Kevin Millwood started the game, and you felt good about it, based on his performance this season. Felt like we’d be able to take the game and the series heading back home. Kevin went out there, and threw two innings, allowing a single hit. Struck out two. Then that was it. He was out after two innings, replaced by Dustin Nippert. At the time, you didn’t know what was going on, but later in the game, it was announced that he was out with tightness in his left gluteus muscle. Doesn’t sound like any fun.
So Nippert followed up with a pretty good performance. Nippert went 4.1 innings, and allowed just a single hit, two walks, and one run. In fact, all the Rangers pitching was pretty good. In all, the Royals got just four hits.
In fact, for the most part, the pitching was pretty good. The Royals trotted out there Sidney Ponson. Capt Aruba pitched like the guy that was with the Rangers for awhile. Six innings, five hits, NO earned runs. When you get that from Ponson, you thought – uh-oh. Perhaps they were going to outdo us. The game after all was scoreless through six innings.
Then we hit the seventh. Rangers led off with a double, a single, and steal, a fielding error, a couple more singles, you get the idea. We plated three in the top of the seventh, which turned out to be all we needed. The Royals scored one in the bottom of the seventh against Dustin Nippert, and another in the bottom of the ninth against Willie Eyre, but that was it. We also had a four spot in the top of the eighth, which was highlighted by an Andruw Jones home run.
Ian Kinsler had a fielding error, his seventh of the season in all.
In all, every Ranger starter had at least one hit except for Elvis Andrus. Michael Young had another three hit game, he’s been on fire lately. In all, he has 120 hits for the season, well on page for another 200 hit season.
Coming home.