about the heat, the drive home with a sold out stadium, and I almost left. But I didn't. Figured I don't go to too many games anymore (about 6 at max), so I stayed. Good thing I did, as the Sox were done scoring at that point.

The Rangers picked up a couple in the seventh on a sac fly and a double. But the real fun came in the bottom of the eighth when Josh Hamilton was on second base. Vlad Guerrero (who has been quite cold lately) singled on a ground ball to the second baseman. Oddly enough Vlad managed to beat it out - although replays at home showed the throw pulled the first baseman off the bag. What was really cool was that Hamilton never stopped running, and managed to score from second base on a ball that didn't leave the infield, and didn't involve a throwing error (well, not one where the ball gets thrown away anyway). That was most impressive, and tied the game at 9-9.

The ninth and the tenth were innings where we had shots, but couldn't get it done. Don't like extra inning games where we leave men on. Always feel like it's going to bite you. But this time it didn't. We get to the bottom of the 11th, and at this point, Boston has run through all their relievers. The only one they had left was Tim Wakefield. Even before they announced him, I thought, "wouldn't it be cool if we led off the bottom of the inning with a home run on the first pitch?" I know it happens, just not often. Then it was announced that Wakefield was coming in, and we've destroyed him this season. I figured we'd win the game off of him. I didn't think we'd win it quite THAT FAST. First pitch to Nelson Cruz, and it's bombed out of here over the left field wall. We won the game in walkoff fashion. Man was THAT cool.

I had been texting a friend of mine who was a huge Red Sox fan, so I taunted him some more now that the game was actually over. Another thing that was interesting was that I was during the game chatting with a friend of mine in Section 328 as well as a guy from the press box, and some other people not there. Was an amusing way to keep in touch during the game. Gotta love tech, eh? I'm by myself halfway across the stadium, and was still talking to a friend (Hi Rose!)

So I began the long walk back to my car, which was helped by the fact that this was a fireworks game, so the drive out wasn't so obnoxious - I don't stay anymore if I'm by myself. My Gatorade was there, but even inside the cooler bag, it had gotten hot. I didn't care. Downed two 20oz Gatorades in the span of about a minute and a half.

Man it was hot. But the game made it worthwhile.

Wow. It just seems so surreal. Completely, and legally, Tom Hicks is out. The 30 major league owners voted this morning, and it was a 30-0 vote in favor of the GnR ownership group taking over.

The stories this morning talked about how Greenberg had to be excluded from the room and made to wait outside when the actual vote was going on, since he technically was not an owner. I had visions of him sitting in a hallway by himself like any number of teen angst movies you see where he's twiddling his thumbs, although in this day and age, he'd be texting someone. Or checking in via Foursquare, or anything like that.

Anyways, the vote was unanimous, and by all accounts shortly afterward the GnR group released the funds, and bam. It was over. They are the new Rangers owners. From what I can gather, there's still some issues that will come up after the season, like the lease, and the grounds around the ballpark. Plus the jet lease that Chase made some noise about at the last second last night. But that can probably be dealt with in due course.

Bring on the new scoreboards guys - I'll be there tomorrow night. It's why I bought tickets tomorrow night, figuring it would be the first game under the new regime. I have tickets in the last row of Section 342 - not the greatest, but it was the best I could get - and I bought them LAST friday. :)

Chuck Greenberg should throw out the first pitch. Let's dance, people!

As is my policy for the last few years, I don't write about losses to the Yankees.

Commissioner Bud Selig concluded the first day of the quarterly owners meetings in Minneapolis by announcing that the Texas Rangers sale was approved unanimously by the ownership committee and the executive council.

A final vote of the 30 team owners will take place Thursday morning. The investment group headed by Chuck Greenberg and Nolan Ryan must receive 75 percent of the votes for the sale to be approved. That appears to be a formality.

"I'm delighted that we got through the first two steps with unanimity," Selig said. "Tomorrow we'll have to meet and tell you how the final vote came, but I guess you can probably guess that."

Greenberg and the two heavy hitters in Rangers Baseball Express, Ray Davis and Bob Simpson, answered questions and presented the operational plan and philosophy to the ownership committee. Ryan did not attend the meetings.

Greenberg said that he welcomed the process, and it appeared to be well-received one week after his group was locked in an intense courthouse auction with Mark Cuban and Jim Crane to purchase the club.

"It beats the heck out of last Wednesday," Greenberg said. "I said to Bob Simpson and Ray Davis, 'What are we doing next Wednesday?' "

It appears as though they will be owning a major-league franchise.

This article originally appeared online here. Yeah, I know I just copied the whole thing, but really - what could I add to this? This article says it all.

Actually, when we went up 3-2, I wasn't thinking win. I was thinking old traditional Yankees, which say that unless you're up 15 runs, you probably aren't safe.

Early on in the game, it started out like a good pitching duel. C.J. Wilson against AJ Burnett. Through the first three and a half innings, it was scoreless. Was a great, well pitched game. Had some pretty amazing defense too, one of which prompted the screen grab. Derek Jeter mashed a ball straight into the ground and it went way up. When it came down, it was about halfway between the pitcher's mound and first base. At that point, there was no chance to toss it to anyone, so CJ dove for the base, and actually got there just a fraction before Jeter did. Jeter tumbled over him, and Wilson got up and gave the antlers to Jorge Cantu. At that point, all the guys in the dugout were doing the antlers to CJ, so he gave 'em back. Was pretty darned hysterical. Lucky he didn't jam his hand pulling that stunt, or worse got stepped on. But it worked out, and it was a sexy looking play, no doubt.

The Rangers managed to squeak out a run in the bottom of the fourth when Nelson Cruz doubled in Michael Young. That prompted something new at the ballpark. When the Rangers scored, two of the Rangers girls ran out on Greene's Hill with two large Texas flags and ran around on the grass. I rather liked that. It felt very "football-y", and I suspect will appeal to a lot of football fans. I just wonder what's gonna happen on home runs that land in the middle of the grass there. :)

In the top of the fifth, the Yankees tied it back up, and were really threatening to get more, and Wilson danced out of it mostly. He was especially helped out when Nick Swisher was headed home, and Murphy threw a bullet to the plate, and nailed him. It also prompted a funny look from Bengie Molina at Swisher afterward when it appeared like he was looking at Swisher, meaning "You're kidding me, right?"

The Yankees went up a run in the top of the sixth when Wilson allowed the other run of the game. Wasn't anything special, just a single scoring Austin Kearns. In the bottom of the sixth, it was the David Murphy show again when he jacked a two run home run to give the Rangers the lead at that time, 3-2.

It was followed in short order in the top of the seventh by a solo home run from Arod. He was booed. :) No surprises there.

The game was 3-3 going into the bottom of the ninth, and the Rangers almost scored. We got a man to third. Didn't get the job done. The top of the 10th was stellar with Feliz getting something like a 6 or 7 pitch inning to set down the Yankees.

We started off the bottom of the 10th against Mariano Rivera. Now I know he's not the Rivera of old, but he's still an impressive pitcher, someone to be feared for sure. Anyway, Michael Young singled, as did Josh Hamilton right after him. Josh's hit was a squibber into right. So much so that Michael could only get to second. Guerrero came up in an obvious bunt situation. Guerrero doesn't bunt. He does ground out though, and that's what he did, a grounder to Arod, who fell down. Had he not done that fielding the ball, it likely would have been a double play. As it was, Vlad was out at first, pushing the runners to second and third. It worked like a sacrifice. Nelson Cruz was intentionally walked to load the bases. Obviously to create a force at any base, or better yet (for the Yankees) a double play.

Except that it was David Murphy, one of the hottest Rangers going right now. The count went to 3-2 (after being 3-0), and you felt weird waiting for what was the final pitch. Didn't want to get out of that with no runs, as that's always a bad omen. However, Murphy delivered, a single over second base scoring the winning run, and prompting a walkoff.

Over the Yankees. YOU HAVE GOT TO LOVE THAT! Much was said about the "playoff atmosphere" at the park on the TV tonight. It did feel like that, and towards the end of the game when my wife peeked in for a little at the end, she said "This season doesn't feel like any season in recent memory".

She's right. It feels good, like it will be a history making season. We shall see what that history actually is.

This is a game that I think made a lot of people believe in Trevor Cahill. The guy's been really great this year. His overall numbers now are 12-4, ERA of 2.56, 178.2IP, 1.43 WHIP. The whip isn't that great, but you can't argue with those wins and the ERA. Those numbers were borne out in the game against the Rangers on Sunday afternoon. Yeah, another day game. We don't like those, apparently.

Cahill went eight innings, allowed six hits, no walks, and did allow two runs, but they were both unearned. He beat out Colby Lewis, who pitched well himself, just not as well as Cahill. Lewis went six, allowed one run on three hits and three walks. Punched out seven. Quality start, technically, but when compared to Cahill's line, not so much.

Darren Oliver was very un DO like this game. He got the blown save and the loss at the same time. Gave up two runs in his 0.1 innings of work. He only threw seven pitches, too, which made it much more concentrated. Given his overall body of work this year, I'll overlook that, but it certainly was NOT a good outing.

Darren O'Day cleaned it up, but we couldn't score against the A's, although we made it interesting in the ninth inning when their releiver (Michael Wuertz) walked two batters. But Guerrero grounded into a double play, ending the game.

So we lost the series in Oakland - something that hasn't happened much this season. Still, we come out of there with a very healthy sized lead over Oakland, who is in second place.

Back home to take on the Yankees.

I had hoped that Rich Harden figured it out, as he pitched like the real Rich Harden in his previous start. Looked good, looked sharp, and acted like the guy we signed in the offseason.

I hoped wrong. We got the Mark Clark version of Rich Harden on Saturday afternoon in Oakland. Which was extra annoying as his only other good start of the season was also in Oakland, he has said he loves pitching there, it's his favorite mound. Couldn't have figured that out this day. I think it's time to put him on waivers. With the team doing well down the stretch, I think the time to let him figure it out on the mound is done. Put him on waivers, or better yet, try and demote him to AAA. I'm sure he technically has waivers left, but I believe he'd earn the right to refuse the assignment and become a free agent. Good. Refuse it. Done. I don't want to see him start anymore. We need to be reasonably sure we have a chance to win when the pitcher takes the mound. We don't have that with Harden anymore. Buh-bye.

Harden: 2.1IP, 2H, FREAKIN FIVE walks, three earned runs. 65 pitches. Ugh.

Gio Gonzalez was the flip side of that. He did pretty darned well against us, and to be honest, I wasn't sure why he was taken out when he was. Gio went seven shutout innings, allowing just four hits and three walks. Punched out two, and was at a pitch count of 113. OK that's why - I didn't realize it was that high until I just looked at the box score. That makes sense. :)

We picked up a single run in the 8th and 9th each against the two Oakland relievers - the one in the 8th was a home run by suddenly streaky power hitter, Taylor Teagarden. That was the only hit we got that wasn't a single - we were shut down pretty well this game. David Murphy was the only Ranger with two hits, and Murphy has come on well lately, it'll be hard to bench him again - the way he's hitting, he deserves regular time.

The Rangers continue to play poorly in day games. Which makes me hope that the stink about the playoffs going to some day games doesn't start this year. :)

This is a complete duplicate of a post I made back on June 10th, but given the Mariners today fired their manager, bench coach, and their pitching coach, I thought it was time to revive the post...

I'm playing catch up with some backlogged game reports, I hope to catch up with the Mariners series tomorrow. Having said that, I was curious to see what ussmariner.com had to say about tonight's game. They had a rather funny image posted there about the Mariners' season:

I prefer this image I posted a couple of years back, originally.

Cliff Lee goes eight.

We got him some runs.

One of those is common this season, the other is not. As a Rangers fan, you should be able to tell which is which.

But what we did get to see from Cliff Lee is how a baseball player clears his nose between innings. That's one of those moments when you go, "Uh, do we need to be focusing on this in the dugout?" I mean he put his finger over one nostril, blew, repeated with the other side, and then wiped his nose with a towel.

However, you can excuse that when you realize that Cliff Lee has pitched 86 out of the last possible 88 innings he could pitch (if he went complete games all 10 of his last games). That's amazing. Amazing is how the Rangers have perceived Cliff Lee to be. He had a bit of a hard time in the first inning, going a staggeringly awful (for him) 20 pitches. He gave up a run, and after a hit in the seventh, pretty much became the Cliff Lee we knew about all the time he's been here. Mowed guys down, seven pitch innings. Making A's batters look foolish. In all he went eight innings, allowed seven hits, the one run. Walked nobody (again), and struck out eight. He would have gone nine, but when he came out, he had thrown 112 pitches. A little high for him, so that's OK.

Frankie came in and threw a 13 pitch one hit shutout inning to get the win in Oakland. Yeah, other than the first inning, the Rangers pitching just dominated. Mark McLemore said in the post game show that it's like watching a Cliff Lee perform surgery on the A's lineup out there tonight. Interesting metaphor.

Offensively, the Rangers tied the game in the top of the third when Elvis Andrus doubled in Taylor Teagarden. The Rangers tied the game in the next inning when Josh Hamilton really tattoed a ball out over the center field wall. It was a slow curve he hit out, so you almost had time to watch it coming. Was one of those pitches that seemed to take a full minute to get to the plate, and you had time to examine it on the way in. Before Josh even swung the bat, I thought it looked like a home run ball, and it turned out it was.

But it wasn't the coolest home run. That came in the fifth. Taylor Teagarden has just four hits this year. Two of them are home runs against the A's. Teagarden went 2-4 this game. That he doubled his total hit output for the WHOLE season in a single game is not a great thing. I mean, you go 2-4 and RAISE your average to .105. Bad. Still, it was a good game for him, and he got to catch Cliff Lee, so it was a great night for Taylor.

The Rangers also scored their final run in the eighth on a balk, which canceled what would have been a double steal of second and home again.

The Rangers are now 9.5 games up against both Anaheim & Oakland. Rich Harden goes on Saturday. Hopefully we get the Harden we got the last time we were in Oakland earlier this year. Not the Harden we got the rest of the season, save for his most recent start.

The whole thing feels good. Man. It is a good time to be a Rangers fan. This might be the best season since the first season after I started this site (which was Dec 1998 - you figure it out). :)

When you write a headline like that. you think of one thing. The Rangers won this game early on, and rode Tommy Hunter to the win. And to an extent that is right, but..

The pitcher that Seattle sent out there was Felix Hernandez, and to be honest, through the first six innings, it was a total pitcher's duel. Neither team amounted much of anything, and to be honest, it was a game that was easy to watch, as it moved quickly, and had some crisp pitching.

Until the seventh, when Hernandez broke down. Vlad led off with a single, and after at Cruz fly out, David Murphy homered to left field, giving the Rangers all they really needed for the win. The Rangers tacked on another run this inning after a Moreland walk, a Blanco single, and an Andrus single. And then Felix Hernandez came out of the game. Tommy Hunter was still in the game.

We put up another three spot in the eighth. That was with singles by Hamilton & Guerrero, followed by a double by Cruz, scoring Hamilton. We got the other runs on a sac fly and a wild pitch. So we went up 6-0 in a very short span there late in the game, pretty much making most people forget that the Rangers had nothing until they got into the seventh inning.

Tommy Hunter, however, got his ninth win of the season, going to 9-1. He went 6.1 innings, actually less than Hernandez and gave up the same number of hits, too (8), and one more walk than Hernandez (2 vs 1), but the all important runs column was a big old donut. That was what made Hunter a far more dominant pitcher than Hernandez was. Seems weird, and when you examine the numbers, it doesn't play out, but when you "feel" it, Tommy Hunter was better than Felix Hernandez.

So we got out of Seattle winning the series 2-1, but we probably should have swept 'em. Still, we have a huge lead over Oakland and Anaheim, and have a shot to put a dent in the A's starting on Friday night.

This was a totally spectacular game, and one of the best days ever during my time running this website for the Rangers. I mean, we've had great wins over the now 12 seasons that have been during my time running this site. And truth be told, in terms of wins, this doesn't really rate THAT high on the great wins list. But when you combine it with the events back in a Ft Worth courtroom, and what happened at the exact moment that GnR got their winning bid in, it elevates the game itself to a bit higher status.

Didn't start out that great. After four innings, we were losing 5-2, and I wasn't feeling that great about the game. It was compounded by the fact that at the time, things weren't looking so great in the ol' courthouse. But in the top of the fifth, David Murphy popped a huge home run out to right field scoring three. It was the big exclamation point to a five run fifth inning, that put us up 7-5, and we never gave up that lead.

The Rangers gave up another run in the bottom of the sixth, which let the Mariners back in the game a little, but we crushed it completely in the top of the seventh when Jose Lopez slacked off on a grounder to third, and he allowed the bases to be loaded, when they should have been off the field.

The next batter was Michael Young, and on the first pitch he saw, he deposited it into the bullpen for a grand slam. The coolest part about that slam was at the same time, the GnR group put in what turned out to be their winning bid for the Rangers in the Ft Worth courthouse. It was quite a cool moment overall. Obviously, at the time, you didn't know of the connection, but it was figured out not too long after that.

I mean, that was the "end" of the day's festivities. It wasn't really, as there was a little more court time, a little more game, but the Michael Young grand slam was the spiritual "end" of the events of the day.

You gotta love that. That it's the 10 year serviced Michael Young too makes things that much sweeter.

And after this night, I dared to entertain the thought that we might be able to keep Cliff Lee next season. Dreaming high, eh? :)

I will write about the sale of the transfer of the team in a separate post, but I will add this - thanks again to Scott Lucas for the idea.

The Rangers head to Seattle feeling good, and then early on we got the usual Seattle moves.

1. The footage of the train out back of the park.
2. Weather remarks.
3. Demolition footage of the Kingdome
4. Footage of Bill from Seattle, the old Mariners fan in the blue hat.

Sadly, early on in the broadcast, they showed the seats that Bill and his wife used to sit, and they were empty. They mentioned that Bill had died about three months ago or so, which was sad, because he was ALWAYS there. They mentioned that Bill had been put on the jumbotron at the Mariners park, so he must have been their version of Zonk or something like that. Shame, as it really will seem weird not seeing him there. Perhaps the Rangers TV team can show a clip of him anyway, just for old times sake when we go there. What made it sad for me I had just sent a tweet to Josh Lewin saying they should send John Rhadigan over to talk to him, as they don't often take their own stadium guy on the road. and then almost immediately, that's when Lewin talked about Bill having died. So I had to delete my tweet. I'll still post this, however:

As for the game itself, the Rangers sent Colby Lewis out there, and was pretty decent, but wasn't totally dominating. He sadly though pitched well enough to get the win, and didn't. Went a total of six innings, gave up nine hits and one walk. Did strike out nine, and that was the mostly dominating part, but for me it didn't feel like a totally dominating performance. Nothing I can point to, just a gut feeling sort of thing.

It's hard to get much support for Lewis when the Rangers get only four hits total. Three singles (Elvis, Cantu, Molina), and a double by Mitch Moreland. Interestingly, both of the RBI's we got were on sac flies (Molina, Young).

The Mariners didn't dominate offensively, either, as they had three innings with single runs. But what they got was pretty much from their pretty darn awesome center fielder, Franklyn Guiterrez. He drove himself in with a solo home run, and another run on a squeeze play.

Colby Lewis did strike out nine. :)

Didn't like losing to Seattle. They're bad. We're not this year.

I am so stealing this from Scott Lucas. It sums it up pretty good. ;)

What a weird couple of days for me. I find out about two days ago that I was to start a temp work assignment in a few days (today, actually). That was cool, as I've been out of work for awhile. Then yesterday was a whirlwind.

The auction for control of the team happened. I hopped onto Twitter and followed the proceedings, starting at 9 am, and staying with it all the way through till the end at 12:50am. Was a heck of a ride but Ill write more about that later.

I'm posting this now because I haven't had the tine to writ about the Seattle settees due to family stuff, plus my church had its vacation bible school tis week (ended last night). Then today I stated my temp assignment, and on top of it, ive caught a cold.

But I couldn't let the day pass without saying something. I coiled not had be happier with the way the auction turned out. Bring in Chuck, Nolan, and the new stuff. Theres a ton to talk about there, and I will when I feel better. Promise. In the meantime...

Bring on August 12th! Goodbye Hicks, and take the remnants of the stupid Ameriquest bell with you!

Did anyone watch the old timer's introductions during the Hall of Fame induction ceremonies back a week or so ago from Cooperstown? I did, because to be honest, I was more interested in hearing those intros and to see who was there than the new player inductions. Not that I think the class of 2010 wasn't worthy, but I like the nostalgia angle more.

Anyways, there was an interesting remark by the fellow who was doing the introductions (George Grandy). It was most specifically his choice of words during the introduction of Hank Aaron. Here's his exact intro:

Our next Hall of Famer is, very simply, everyone's home run champion. He hit a home run on the baseball field, he's hit a home run in life. Let's welcome the Hammer, Henry Aaron.

At the moment he called Hank Aaron "everyone's home run champion", my mind immediately lept to Bonds, and all the discussion about is he the real champ, etc.. That someone from the National Baseball Hall of Fame would call Aaron "everyone's home run champion" was telling to me. Now it could be nothing - it could just be a speech and choice of words for sure. But I felt the choice of words was a small dig at Barry Bonds. Does it imply what the hall is thinking?

If you don't believe what I'm saying, click here - it's a pdf with the complete transcript of the entire induction ceremony, including Aaron's intro (which is on Page 43).

I figure on this day where Arod hit #600 at age 35, and provided he doesn't break down into his 40's will eventually pass Bonds, I thought it was interesting to make this observation.

I've spent the weekend of trade deadline mostly sick, so I'm taking a pass on writing about this one.

Some runs for Cliff Lee would be nice.

I've spent most of trade deadline day sick, so I'm taking a pass on writing about this one.

But still, wow. Where was this Rich Harden all year?

I've spent most of trade deadline day sick, so I'm taking a pass on writing about this one.

Today was an interesting day, the Rangers announced a trade for Jorge Cantu, who was announced as a right handed complement to Chris Davis at first base. However, due to 25 man roster considerations, the Rangers called up Mitch Moreland to play first, according to some stories just for this game until Cantu got here. Well, Moreland looked good, went 2-4, and guess what? He's staying, and it was announced after the game that Chris Davis was going back to AAA. An interesting little circle there.

Speaking of this game, Moreland got his first major league hit in the game (and his second, too). But the first one had some funny video if you were watching. It was a single to right, and when the camera from center field was watching him you could see 4 or 5 players from the dugout trying to get him to do the "claw" gesture, which he obviously wasn't up to speed on. He eventually got it, and it was a great piece of video. You can see the hit here on mlb.com. There was video of the claw stuff, but I can't remember where I saw it.

Anyway, Moreland looked good at the start. I feel bad for Chris Davis, as I like him, but all these moves make me think the team has soured on Davis, or at least aren't willing to wait for him to figure out his bat at the majors.

CJ Wilson got his 10th win of the season, but he was not like he was the last two starts (which were great Cliff Lee like outings). This was a lot more laborious, he wasn't quick and crisp, his line bears that out. 5.2 innings, 7 hits, two walks, and three earned runs - all with 105 pitches. Not godawful, but certainly not on the good side of things.

Offensively the Rangers were led by Michael Young and Josh Hamilton. Young had four hits, and Hamilton had three. David Murphy had a really long home run (almost totally over all the seats behind the wedgie (Former Section 43). But the big note of the offensive side was a two run home run by Taylor Teagarden, who hit just his second hit of the whole season with that. His batting average was .034 before that hit.

But most importantly, we won the game, and we're 8.5 games up on Oakland in second place, and 9 games up on the Angels (who are amazingly just 52-52 at the moment). We're headed out to California for a series with Anaheim. It could bury them if we swept the Angels. What an amazing thought. Don't think it will really happen, but still.

This bit from the line score summarizes the game.

Four hits
Three errors

That's about it. The Rangers managed only four singles, and managed to get two of them together in the 9th for the one run we got. We barely avoided the shutout, and given we had just two hits through eight innings, the only story of this game was Trevor Cahill.

Granted, Colby Lewis was good too (7IP, 5H, 1R, 8K) is nothing to sneeze at, but it was not what Cahill did.

Fortunately, the Angels lost too, but they were jumped by the A's in the standings, and the Angels are currently in third place.

Hats off to Trevor Cahill.

Cliff Lee was freakin' fantastic! Nine innings pitched. Five singles allowed, no walks, and THIRTEEN strikeouts. He did allow a run, but it was unearned (due to an error by Kinsler when he didn't cover second on a steal attempt). Nine innings, and 118 pitches. I felt sad for him when we didn't win it in regulation. He should be perfect in wins and losses since coming here, but we have developed an inability to score any runs for Cliff Lee. I hope that's not his legacy.

The Rangers went up 1-0 early on when Vlad Guerrero doubled in Michael Young. It sat that way for awhile until the unearned run scored in the top of the sixth, and then there was no more scoring.

Until Nelson Cruz crushed a home run way over the left field wall for a walkoff home run, which is always a good thing.

I was going to go to this game, but I was so beat I wasn't in the mood to drive to Arlington. Which turned out to be a good thing as I fell asleep on the sofa from 7PM till 8:30PM.

But the Rangers won the game. Which is the bigger deal, but man, you feel bad for Cliff Lee. Really.

Tommy Hunter is now 8-0 in his first eight decisions with the Rangers. That is a record that no other Rangers pitcher has ever had in the history of the franchise. That's quite an accomplishment, and something to build on. He's looking like a huge part of the rotation if we go into the playoffs. Six point one innings of work, three hits, three runs, and it's home runs again - the Angels had two home runs. Still, it's a quality start, and you just got the feeling that Hunter was all over the game.

Offensively, the Rangers had a nice pile of hits (13), and it was almost all singles, as the only extra base hits were two doubles by Elvis & Chris Davis, and a triple by Josh Hamilton which was a cool one to watch, as it just squibbed over the second baseman, and slowly rolled out to the 407 spot in the right field power alley. As it rolled, you thought perhaps it might be an inside the parker, but he ended up with a two run triple, which was nice to watch.

Feliz made it a little more interesting by giving up a run in the 9th, but still it was all about Tommy Hunter to me, and that's a cool thing.

We're up seven games in the West. Wow.

Yeah, we lost, and sadly it was Scott Feldman who started. Unfortunately, we're at the point in the season where we have to start thinking of removing Feldman from the rotation. We're at a point where we have a very real shot at the playoffs, and it's no shock to anyone that Feldman is the weak link in 2010. Which is saying something given how "meh" Rich Harden pitched earlier this season. It's quite a fall for Feldman, who I think everyone expected to be an Aaron Sele this season, win 21 games or so, and be a huge part of things.

He was not.

This game actually was somewhat better than some of his outings, but still, 5.1 innings, seven hits, one walk, three earned runs isn't the greatest outing. But he struggles now, and most fans probably don't have any confidence in him. While the team will never admit it, they might think the same thing themselves.

On top of that, Darren Oliver probably had his worst outing of the season, giving up another three runs in his 0.2 innings of work. This was not the most well pitched game by the Rangers, who have recently been a team with good pitching.

The Rangers only had six hits the whole game, and two of them were solo home runs (Young, Cruz), and even though we got those two, this one felt like one where we didn't score that much.

We lost.

Was watching some live late coverage on MLB Network tonight, and in the middle of their reporting they did an impromptu "Prime 9", only this time on the best free agent signings of the past off season. They had Vlad Guerrero as the #1 best off season signing. Here's the complete list:

10) John Lackey
9) Troy Glaus
8) ?? - I forgot to write it down
7) Carl Pavano
6) Matt Holliday
5) Aubrey Huff
4) Jose Valverde
3) Billy Wagner
2) Adrian Beltre
1) Vlad Guerrero

What bummed me out was that Colby Lewis wasn't in on this list. Huff and Glaus on there over Lewis? That doesn't seem right. And Carl Pavano should be higher than #7.

Still, it was nice to see a Ranger signing as #1 on the list as their best off season move.

Michael Young homered in the bottom of the first inning for the second night in a row to put us up 1-0. That was the end of the scoring this game. That was it. The first run was the last.

CJ Wilson was pitching more like Cliff Lee tonight than CJ Wilson. His pitches per inning have been pretty high this year, and was one of the things one had to watch out for when he became a starter. It was 17 and change per inning. This game he was more like Cliff Lee, averaging just 13. Even if Lee doesn't stay here past this season (rather likely I would assume), his time with our staff this season will be a valuable lesson. CJ went eight innings total, throwing 104 pitches, which is quite good for eight. He allowed no runs on just four hits. All four of those hits were singles, and none next to each other, as NOT A SINGLE ANGEL REACHED SECOND BASE THE WHOLE GAME! I mean - WOW! CJ walked nobody, and struck out just three, but man, four hits, nobody getting to second is quite impressive.

Neftali Feliz closed out the ninth, and at this point my wife came in and watched the last inning of the game. She's not one to remark on Rangers games except for the highlights (you know, "Chick dig the longball" and all that), but when Feliz closed out the game, she said out loud "That was some spectacular pitching". She never says stuff like that.

This game was all about pitching. There was not a ton of offense to speak of, what with just one run at all. This was spectacular. And it gave us a seven game lead in the division over the Angels. By far the widest lead of any of the six division leaders.

It's just a damn good feeling being a Ranger fan at the moment.

Scary moment in the game when Matt Treanor tripped over first base and fell in a heap lying in the chalk line. He had to be helped off the field, and was reported to be back in the clubhouse in crutches at the end. He's supposed to have an MRI today, but I can't imagine how he doesn't go on the DL over this. Even if he's down just a few days, we need to have a backup catcher on the roster. Shame, as he's been doing great this year.

Man, on paper this was the game to go to. The AL ERA leader in Cliff Lee goes for the Texas Rangers, and the leader of the Angels, Jered Weaver dueled in Arlington on Thursday night. A battle of aces for sure.

One I wanted to truly watch on TV, and not just use the TiVo FF function to skip the boring bits. Watched it all I did, and man, was it a rewarding game. Cliff Lee continues to be as advertised. I think a lot of Rangers fans are seeing Lee as the saviour, the guy we're riding high into the playoffs on the back of. I still haven't forgotten opening day 2009 when Lee was bombed by the Rangers here in Arlington, although he was pitching against us, not for us.

Lee was great, don't get me wrong, but by his own standards, he struggled just a little. Not enough that your average fan would notice (especially if you look at his line), but he didn't strike out as many as usual, and he had more 3 ball counts than normal. So it wasn't a total lights out performance, just a step below it.

Lee allowed five hits, with no walks and four strikeouts. One of the hits was a home run in the seventh (to Mike Napoli). The other run was a double in the fifth that Josh Hamilton almost caught. He made a spectacular run for the ball, and it just glanced off the side of his glove. Had it been just two inches closer, I'd say it would be easily the defensive play of the game. Still, it cost us a run. In the grand scheme of things it worked out OK, but you would have liked to have seen Josh catch that.

Cliff Lee came out for the ninth, and pitched to one batter, and gave way to Neftali Feliz. There was a confab on the mound where Lee was smiling as he was taken out. Feliz needed the experience in this kind of situation too, so I wasn't totally against Lee coming out, but you would have liked to have seen his streak of complete games keep going.

On the other side, Jered Weaver appeared to be pissed on the mound a lot, there were several camera shots of him coming off the mound and apparently swearing at something. Probably himself for not getting guys out, but he seemed rattled a little by the game situation. Whether that worked in our favor is an unknown, but we did score enough off of him (all three actually) to win the game.

The first one set the tone with Michael Young homering in the bottom of the first inning to go up 1-0. The second one was a double by Josh Hamilton in the sixth which scored Vlad Guerrero. Guerrero himself helped out earlier by legging out his single into a double, which I thought was a bit of a gamble at the time. The third run was scored on a sac fly by Bengie Molina, scoring Hamilton.

The game was tight, was well played, and the Rangers had some nice defense. There were two catches in the ninth inning by Cruz & Hamilton that could have easily fallen for hits. We're looking like a well rounded team all of a sudden. Offense, pitching, & defense are all there.

Man, it's a great feeling! Great that Lee got his first win in our uniform, too!

Colby Lewis has been one of the best surprises of this season so far. However, tonight in Detroit, he was more pedestrian. It's not like he was totally awful, he looked at times to be well, but he labored a bit, and was just "eh". His mound opponent (Max Scherzer) pitched more like 2010 Colby Lewis than the actual Colby Lewis pitched.

Colby's line ended up with seven innings pitched with nine hits, two walks, and four earned runs with 103 pitches thrown. Not horrendous, but not a lot like the 2010 edition of Colby Lewis we've known so far. He even allowed a home run to former Ranger Gerald Laird, a two run bomb that was a true Detroit home run, not one in front of the old left field wall in the new home run area. :)

Scherzer on the other hand went seven, giving up just four hits and three walks, but more importantly, no runs. Matt threw a LOT more pitches, 123 in all over seven, which is 17.5 an inning on average. Too many. But he got it done where it counted - no runs allowed.

All four hits that the Rangers got were off the Detroit starter. One of which was a triple by Michael Young, and the others were singles by Nelson Cruz, Elvis Andrus, & Ian Kisler. That was it. No other offense to speak of. The one run we did get wasn't even on one of those hits, it was a ground out RBI by Josh Hamilton in the top of the ninth.

So we were pretty effectively shut down. But still, we took 2-3 in Detroit, and 5-2 for the road trip where I think most people expected 2 out of 7 (or worse). We're feeling good coming home, even with a series finale loss.

Tommy Hunter came out of the game after seven innings and having allowed no runs on just three hits. His pitch count was pretty darn good too, topping out at just 92 pitches over seven innings, a pretty good count. His seventh was a bit rocky (ground out, double, walk, fielder's choice out, line out), but not terrible, I was a little surprised he didn't come back out for the eighth.

However, he was followed by Darren Oliver, who has been fantastic this season. Darren only allowed one walk, and nothing else. Darren's had a renaissance here in 2010, I remember when he left last time, it was a "can't wait to get him out the door" kind of feeling, but he put it together after that second stint with us, finally settling into a good relief job, and this year he's carrying an ERA of 1.29 after this game. It's quite spectacular, actually. He's got a team option for $3.25M for 2011, I'd say it's a safe bet it's picked up (he makes $3M this year).

The Rangers took an early lead in this game when Ian Kinsler tripled to the left center field wall, scoring Elvis Andrus. Kinsler himself was brought home on a sac fly by Josh Hamilton. In the top of the second, David Murphy jacked a seriously long home run, which went out over the dead center field wall, which is impressive, as that wall is 420 feet.

They said his home run was 430 feet, and I have to say, my immediate reaction to the home run shows that I watch Tom Grieve a lot on TV coverage, because I said "That was a long home run, boy!". The "boy" is a Grieve announcing staple, and it came out of my mouth without thinking about it. :)

The score stayed that way until the sixth when Cruz singled in another run.

The Rangers scored four more runs in the top of the ninth in dramatic fashion. The first was a suicide squeeze by Elvis Andrus, scoring Chris Davis. Don't see a ton of squeezes, and even less so when you're up 4-0. Ian Kinsler finally did get a ball out of the park after that when he hit the left field foul pole, scoring himself and Michael Young. Josh Hamilton followed with a solo home run to right, so the rout was on. It was 8-0 at this point.

The Rangers brought in Doug Mathis, who was brought up from AAA today to take the slot of Dustin Nippert, who went on the DL as a precautionary reaction to his being hit the in the head by a batted ball the night before. Mathis allowed just one hit, but nothing else, and got the win.

This gave Tommy Hunter a record of 7-0 this season, and set a new all time Rangers franchise record by a starting pitcher having the most wins in his first seven decisions of the season. Nobody had ever done that before, and one wonders how long this can go, because Hunter has looked pretty darned good this year. One would think he'd get a lock on a rotation slot next year if this keeps up. Granted, we said the same thing about Feldman at the end of last year, but when you're in the middle of the good part of that equation, you're not thinking that way. :)

But the biggest story I suppose is the fact that we've now won two of the three games in Detroit (one left to play Wednesday), and we've won both series in Boston & Detroit. I think a lot of Ranger fans expected us to come home from that trip something like 2-5 or 3-4 at best. If we win tomorrow, it'll be 6-7, which is something I don't think any of us expected. Thing is if we do win tomorrow, it so easily could have been 7-7. GAH!

But we're still five games up over the Angels in the West (with more in the loss column). ESPN tonight said the Rangers should win the division, and get well into the playoffs. While I don't think I'm ready to feel that way, this run has certainly felt good. Nice to see the team getting some love nationally.

Now if only we can get the bloody creditors off our backs and kick Hicks to the curb, giving the reins to Greenburg/Ryan, I think most Rangers' fans heads would explode.

Scott Feldman took the mound to start this game, and sadly, we got the 2010 version as opposed to the 2009 version. This wasn't good, as we still had to play games in Detroit, a city we haven't won even so much as a single game at in years and years.

So Feldman's performance certainly didn't help. Just five innings with seven hits and two walks. Of which three of the hits were home runs pretty much led to the five earned runs that Feldman gave up. Two of the home runs were by Miguel Cabrera, which isn't a shame, really, as he's a great hitter, but still, it just felt like it was more Feldman's pitching than Cabera's bat.

The Rangers scored a bunch early on, with a two spot in the first (two run homer by Kinsler), and three in the third (couple of singles, etc). The problem is that Feldman couldn't hold that up. The Tigers scored a run in each of the first three runs. Then two of the home runs came in the bottom of the fifth when Feldman allowed two solo home runs, and the Tigers tied the game at this point. The Rangers and Tigers traded solo runs in the seventh and eighth, allowing to a feeling that the Rangers were going to lose the game, adding to the despair of Detroit.

When Feldman first came out of the game, he was replaced by Dustin Nippert, who got an out, but the second batter got the ball came back and hit Nippert on the head, which bounced into left field. Dustin laid on the ground for awhile, and when he went off the field he was actually smiling. It's quite amazing and a blessing by God that he wasn't hurt. Quite a blessing.

Darren O'Day came in and finished off Nippert's inning, and was followed by Alexi Ogando who gave up the tying run, although it was technically Francisco who allowed the run to score. We were saved so to speak by Matt Harrison who came in and pitched four innings. He did allow two hits and four walks, but most importantly no runs.

The game lasted a very long time - in all just a few minutes short of five hours. I hung around watching all of the game. I did think we were going to lose once when the bases were loaded, but we got out of it by a double play.

We got to the fourteenth inning, and Nelson Cruz saved the day with a two run home run in the top of the inning. It just barely cleared the wall right next to the right field foul pole. I initially thought it was going to be reviewed, as it appeared that a fan might have interfered with it, but it was allowed.

Feliz came in and got the save and the Rangers finally broke the streak of losses in Detroit. It just made you feel good finally about the team. It's pretty cool how well we've played in Boston & Detroit after the debacle at home with Baltimore.

This was the one game of the Boston series going in is the one I had the most concern about. CJ Wilson has been a bit up and down over the last half dozen starts, and doing that in Boston could be real trouble. However, we got the earlier version CJ Wilson in this start.

CJ went 6.2 innings, and gave up just three hits and one earned run. He did walk five, which gave the feel a less dominant feeling than it probably could have been. The walks contributed to his 113 pitches thrown in the middle of the seventh when he came out. Our pen backed up CJ with 2.1 innings combined. However, Neftali Feliz, who closed the game out, had a John Wetteland moment by allowing the Sox in a bit closer by allowing a run in the bottom of the ninth. But despite the final bit of nailbiting, the game felt pretty well pitched overall. A great bit was the fact that CJ Wilson struck out 10 batters, which is something that's surprisingly common this season (thanks Colby).

The Rangers mostly singled their way to the win, with six of their nine hits being singles. The other three were doubles, but despite the lack of power, it was well put together. They scored two on a double in the fourth, and then we got a run on a double steal of second and home in the fifth. That was a cool move. Not a straight steal of home, but still, it's a fun way to score a run. Kinsler singled in the final run, so it was all well placed.

This gave us a 3-1 series win in Boston, something that's not happened in ages, and I'm sure will upset Boston fans, who would likely thing "Texas? We lost three to Texas?"

Well, Cliff Lee made his second Rangers start on Saturday night, and unfortunately, I wasn't able to watch any of it. I had taken my daughter out to a Grand Prairie Air Hogs game, and that was a blast. However, since I have a five year old daughter, she wanted to spend a boatload of time in the playground that they have out there. So I had a ton of time spent in the playground. Fortunately, I had my iPhone with me, so I was able to watch the game sort of on "MLB At Bat". It wasn't a great way to pay close attention, but I wasn't able to do that really, as it was bloody hot out at the AirHogs game, and yet at the same time, I could generally see what was going on.

There wasn't a ton of offense going on in this game, so I was watching my iPhone app put up a lot of zeroes. The Sox put up a single run in the first, the Rangers had a two spot in the top of the sixth, which put us up 2-1, and Cliff Lee was cruising. He went into the ninth inning again, which he did in his first outing, and Cliff's like fourth or fifth in a row or something like that. We had two outs in the bottom of the ninth with a man on, and Kevin Youkilis doubled in the tying run in the bottom of the ninth.

A couple of innings later, Youkilis sac flies in the winning run in the bottom of the 11th, and that was frustrating. That's two starts by Cliff Lee that we lost due to a really close score, and one that if we hit like we normally did, we'd have won. I really hope Cliff Lee doesn't turn into our guy who ends up with no run support.

Still, we're up 2-1 in the series at this point, and that's nothing to be ashamed of in Boston.

It's Friday night, so we got a rain delay, it's become a pattern. Last three Fridays have had a rain delay. This one was inside the game, though. Plus they played a lot of it IN the rain.

We got out early again, and while it wasn't a six spot in the first inning, we were up 2-0 on a couple of RBI singles, and it felt good. It wasn't 6-0 for sure, but I'll take 2-0. Colby Lewis didn't stick a string of zeroes on the board, he let the Sox tie the game in the bottom of the second. It was on an RBI single, and then a wild pitch scoring the second run.

After the game was tied, the rain delay (of an hour) came in, and surprisingly, both starting pitchers came back out to pitch.

Colby gave up the lead by allowing a solo home run to Adrian Beltre about 3/4 up the monster seats. But that's about as bad as it got.

Because in the top of the fifth, we had another inning like the top of the first the night before. The big highlight was Bengie Molina hitting a grand slam just over the center field wall into the first row or so of seats up there. It was pretty cool, and was something that became more important later on. At this point, the home run left Molina a triple away from the cycle. Now we all know Molina has some pop, so the home run wasn't a surprise. Single - no problem. Even the double is reasonable, as even I could run to second on a ball hit far enough into the alley. But a triple? Bengie Molina? Three bases? I don't think so. But that's exactly what happened in the top of the 8th when Molina lined a fly ball to center fielder Eric Patterson. It bounced off his glove, and careened into that little wedge out there in center field - about the only place Molina could get a triple, save for the deepest part in right field. What was the coolest part about the cycle was not the cycle itself. It was the fact that Josh Lewin & Tom Grieve turned into fans and weren't announcers, as Molina approached second base. It was absolutely awesome to hear them hooting and cheering 'em on as he got to third base. One of my favorite moments of the two of them during their tenure. I replayed it a few times, it's a great clip. You can watch this clip at this link over at mlb.com. After the bit used in this clip, they went on to talk about it some more, and Tom Grieve said that after Josh stopped calling he heard the end of Eric Nadel's call in the booth next to them, and they said virtually the same thing. I think my favorite single moment is Tom Grieve laughing after Molina got to third - his laugh reminded me an awful lot of Burt Reynolds' laugh as "The Bandit" in "Smokey & the Bandit". Josh, if you read this, there's your popular media reference for the night. :)

So good for Bengie Molina getting the cycle - it's a great thing for him to have, given how much of a beating he takes for his "slowest runner ever" reputation. Not long after this Molina came out of the game, from what I can gather as a precautionary measure, as he tweaked something coming around first base on the triple. From what I read after the game, he could play on Saturday, but it wouldn't surprise me if Treanor catches Cliff Lee just to save Molina.

We're now up 2-0 in this series against Boston, which is way better than we've performed in Boston recently. Tomorrow night is Cliff Lee against John Lackey. It should be a good game, but I'll be out in Grand Prairie with my daughter at an AirHogs game. I guess I'll be keeping track of the Rangers game on my iPhone. :)

We went into Boston feeling good about the team in general, but still feeling crappy based on the way we limped into the All-Star break. The less said about the last series the better, but even given the shame of that, one still felt good going into Boston.

You felt a whole lot better very quickly once this game got started. While Elvis Andrus fell victim to a good knuckleball, that's about where it ended. The immediate aftermath after Elvis was single, single, single (run), double (run), single (two runs), home run (two runs), and then the last two outs were made. We roughed up Tim Wakefield pretty good, slapping a six spot on him in the top of the first. He calmed down a bit in the second, getting the Rangers 1-2-3, but no so much in the third. THere was a single, an error, and a double, which scored the seventh Ranger run, leaving men on second and third with nobody out. The total rout was on!

However, that's where our scoring ended. Second and third, nobody out, and we didn't score any more. There were a few other opportunities to score as well, and truth be told, we probably should have scored about 12-15 runs total. I'll take the 7 and the win for sure, but it could have/should have been a lot more than that.

The home run came from Bengie Molina, which seemed to surprise me. I know he's had some pop in his time in San Francisco, but still. He seemed to be batting like all the other guys we've had at catcher this season so far. So the home run surprised me.

Tommy Hunter went to 6-0 after getting this win. He had a good game, going 6.2 innings, allowing just two runs on five hits. However, most of those hits didn't mean anything, since the two runs the Sox got were both solo home runs (Drew, Hall). Hunter came out with 108 pitches thrown. Darren Oliver & Alexi Ogando (who has been looking nice in the pen) cleaned up, and held down the fort.

It was a great way to start this rather important road trip. As I told NESN, it wasn't so much that we needed to beat the "Red Sox", we just needed to win this series, given the Angels are playing a team they should beat. So yeah, the win was a good one for us, plus it erased the memory of Baltimore mostly. And speaking to the "Red Sox", it's nice to win in Fenway fairly decisively, as we have had problems in Boston the last few years.

Earlier today I was interviewed by nesn.com about the upcoming Rangers / Red Sox series. They wanted my perspective being a Rangers fan, and asking me some questions about the Rangers. Most of you who read this site regularly (hello nesn.com visitors!) will know most of this stuff already, but most Red Sox fans don't. So below are the questions and answers they had for me and what I answered with. Check it out.

There's more to this article than just my Q&A, so check out the full article over at NESN.com.

1) NESN.com: Considering both short- and long-term effects, was the Cliff Lee trade a good one for the Rangers organization?

Joe Siegler: On the short term, I think it's an obvious answer. It helps us. I don't think there's a club that exists that wouldn't want Cliff Lee for their team, especially in a stretch run. I mean, if we were the Pirates or the Orioles or something it wouldn't make sense, but heck yeah, Cliff Lee is great because of who Cliff Lee is and what he brings.

As for long term, it's harder to tell, as you never know how these things work out. We did import a good relief pitcher, and I expect most people figure he's all we'll have left next year (save for a few draft picks) for Cliff Lee (kind of like the Carlos Lee/Nelson Cruz trade the Rangers made with the Brewers a few years back). We'll make a run at Lee, I'm sure (once our ownership gets worked out), but if he signs back here, I'll be surprised. But the absolute best part of all this is that the Yankees didn't get him (at least for now).

2) NESN.com: Julio Borbon has had his ups and downs this year. How has he evolved as a player since his call-up toward the end of 2009?

J.S.: I remember late last year hearing that he was going to be a great center fielder. In our park, you need a guy who is fast out there, or at least could get great reads on balls. Last year, he wasn't so much a big power hitter that grabs your attention, but he did end last year with a .376 OBP. This year, his bat started off slow, but he's come on lately, and still has some work to do. But his defense has improved greatly since last year. I don't think he's an All-Star caliber player, but he does have speed, and is not someone you worry about their defense. So that's a big improvement.

3) NESN.com: Now that Justin Smoak has been traded, who will be the Rangers' first baseman of the future?

J.S.: Well, the easy answer is to say Chris Davis. This is actually an extension of your first question, because now that Smoak is gone, it's definitely Chris Davis for now. Until Smoak was moved, we had kind of a two-headed monster with Smoak and Davis. Both were projected high caliber, with Smoak perhaps projecting a bit higher due to him being a switch hitter (like Mark Teixeira). Davis however, is the better defender, so in an immediate sense, we're probably better off with Chris Davis, as he's a better defender and has some more major league experience.

Davis did crash and burn bad last year, though, and wasn't exactly hitting up a storm earlier this season. So I guess "of the future" comes down to whether Chris Davis ends up as one of those AAAA hitters. We went through that same thing recently with Nelson Cruz. The light finally came on last year, and he's living up to it. If Chris Davis figures it out offensively, he'll be the guy of the future as he's an awesome defender, just needs more work on offense. We'll see if his AAA tuneup this year did anything. If it's not him, a guy in AAA named Mitch Moreland (currently playing right field) would likely be the choice going down, unless we brought in someone.

4) NESN.com: What do you think the problem was with Josh Hamilton in 2009, and how has he bounced back to become an MVP candidate in 2010?

J.S.: I think a lot of 2009 was Josh thinking too much. Plus he was hurt for a decent part of the season. A lot has been made locally about him constantly tinkering with his swing. We do have a new hitting coach here in 2010 for the first time since 1995, so it's possible Clint Hurdle himself fixed Josh. Hard to tell, but the Rangers TV guys have talked a lot about how Josh has gotten rid of he toe tap in his swing, and since he did that, he's taken off again.

5) NESN.com: Nelson Cruz and Ian Kinsler have each missed significant time in 2010, yet the Rangers are still in first place. Who is the one player that Texas simply cannot afford to lose?

J.S.: Since it's hard to say just one guy, I'll go for one offensive guy and one pitcher. I'd say offensively, Vlad Guerrero. I've always liked Vlad going back to his days in Montreal, and I'm glad he's with us. I'm more glad he has bounced back, and isn't just one of those long time guys trying to hang on somewhere and under performs. Vlad's back. Losing him would be rough, as it would make Josh Hamilton somewhat vulnerable, and would take some of the swagger out of our offense.

Cliff Lee aside, pitching wise, we'd probably be a lot worse off if we lost Colby Lewis. Lewis has exceeded everyone's expectations when he returned here in the offseason. I think a lot of people (myself included) thought, "Well OK, he sort of figured it out in Japan, but that's Japan, and this is the MLB -- will it translate?" It certainly has. As you pointed out, we're in first place now, and that's before Cliff Lee. I say Colby Lewis is our pitching star this season (although I like Tommy Hunter, too).

6) NESN.com: How important is this series against the Red Sox for Texas coming out of the All-Star break?

J.S.: I think it's important that we stay strong out of the gate. That it's against the Red Sox isn't so much important because it's the "Red Sox;" it's not like the two teams have a big rivalry as such. It's more important for us to do well this series, as we need to hold and expand our lead. The Angels, while down this year, are still the team to beat, and I don't think anyone can take 'em lightly. The Angels are playing Seattle this first series, and Seattle has been a big disappointment. The Angels should handle them well, so we need to have a strong showing against the Red Sox to keep our division lead.

For more sports news, visit NESN.com (http://www.nesn.com/).

Well, I've become pretty disenchanted with the Home Run derby the last few years. Other than Josh Hamilton's show a couple of years ago, and Nelson Cruz winning it last year, I've grown tired of listening to the babble of Joe Morgan & Chris Berman. Berman's "back back back back" itself was getting old, but in the last few years, the "newscast" has been so interrupted with things they have to do commercial wise and all that... Yeesh. They spend so much time talking to "guests" on the panel, that for some of the guys in the derby, they spent no time talking about, and talking about the doofus there.

Will Ferrell was the final straw for me. All he was there for was to push some movie he's in. That's enough. It's bad enough they have people there at all, but to then turn it into a Jay Leno type interview was unforgivable. First off, the derby lineup was guys I pretty much didn't care about, I was completely bored. I was mildly interested when Corey Hart did well in the first round, but he tanked out with zero in the second round, so I didn't care who won.

They need to boot Berman and his cronies, and put someone else in there. While I don't have a particular replacement in mind, why not turn it into some rotating thing of the various MLB teams' broadcasters, so we can see/hear some of them? Get the broadcasters to the All Star game, too. I'm sure they'd love to do that. Ditch the Will Ferrell suck ups for personal promotion, too. This thing is already so stupid commercialized, it's just annoying as hell now. Don't get me wrong, I like Will Ferrell a lot. He's pretty darned funny. He did NOT belong on the panel at the HR Derby.

For the first time I actually stuck around and watched the Celebrity Softball game afterwards. I never do that. You know what? That was miles more entertaining than the Home Run Derby. I think next year I might just skip the derby completely and tune in for the last 15 minutes and see who won, and watch the softball game.

Jenny Finch fast pitching to Ricky Henderson was a hysterical moment. Ricky's then "dancing" around the basepaths after his home runs (yeah, two of 'em) was pretty darned funny. The softball game was fun, the Home Run Derby was not.

Get a clue, MLB. This isn't the way to have a HR derby.

Get out of town Baltimore. Screw you.

You know, I had planned to write a ton about Cliff Lee. I knew him from Philly, and had all this great stuff to say. Then we lost. Meh, I didn't want to write about this game. It's the bloody Orioles. Cliff Lee was down 1-0 two pitches into the game. While he ended up pitching a nine inning complete game loss, it was disheartening.

Meh. Bloody Orioles.

I instead direct you to the excellent report Jamey Newberg wrote on the Cliff Lee trade, which still seems quite bizarre. I had to alter my roster in MLB 2K10 to account for that, since they don't move fast enough with roster updates. :)

This was a weird day for Rangers fans. At the beginning of the day, everyone was reeling from the horrible loss the night before. Even Jamey Newberg got into the depression by sending out a report that said:

Just a brutal day

For Texas Rangers baseball.
Nothing else to say.

It was a really ugly loss the night before in every sense of the word. Then we woke up to the news that the ownership situation was thrown another curveball, with some quotes coming out that it seemed to be that Greenberg/Ryan are no longer a lock despite the legal dancing. That was really quite sad. It likely will still happen, but it's not a dead set lock anymore. Then around noon, it all got worse with the news that the Yankees were acquiring Cliff Lee from the Mariners. I was at Red Robin at the time with my daughter for lunch, and I saw all the headlines on the ESPN tickers about that, and got really bummed out.

When I got home, I was looking around on the net, and saw some stories that the Yankees were not getting him, and then the word came out a little later that it was the Texas Rangers getting him, I was rather excited. Anyone reading this blog knows I'm also a Phillies fan, so I know Lee well from his time in Philly last year. I'll write more about Cliff Lee on a separate entry, this one is technically about the game against the Orioles on the 9th.

So it was with the fact that Cliff Lee was inbound that I approached the game last night. Yeah, the game before that was bad, but I figured that couldn't happen two nights again against the Orioles (a team that actually has a worse record than the Pirates), and the Cliff Lee euphoria. It was announced that Chris Davis was back from AAA, and would be our regular first baseman, so I was excited to see if what he learned in AAA would translate, or if he'd be Nelson Cruz again (one of those 4A hitters). Scott Feldman started the game, and while he looked rocky early, he ended up with a pretty decent line overall. He went seven innings, allowing eight hits, no walks, but just two runs. Some of his cutters were of the 2009 vintage, the kind that earned him 17 wins. If he figures it out for the second half, it will be like we traded for a great pitcher, and it didn't cost anything to get him!

Our big inning was the third, when we scored four runs, pretty much powered by a three run home run by Vlad Guerrero. It barely got out over the left field wall, and it wasn't the kind of swing you thought would be a home run, but there you go. Was Vlad's 20th of the season, and I believe his 75th RBI as well. Was feeling good, especially when we got two more runs in the bottom of the 8th to go up 6-2 at the time. Chris Davis came into the game late and worked a good count and got a sac fly. The other run was another sac fly by Kinsler.

Then Neftali Feliz fell victim to the same mess that Francisco had the night before. Long story short, he gave up a grand slam to Corey Patterson which tied the game at 6 in the top of the ninth. We didn't do anything in the bottom, and then to make it worse, Dustin Nippert gave up another solo home run in the top of the 10th, and we lost the game. I actually missed the end of it, because at this time it was after 1AM - the game was delayed two and a half hours by rain at the start, and then the game itself was freakin' long (three hours and fifty one minutes). I had fallen asleep. I woke up and actually saw us down 7-6, but missed the home run that caused it, and I was so heavy tired, I just stopped watching and went to sleep. Didn't see we had lost the game until the morning.

That was annoying. As I said earlier up, the Orioles have the worst record in the majors, and up until two nights ago had NEVER won a game this season where they were trailing after 7 innings. Then they go and do it twice in a row against us. That's sad.

But hey, Cliff Lee pitches tomorrow night! w00t!

I'll have more to say tonight, but..

The Rangers get Cliff Lee, and Mark Lowe (on DL for season) plus $2.55M in cash for..

1B Justin Smoak, P Blake Beavan, P Josh Lueke, & 2B/IF Matt Lawson. Other than Smoak, those guys are all AA players, definitely not major league ready. A friend of mine in Seattle said the press up there is going nuts about catcher catcher catcher. Surprised he's not getting a catcher. Teagarden, Salty, or Ramirez.

USSMariner is happy about Smoak, though. As they should be.

But the best part about this - the ABSOLUTE BEST PART is that the Yankees did not get him. I honestly don't care who we gave up. So long as it doesn't help the Yankees, I'm all for the trade.

Even if I was writing this week, I wouldn't want to write about this one. It was bloody disgraceful.

Still taking a break due to being backlogged. Sorry about that.

I'm still backlogged, but I wanted to say something about this one.

The Rangers just stomped on Cleveland. If this was a full update, I'd use my whoop-ass graphic here. Twelve runs, seventeen hits. Four home runs (Hamilton, Guerrero, Cruz, & Murphy). It was about time we do this, as we've been fairly flat recently.

Still taking a break due to being backlogged. Sorry about that.

Still taking a break due to being backlogged. Sorry about that.

Still taking a break due to being backlogged. Sorry about that.

Still taking a break due to being backlogged. Sorry about that.

Still taking a break due to being backlogged. Sorry about that.