I was kind of not really paying attention to this one. Earlier in the day, I had attended my first baseball card convention in about 20 years, and I had purchased several things (including three complete sets of cards), so I had a ton of new toys to play with. Boy, did I ever feel like I was 12 again playing with baseball cards while baseball was on!
Anyway, the story of this game was Rick Helling. After the first three starts of the season for Rick, he appears to have bounced back to 1998’s form. Which is good, as the Rangers need this. BADLY!! He went a full eight innings, and Oates said after the game that he would have let Rick go 9, but this was uncharted territory for any Ranger pitcher this year, and that if he had done this before during this season, he would have let Rick go for a complete game. Rick looked really good out there, not completely dominating, but still very good.
Actually, it looked like a pitcher’s duel was brewing, as we didn’t do much off of Orioles started Juan Guzman, either. However, he had to leave the game after the fourth inning and shortly after that, the current Ranger offense (aka Rafael Palmiero) took over. He cracked a three run home run into Home Run porch for the game-winning hit. We then picked up four more in the seventh to end the day’s scoring.
Crabby came in for the ninth and pitched a scoreless inning in something odd this season for the Rangers – a really well pitched game!
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
No commentary for Saturday’s game. I hurt my back and had to go to bed early, I didn’t hear any of the game. Sorry.