I got pretty sick on Friday evening, and it carried over through Saturday and into Sunday.
Because of that, I fell asleep watching Friday night’s game three seperate times, and Saturday night’s wasn’t much better. While I was conciuous I was dealing with some issues that decorum prohibits me from discussing here. Suffice it to say my mind wasn’t all there. I’ll look back at the games, and write something quick about them.
Friday: (W: 4-3) Kameron Loe & Jon Garland had similar lines, going 6 or so innings, giving up 3 earned runs (although Loe gave up twice as many hits (10-5) as Garland did). The bullpens were the story here. Chicago’s gave up one run, ours none. That was the difference. We had one home run (Wilkerson), and three doubles tonight (Tex, Young, & Matthews). Francisco Cordero picked up the win (his 5th), and I think puts him up there with our team leaders in wins. Otsuka got his 10th save. [ MLB.com Recap ]
Saturday: (L: 8-6) Vicente Padilla was pulled early in this game after throwing only 3.1IP. He gave up 7 hits and 7ER on 3BB and 4K. That was pretty much the game there. Chicago put up a rather ugly 7 spot in the fourth inning, and while we got a ltitle momentum back with a 3 spot in the top of the fifth, we couldn’t rally enough. We lost the game 8-6. Gary Matthews continued to be hot going 3 for 5 with 2 doubles, and a run scored. Blalock & Young were also 3-5. We had 13 hits overall, but it just wasn’t enough, we couldn’t overcome the pitching of Padilla tonight. [ MLB.com Recap ]
Sunday: (W: 10-2): This was the game I knew the least about actually. I was feeling better Sunday, so I did some errands. I did hear parts of the game as I was driving around town, but it’s hard to get a grasp when you hear half an inning here, a few batters there. Looking at the line, John Rheinecker pitched his second great start in a row, and is now 2-0 with us. Rhien went 8 innings, giving up just 2ER on 7 hits with no walks and four strikeouts. Another well pitched game from him; hopefully that can conitnue, as I can’t see us sending out someone who is pitching that well. We bombed Mark Buehrle to the tune of 6 earned runs over 7 innings pitched. Mark didn’t help himself with four walks, either. Jerry Hairston Jr got into the action, and did make an error in his first Ranger game. Hairston went 0-4, but did walk once and scored. Mark Teixeira was red hot this game, going 4-5 with two doubles. But as hot as he was, it didn’t compare to Gerald Laird. Laird was 4 for 5 also, but had two doubles AND two home runs with 4 RBI’s. A great day for Gerald – hopefully the tide starts to turn back to him, as I don’t think Barajas will be here next year. Time to give Gerald his job back that he lost due to injury. [ MLB.com Recap ]
Tomorrow night we go into Kansas City for game against the woeful Royals. I’m sure we’ll lose 2 out of 3, as we seem to have a mental block that disallows us from playing good there.