In the final exhibition game of the spring, the Rangers lost to the Royals 10 to 7. They played the game in Frisco, and had I not been at my church’s Easter Egg hunt, I might have turned up.
Nelson Cruz, who was out for the previous couple of games went 2 for 2 with an RBI double. Michael Young had a hit, and finished spring with a torrid batting average of .429.
Matt Harrison started, and didn’t fare too well. Gave up five runs in five innings. He gave up seven hits and a walk. However, that was by far not the worst pitching performance of the day. That fiasco goes to Chris Ray. Ray only got one out, and around that one out he gave up a walk and four hits. ALL FIVE of those guys scored. Five runs in 1/3 of an inning. That was pretty darned awful.
Frank Francisco pitched the final inning, and was perfect. Finished spring with an ERA of 3.00 (fairly meaningless, but still, lower is better even in meaningless pitching stats).
In all, the Rangers had 14 hits, and eight of them were doubles. Which is nice to see, as we’ve been a fairly decent doubles machine as a team recently.
The Rangers finished the spring 10-19-1. Not exactly tearing things up, as only two teams were worse than them. Those being the Nationals (10-20) and the Pirates (7-21). Still, one doesn’t feel that bad heading into the regular season, despite the worst record in the Cactus League. This team just feels better than that.
Bring on Monday!