Well, the offensive onslaught continues. Over the last three games (26 innings), we’ve scored 37 runs including a bazillion home runs. I went into last night’s game with a feeling of ambivalence – having just lost Doug Davis on waivers to the team we were playing. While Doug hasn’t lit it up in awhile, I still liked the guy and held out hope he could get it going in a Ranger uniform. Oh well, that’s in the past now. So as this game started, I figured after a few good offensive performances, we couldn’t get another one, could we?
Yes, we could. Juan Gonzalez just continues to tear the hyde off the ball the last few days jacking a very impressive home run and hitting the ball around the field going 3 for 5 with 3 RBI’s. In fact, the only other (Ranger) home run of the game came from Mike Young – a three run shot late in the game. The other recent hit machine, Alex Rodriguez didn’t have any home runs, but went 3 for 6. Josh Lewin said something about his raising his batting average something like 60 points in the last two days because of his recent barrage of hits. Carl Everett & Hank BLalock both had doubles. We also left more men on base than scored, and when you score 11, it tells you that it could have been even bigger offensively.
On the pitching side, Ryan Drese didn’t pitch wonderfully, but pitched a hell of a lot better than his brief experimentation with an ERA in the 100’s showed! He did dance with trouble early, walking too many, but getting helped out by a few double plays early. R.A. Dickey went 2.2 innings giving up but a lone run, and Ramirez came in in the 9th to shut things down when Dickey looked like he started running out of gas.
Nice to see Erasmo Ramirez & Gerald Laird both make their major league debuts last night. They were in the game in the 9th at the same time – something I can’t recall seeing much of in the past. And speaking of Laird, I really feel for Todd Greene getting hurt when he did – just as his playing time was about to increase as he got out from under the “three catcher” situation. :(
The Raffy watch is still stuck on 497. If he doesn’t get any in the next couple of games, it looks like #500 might happen at home, something I didn’t think possible when he went on the road needing 3 in 6 games.
We’re now just one game under .500 at 13-14 ending the month of April. Considering who we were playing all month, and the fact we’re only 4 games out, I’m actually feeling pretty good about where we are at the moment.