For awhile, I thought we were going to get two straight games that were 1-0 wins. This game started out that way after the first run was plated in inning one by a Hamilton double and a Michael Young single. It stayed that way for quite some time. Colby Lewis was dealing – went 6.2 innings of shutout ball. The Rangers were up 1-0 the entire time he was on the hill. It wasn’t until the bottom of the seventh when some more runs scored.
The Mariners had pulled their starter (more on him later), and was replaced by Steve Delabar. Who appeared to get the job done, and then hung one to Ian Kinsler who whalloped it over the left field wall to put us up 2-0. What’s more surprising about this was the next at bat. Was Elvis Andrus, who was battling until he too hit a home run to left center. A home run for Elvis is not exactly a common occurrence. This put us up 3-0 after seven. Feeling good.
When we got into the 8th, Alexi Ogando was on, having relieved Colby Lewis to finish the seventh. John Jaso led it off with a triple. When that happens, you’re pretty much assured of giving up a run, unless God himself was pitching, but then God wouldn’t have given up the triple in the first place. Anyway, Dustin Ackley made it happen with a single.
Then the bottom fell out when Joe Nathan came on, which shows an early disturbing trend in 2012. Don’t use the closer more than one day in a row. This is the Rangers’ second loss of the season, and both were by Nathan meltdowns. Both of those were after he had pitched more than one day in a row. Single, double, sac fly, double, K, single, K.
Bah. I said going into the season that Nathan is the biggest question mark for me in the 2012 season. Moreso than Yu Darvish or Neftali Feliz, or Josh Hamilton’s contract. If Nathan fails, we have a mess. Hopefully this is just early season “creaking”, and it sorts itself out. But I’m a little concerned; yeah.
Oh yeah. It was odd seeing Kevin Millwood again. I know he’d been in Colorado for a couple of years after a horrible season in Baltimore. Not sure what to make of him in 2012 – he looked mostly the same as he did when he was in Texas. :)