The Rangers offense was shut down on Thursday night by Anaheim’s pitching. The Rangers had six hits in all. One triple, one double, and four singles. Nobody had more than one hit, and three starters (Sosa, Wilkkkkerson, & Relaford) had none. The two runs we got were on singles, one by Mike Young in the first, and the other by Marlon Byrd in the bottom of the ninth.
Wilkkkerson’s recent hot streak actually filled me with confidence that he might be able to deliver in the bottom of the ninth, but that was a fleeting thought, he struck out – to end the game, no less. GASP!
Tejeda continues to be the enigma that both Texas & Philly know. Totally mediocre line. 5.1IP, 6H, 4ER, 3BB, 4K. Not going to win much that way. Ron Mahay came on and finished the game, going a total of 3.2IP, and giving up one earned run on four hits. That was decent enough, if not spectacular.
Kelvim Escobar got his 10th win of the season, going 7, giving up just three hits, and the one run to Mike Young’s single in the first.
Kind of a flat game. Still, we took the series against a division foe, and that’s always something to be positive about. We were 6-4 against good teams in this recent stretch (Detroit, Boston, Anaheim). I hope that sort of play continues, and isn’t just a flash in the pan.

This was another one of those games that on paper, we had no hope. Jered Weaver against Jamey Wright. Ugh. I expected us to be down 7-1 after three innings or so. But that’s not what happened. Not even close.

As much as I’ve been ragging on Jamey since spring training, I have to give him props. This was a pretty well pitched game I thought. Except for a stretch where he allowed four singles in a row (which accounted for the two runs in the fourth), he was pretty spot on. Even those four singles were all ground balls. He also had three double plays turned on the field, two of which he was involved in himself. Jamey Newberg said he had a hard time watching him this game; I didn’t. He looked good to me. At least for tonight. You can’t argue with his overall line. It was 6 innings, five hits, two earned runs, two walks, and two strikeouts. His pitch count was 76, so I’m a bit surprised he came out after just six innings.

But no matter, our bullpen was lights out. The three relievers we used (Wilson, Benoit, Gagne) all went one inning, and were all perfect. CJ Wilson struck out two of his three batters, Benoit struck out the side, and Gagne didn’t strike out anyone, but only needed six pitches to get the save. I imagine that inning was a small taste of what Los Angeles (the real LA team, not the one we played tonight) was getting when Gagne was in his prime a few years ago. That was exciting.

Jered Weaver went five+ innings, and was just “OK”. Kind of the line I’m used to seeing from Ranger pitchers. Five innings, 7 hits, 3 earned runs, 2 walks, 2 strikeouts. Not awful, certainly not great. Frank Catalanotto and Marlon Byrd both had three hits. Cat was 3-4, and Byrd was 3-3 with a walk. Man, if Byrd is this solid the rest of the season, you would have to think he’d leapfrog Nelson Cruz in the pecking order for the 2008 outfield. Man is he hot. Speaking of hot, recent vintage powerhouse Brad Wilkkkkerson went 1 for 4 tonight with a double off the wall, that looked like a home run off the bat, but didn’t quite get out. He did strike out twice though. No shock there. Overall, we had 11 hits. Two doubles (Byrd, Wilkerson) and nine singles. Gerald Laird had an odd line, going 0-2 with two RBI’s. They were both sac flies.

This is the kind of game you love to see the Rangers win. Well pitched, well played, a great game of baseball. As much as I love 14-2 wins, these 4-2 games where it’s close with great pitching are what it’s all about.

Man, if they only started this way. Now I’m not claiming it can happen, but if we did manage to come back from this enormous deficit and somehow get into the playoffs, Ron Washington would probably win manager of the year. One wonders if that would happen if Buck Showalter might get a small playoff cut – I mean it would be partially due to him being fired, eh? :)

This game can be summed up in two major points:
Kevin Millwood – Kevin was fantastic. By far his best outing of the season. He went eight innings, giving up just 2 earned runs on 5 hits, four strikeouts, and no walks. It was almost a buried performance given the #2 major point of this game, plus the strikeout barrage that Anaheim starter Ervin Santana threw at us. But Millwood was great. It’s seriously hard to try and find fault with the line. You know that bit about sometimes performance gets buried in the stats? Not this time – his line was great. Can’t argue with it. Kevin had a nice streak of 13 retired Angels in a row at one point.
Brad Wilkkkkerson – Say what you will (strikeout!) about Brad, but wow did he deliver tonight. He’s become known as the strikeout king, hence my recent spelling of his name in my updates, but it was a night he won’t forget. Brad had three home runs (after his first at bat was a strikeout). The first home run was a no doubter, and the second looked good, but went into the wedgie. That one was probably helped by it’s location. The third one was two rows into right center. Was a six RBI game for Wilkkkkerson, who accounted for six of the 8 runs we got. One was an sac fly by Frank Catalanotto. Right now I can’t recall where the eighth came from. But this was really about Brad. He was on fire, and couple it with his three home run game from yesterday, and he’s gotten pretty hot here.
The other story (at least early on) was Ervin Santana. His line wasn’t great (5.1IP, 7H, 2BB), but the biggest stat was his 11 strikeouts. He struck out five in a row at one point, and for the early part of the game it looked like we were dead in the water; we couldn’t do anything. The fourth started off quite wierdly when Marlon Byrd reached first on a strikeout. After a hit and a sacrifice, Wilkerson turned the game around on the first of his three home runs. From that point on, Santana didn’t seem like the same pitcher; he seemed rattled to me. Santana had to come out of the game in the sixth when his pitch count topped 110. Course he was no longer dominating at this point, though.
Vlad Guerrero couldn’t be kept down, he got a single. What a shock he got a hit against us. Wilkerson was big driving force to the 8-3 win, followed closely by Millwood. A good win against a good team. That’s always ALWAYS nice to see.

My fears of us becoming the Phillies South have been realized. We have the following players on our 40 man roster who were former Phillies:
Kevin Millwood
Vicente Padilla
Robinson Tejeda
Marlon Byrd
Desi Relaford
Desi Relaford. Wretch. Haven’t we had enough from this pile of players: D’Angelo Jimenez, Esteban German, Manny Alexander, Doug Glanville, Donnie Sadler, Calvin Murray, Jason Romano, Kelly Dransfeldt, Scarborough Green, Randy Knorr, Rob Sasser, Mark Sagmoen, Craig Worthington, Jack Voigt.. Do I need to go on? Why is Relaford here? Gahhhh!
Anyway, about this game. Michael Young is the only one of our starting infield not to go on the disabled list with Ian Kinsler’s landing there today. He’s going to be out for awhile, which means he’ll come back for September. Oh well. This season has been a serious bout of the disabled list. It feels like everyone has been on it at one point or another. Kinsler’s landing on the DL paved the way for Brandon McCarthy to come back from the DL (early) to make tonight’s start. He probably should have gotten his final rehab start. It’s a shame as McCarthy was our most consistent starter when he went down. Hopefully it won’t take long for him to regain his form, and to keep the blister from returning.
Boston starter Kason Gabbard (who??) made only one real mistake. It was a three run home run to Brad Wilkkkkkerson in the fifth. Other than that, the Sox staff was pretty decent. Gabbard did allow four walks in addition to the three hits he surrendered. The remaining sox relievers combined for two hits over 3.1IP. Not bad. In fact, other than the home run to Wil-K, there were two singles (Young, Laird), and two doubles (Byrd, Metcalf). Not a lot of offense on this night.
McCarthy was nowhere near as close. He gave up 6 hits and three walks in his 3.2IP. Willie Eyre, who doesn’t have a bad overall ERA, but in my eyes never seems to pitch well, went 3.1IP, and gave up 3 three hits and FIVE walks. That’s 8 walks in seven innings. Bleargh! At least Jack Benoit came in and struck out the side in the eighth. That’s something I suppose.
We get out of Boston with a series split. We also took 2 out of 3 in Detroit, so that’s a 4-3 roadtrip against teams that are division leaders, and not weak division leaders either. They were decent teams. We’re not ready for the playoffs or anything as bizarre as that, but a 4-3 road trip against these teams is something I think any Rangers fan will take.

Kameron Loe:
6IP, 6H, 2BB, 1ER, 1K
Julian Tavarez:
5.2IP, 7H, 3BB, 2R/1ER, 2K
Not too different of lines between the two starting pitchers. Very similar, in fact. However, Loe seemed to be dealing this game. He continues his post AAA meeting very well. He came back and has been great since. There’s a lot of other lines to talk about this game, but to be honest, I just want to focus on how well Kam Loe has been doing lately.
Oh, this game was the mathematical half way point of the season. 81 in the books, 81 to go. At this point, we are 34-47 (.420), and are 16.5 games back. Now I don’t expect to get back into the race, just pointing out where we are at the halfway point. We can continue playing well, and get more than one or two games over .500, and I think most folks would be happy. Playoffs, while not mathematically gone, might as well be. We did pass the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and the Kansas City Royals for worst record in the AL. Only the Nats & Reds in the other league have worse records than us.

This was another one of those matchups that by just the starting pitchers, we lost. Robinson “Mr. mostly bad” Tejeda vs Josh “Mr 20 wins” Beckett. No had no business winning this game, yet we did. Although it was really not due to Tejeda. Usually when I write about these expected blowouts against us that we win, it’s down to the starter say giving up one run over 7.2IP on 3 hits. That kind of thing.
That was not the case here. Tejeda stunk up the joint again, going four innings, giving up four earned runs on five hits and SIX walks. Ugh. In fact, the first two batters of the game walked for Boston. They both scored. In the second, Tejeda tried a different tactic. Instead of walking guys and smallballing the runs in, he gave up a triple and then a home run. He did hang around for another two innings after that, not giving up any more runs, but the damage was done. 101 pitches over four innings is horrible. Had to get him out. Our pen was good again, going five innings (over four pitchers), and allowing no runs on three hits and one walk.
The Rangers offense came alive in the fourth. Three straight singles brought home Sammy Sosa, and then a Brad Wilkkkkkkkerson double scored two more. Two more singles gave us our forth, tying the four runs that Tejeda gave up earlier.
This was followed in the fifth inning by career home run number 602 for Sammy Sosa. That gave us the lead, and the win, as there was no more scoring after that.
Nice to see a comeback win against the team with the best record in the league, and also on the road like that.

Well, Jamey Wright didn’t do too horrendously bad this game. I’m no fan of his, but this wasn’t a stinker. Nothing to write home about (5IP, 6H, 3BB, 2ER), but nothing awesome. Thing is, though he pitched well enough to win. He did not.
He was matched up against Tim Wakefield. As I’ve said many times before, Wakefield either will totally shut you down, or you’ll score 10 runs off him in the first; there appears to be no middle ground. Tonight was one of the former. Wakefield went 6.2 innings, giving up 7 hits and four walks, but just one earned run. He was however victimized by Kenny Lofton, who was everything you want from a leadoff hitter, going 4-4 and a walk. Unfortunately, none of it counted for anything, as Kenny never scored.
Both bullpens threw three guys out there, but the Boston pen was just slightly better, giving up just one hit in their combined 2.1 innings of work. Texas’ pen allowed two hits in their three innings of work. Both sides had a combined one walk each. Boston struck out more guys though, k’ing 4 in all, and Texas k’d two. Not bad on either side, really. Although Boston won in the “number of letters in the surname” department. Their three guys had a combined 24 letters in their surnames; Texas only had 21. Yeah, OK, I’m tired (it’s 1:15AM as I write this), and those are the kinds of things you think of when trying to do summaries instead of sleeping.
A loss is never something you want, but 2-1 losses mean you are pitching well, and I’ll take my chances giving up just two runs every game.