Derek Holland. Six innings. Five hits. Two walks. Six punchouts. ZERO EARNED RUNS!
Darren Oliver. One perfect inning pitched.
Darren O’Day. 2/3 of an inning pitched. No hits, but two walks. Uh-oh.
Neftali Feliz. 1 1/3 of an inning pitched. One hit, but nothing else allowed.
Overall? 9IP, 6H, 4B, 6K, 0R. This was a fantastic pitching performance by us. O’Day was a tad rickety with two walks, but nothing came of it, fortunately. His ERA remains at 0 for the season, but it’s the least dominant ERA of zero I can think of in baseball. :)
Still, a win is a win, and a shutout of the other team ALWAYS means you have good pitching going on. Can’t argue with that. Can’t wait to see what Ogando does on Monday to complete the second run through the starting rotation.
Offensively, the Rangers didn’t mount a ton of movement themselves. In all, the Rangers had seven hits. But only two of them had any true effect, and that’s because they were both home runs. Adrian Beltre struck first. Hit hit a home run into the left center field area one pitch after jacking one down the left field line and missing the foul pole. You always get frustrated at those “almost” home runs, as it feels like an opportunity missed. Not often does the guy come back next pitch and get a home run anyway. So I liked that.
The offense remained that way for a few more innings with the Rangers up 1-0 going into the seventh. Baltimore brought in Jim Johnson to relieve, and that’s when the really good outing by starter Jeremy Guthrie was wasted. While Guthrie was tagged with the loss, you felt like he deserved a better fate, given how he pitched (6IP, 4H, 1BB, 1ER, the Beltre HR). Johnson only gave up two hits himself, but one of them was a two run home run to Capt Uppercut, Ian Kinsler. That was all we got.
And given all the great pitching we had, it was all we needed.
Loved, just LOVED the 3-0 shutout of Baltimore. Not because it was the Orioles, it could have been anyone and I would have loved it too. Although shutting out NYY 3-0 in the Bronx probably would have been sweeter.
8-1 and headed to Detroit. Man. That’s a surprise. No way did I think we’d get out of the gate like THIS. Especially given