Three games to go. All against the A’s. The A’s are .5 games behind the Yankees for best overall record in the AL, and homefield advantage. Do I want the Rangers to win any of these games and help the Yankees? Hell no! I want us to lose all three of these, and give the Yankees a big pfffft. Of course, I’d like to see Arod hit his three home runs to get to 60, but he didn’t get any tonight, so he needs three in the last two games. Unlikely, but you never know.
Overall, this was a pitching game again. Chan Ho Park was sloppy in the first, giving up two runs, but that was it, really. While he did give up one more run later on, he was pretty good after the first inning. Mark Mulder on the other hand, gave up nothing. He went 7 innings, giving up only 3 hits. We didn’t score anything until we made it very interesting in the bottom of the 9th, putting two runs up on the board. I was actually scared we’d win! :)
Two more to go.

Day games are hard for me (as regular readers know), because I’m working. I have it on on the radio, but it’s hard to pay attention. Plus when we went down by a lot of runs yesterday, I just kind of tuned out. :)
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Didn’t see much of this, as it was my bowling league night. However, I saw enough. Kenny Rogers pitched pretty well, in what could be his final start as a Ranger. Arod got #57, and Raffy got a HR, too. I could look at the box score and make up stories, but at the end of this bad season, I don’t really have the urge to write a lot. :)
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I was at the Ballpark for this game, and when it started, I told my wife this was either going to be a well pitched game, or a total fiasco. We got the well pitched game. I really didn’t think Benoit would hold on – I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, and for him to give up 6 runs in an inning. However, he didn’t. He got some really key strikeouts to get out of some jams, and looked every bit the well seasoned major league pitcher would be. Thing is, we need to keep playing teams that are good. When Benoit plays the Tampa Bays or the Baltimores (this months Baltimore), he plays bad.
However, last night he was great. Anaheim’s pitching was great too, especially Ben Weber out of the bullpen (come to think of it all the bullpen folks used (even my nemesis Rich Rodriguez) pitched well). There were three runs scored, two of them on solo home runs (Anaheim’s Garret Anderson & Pudge). In fact, Pudge scored both runs, and threw out a runner attempting to steal in the 9th, which was huge.
A nice game, and while there were 16 men left on base for both teams, one that seemed to be an old style pitching duel – nice to see in the surprisingly cool weather of late September 2002.
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We lost three over the weekend to the A’s. Too many walks, poor pitching. What more needs to be said? Oh yeah, we had better not have Rich Rodriguez on this team next year, or I’ll be pissed.
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We lost three over the weekend to the A’s. Too many walks, poor pitching. What more needs to be said? Oh yeah, we had better not have Rich Rodriguez on this team next year, or I’ll be pissed.
Additional game commentary is available here.

We lost three over the weekend to the A’s. Too many walks, poor pitching. What more needs to be said? Oh yeah, we had better not have Rich Rodriguez on this team next year, or I’ll be pissed.
Additional game commentary is available here.

Our last game of the year against Seattle ended in a win – our 70th of the year. Unfortunately, it happened to come at Game 153 of the season, which means we’ve lost 83! Eek! It was pretty funny that the pregame show showed Lou Piniella’s blowup two or three times, and the game intro did as well. Still got a lot of mileage out of that. :)
While it was nice that we busted out the big bats in support of Ben Kozlowski – who pitched pretty decently considering the situation. (Raffy Grand Slam, and Arod 3 run home run), we let it get away again after Kozlowski got out of the inning. Jamey Newberg reported today that Pudge was looking sloppy, and I have to agree. If that’s the kind of catching we’ll get if we give him a new contract, then hey, let’s jack up Todd Greene to #1, and have Haselman as his backup. We busted out for 5 runs in the top of 10th, in our fourth straight extra inning game against the Mariners. Nice to see that.
I was astonished to see the total number of walks by both teams in these four games – SIXTY EIGHT!
I was a bit concerned about the goings on in Kansas City, though. Those two mental zeroes that attacked the Royals’ coach should be prosecuted fairly heavily. Also, did you get a look at these idiots? Neither of them looked like they had enough brain cells to even comprehend baseball. Do a Google Image search for ‘William Ligue Gamboa’ – you’ll see what I’m talking about.
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This is the time of year that folks who root for bad baseball teams find ways to do other things. I’m no different. Last night I spent a lot of time watching the Monsters Inc. DVD that I got in yesterday. :)
I tuned in late to the game, and guess what? We lost in extra innings again. However, by far and away the most entertaining thing of the game that I watched was Lou Piniella’s blow up after Mike Young made a spectacular play at second to get (at least by the umpire’s call) an out. Lou of course came out and had a major Lou meltdown. Quite funny to watch, ESPECIALLY as the umpire kept his cool and didn’t say a word, just kind of stood there and let Lou spew. I’m fairly sure that egged Lou on a bit more than he might have. Was also nice of the TV folks to leave the game on Lou, and not cut away to commercials, so we could see it all. There’s only one picture below of this, wish there were more stills. Quite quite funny.
He didn’t pitch in this game, but I still don’t like Rich Rodriguez. Oh yeah, Arod didn’t start the game, but did pinch hit late. Would have liked to have seen the entire night off for him, but one pinch hit isn’t that bad, I guess.
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You know, when a game is played close, and you lose late, you’re supposed to say “I don’t mind losing that because it was a good game”. I’ve gotten tired of saying that over the last three years. I want to win again. I’m sure the Rangers do too, but as a fan, hey, all I can do is bitch about it, right? I can’t actually make decisions that impact the games, right? :)
Anyway, Chan Ho Park looked good, even though he walked 8 batters, it didn’t seem to impact him too much. Park has done a complete turn around lately, and he seems to be the pitcher we had signed, not that guy wearing #61 for the first half of the season. This is good, as I hope he can carry this over into next season. It does show he doesn’t come back well from an injury, though.
Arod looks beat out there, I think he needs a day off. Also, I still don’t like Rich Rodriguez.
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