Back on the radio! Coolness. :)
A roller coaster game for me listening on the radio. We got out early and big, and I was hoping that unlike a lot of other spring games so far, we’d be able to keep the lead. Unfortunately, that wasn’t to be. We got out to a 4-0 lead in the second inning thanks to the second grand slam of the pre-season for the Rangers; this time by Tom Evans, who really has to be given a look for third if he keeps this up for another couple of weeks. Evans’ slam (he was 2 for 3 today) was his fourth homer so far, the 13th by the Rangers, and the second slam (the other was Kapler). There were also two triples in this inning, one by Gabe Kapler, and the other by Royce Clayton. We did score a fifth run when Clayton was hit in by Rusty Greer, I believe. We batted around this inning, and I felt good.
However – after a masterful appearance by Darren Oliver (3 IP, 40 pitches, 1H, 1K, 3 broken bats), he left, and the Jays caught up with home runs in the 4th (Segui off Crabtree), the 5th (Lopez off Munoz), and the 6th (Bautista off Benoit). There goes another big lead. However, the back end pitching was perfect – Doug Davis & Chuck Smith combined to pitch three perfect innings – retiring all 9 they faced.
During this time, we picked up four more runs – one more by the long ball (McDonald who was 2 for 2 off former Ranger Eric Gunderson) in the 8th. I was busy during this time, and didn’t get to pay much attention, I only heard the long ball score personally.
One other highlight was a spectacular catch (going by the radio guys’ voices) by Ruben Mateo to end the 7th inning.
Was a nice win – hopefully our relief pitching gets it going before the season starts. So far they’ve been less than stellar this spring, but that’s not a whole lot to worry about yet. Still feeling good (if different) about 2000.