As is my policy for the last few years, I don’t write about losses to the Yankees.

It’s always great to go into the Bronx and beat the Yankees? Who doesn’t like putting that self righteous franchise a few pegs lower down on the totem pole? The only thing better than a Yankees loss is a Cowboys loss, but that’s a blog post for another time.

Matt Harrison took the mound, and continues to post like a guy you wouldn’t expect “Matt Harrison” to post like. While he didn’t have dominant stuff, he did certainly manage to get the job done. Just look at his line:

8IP, 7H, 3BB, 2R (1ER), 3K, 104P.

That’s a great line. While he did allow more hits/walks than innings pitched, he was most certainly helped out by the defense, which turned not one or two, but SIX double plays behind Matt. The first one was by Alex Rodriguez, which prompted me at home to declare out loud, “The Chiller is back”! Arod’s having a great spring, but not this game. He started it off by grounding into a double play. The only better thing than that was the called strikeout of Arod last October.

Anyway, Harrison continued to look like a brilliant pitcher. After three outings, I’m starting to think that this might be the new Matt Harrison, and making the Mark Teixeira trade with Atlanta look even more brilliant on our side.

The other really interesting line from this game is the fact that the Rangers scored five runs to win the game. However, the team combined had just four hits. But, the Yankees allowed SEVEN walks, which is where the bulk of the action came from. On the hit side, all we had was a double by Adrian Beltre & Michael Young, and singles by Michael Young & Nelson Cruz. That was IT. Pretty spartan offense, but with all the walks, you could make the point that Ivan Nova gave it to us, as five of the walks were on his ledger.

Neftali Feliz gave up a run in the ninth to make it a little closer, but despite the lack of a real offensive attack, it always felt like our game. Which is always ALWAYS good against the Yankees.

The Rangers final game in the Detroit series was an odd one. First off, due to the doubleheader, we needed a spot start, that it was chosen to be Dave Bush.
Who did a decent enough job Three innings, three hits, three walks, and no runs allowed. He only went three innings, so it was really a bullpen game from the start. I thought he’d go more than he did, especially as when he came out, he only had 71 pitches. Way high for just three innings, but he didn’t look awful when he came out, I figured on four at that point. Oh well.
He was followed by Mason Tobin, who did pretty well. Went two innings himself, allowed just a hit and a walk – no runs. He looked good.
What didn’t look good was what was next. Mark Lowe. Blown save, allowed the two runs the Tigers got to tie the game in the sixth. Given we had just scored our two runs in the top of the sixth, it was a momentum killer, for sure.
Arthur Rhodes kept up his end of the bargain with a perfect inning thrown in the seventh.
Even Darren Oliver was OK in the eighth, but he went back out in the ninth, and allowed the winning run in the bottom of the ninth for the loss. Bummer.
Offensively, we didn’t string much together. We had a double by Michael Young, and eight other singles. That was it. That seems like a lot of hits when I play the “not a lot of offense” card, but the Tigers did a good job at spacing them apart, and keeping us off the scoreboard. Managed to string enough together in the top of the sixth to score our two runs then on RBI singles by Nelson Cruz & David Murphy.
That was it, though. Dropped a series for the first time this year, 1-2 in Detroit. Which is better than we have been playing there lately, which would have been 0-3. Sigh.

Well, there’s two big things to talk about in this game, other than the fact we lost.
First was the play at home with Josh Hamilton that caused us to lose Josh until effectively the All-Star break. After a foulout to the area in front of the third base dugout, nobody was covering home for the Tigers. Apparently, Dave Anderson told Josh Hamilton that home plate was open, and depending on what story you read, he was told to go, or was just mentioned the plate was open. Either way, Josh took off, and it was a mad dash to home plate between him and catcher Victor Martinez. They arrived at more or less the same time, and Josh slid headfirst into home plate, and got injured doing so. The clip to me doesn’t seem to indicate anything that Martinez did that was bad, was just one of those freak injuries. That’s twice in an inning that Hamilton slid headfirst into a base, which really is NOT the best way to go. Should have slid feet first. There’s a quite by Josh saying that he would have definitely been out, but given how close the play was, I don’t know if you can definitively say that one way or the other.
Now after the game, on MLBN and ESPN, and many articles, Hamilton was quoted as saying “It was a stupid play”, and “I was thinking, ‘I don’t want to do this … something is going to happen”. While he didn’t exactly come out and call Dave Anderson stupid, the implication is there since it was Anderson who supposedly “sent” Josh. I’m not taking Hamilton’s side on this one, because if he TRULY felt that strongly about it, only he could start his legs moving. Anderson could tell him to rub his backside on a cheese grater, but if Josh felt it was a stupid thing to do, then he shouldn’t have done it. Some of that reaction is probably frustration over being hurt yet again, but still. Whining about it in the press doesn’t seem like a very cool thing to do. I’ll be curious to see if there’s a retraction or explanation, or refining of the comment in the next day or so.
Either way, he’s out for awhile. Josh has been hitting for average, but not for power. Chris Davis comes up to replace him on the roster, and we get a chance to see if he can shake his 4A label like Nelson Cruz did a couple of years ago. I’m guessing he’ll get a few starts at first, and if he can hit the way he has been in spring and AAA so far this year, he’ll probably play first, and I’d imagine they’d put Moreland in the outfield. We’ll see.
As for pitching, CJ Wilson has a quote about this game, saying “Just garbage, to be frank.” While I don’t think he was quite that bad, he was inconsistent. Wasn’t pounding the zone, and was a bit all over the place. His line wasn’t THAT bad. 6.2IP, 7H, 3B, 4ER. Not great, mind you, but not “garbage”. Struck out four, and looked pretty pedestrian. Nothing to worry about, I think, as he battled, and in places did look good, but yeah. Not a great outing.
He was followed by Pedro Strop, who looked good in his 1.1 innings of work. He walked one guy, which if he hadn’t, would have been a perfect outing. Strop has been pretty good numbers wise, so far.
Darren O’Day though.. Lost the game in the bottom of the ninth. I don’t think anyone had any faith in him, except maybe. While I did think he’d actually get out of it, I didn’t think it would be easy. It was not. 22 pitches to get just two outs, and give Detroit the game in a walkoff. Bah.
We’re still in great shape. 9-2, which anyone would kill for, but the Hamilton injury kind of makes this game worse than your usual loss.
Rubber game on Wed afternoon when Dave Bush makes a spot start to help out due to the doubleheader.

Alexi Ogando vs Justin Verlander. Despite Ogando’s performance in his first start, it did seem like a bit of an unfair fight, didn’t it? Not quite David vs. Goliath, as I wouldn’t call Ogando “small” at all (haha). But one figured this would be a place where the streak would stop. It didn’t.
Ogando was brilliant. I mean BRILLIANT. His stuff was dominating, and no WAY did he pitch like he was a fifth starter. He pitched like he was up the top. Man, Tommy Hunter simply cannot be liking this. There’s no way Ogando can come out of the rotation if he keeps pitching like this. Things have a way of working themselves out, and I’m sure this will too, but man. Ogando was scary good looking. Shame that a blister had to take him out of the game after the seventh, as he looked dominating enough that he could have gone all nine, even where Feliz would have more obviously come in based on circumstances.
He was followed by Darren Oliver and Neftali Feliz who both pitched scoreless innings and allowed a hit each (Feliz threw in a walk too for good measure). Wow. Just WOW.
On the other side, Justin Verlander was advertised. He pitched the complete game loss, and he himself was brilliant too. Except for the top of the seventh. Verlander allowed too many bunched hits together. Walk to Hamilton, single to Beltre, and a double to Mike Young. After a groundout by Cruz that resulted in Beltre being out at the plate, Moreland also doubled for the other run. Without breaking out my scorecard to look at the number of pitches, I recall most of that sequence having at bats with just a few pitches, so it all happened pretty quickly. Verlander regained control and shut out the Rangers for the final two innings, but the damage was done.
Just in case you didn’t notice it. I was seriously impressed with Alexi Ogando. I CANNOT WAIT for him to pitch again.
This was an awesome win. 9-1. Matches the best start in club history. I think if we win on Tuesday, we set a new standard, right?
Go Rangers!

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

After losing game one of the DH 5-0, you wondered what would happen in game 2. For the first two innings, pretty much the same.
The Rangers went down without a fight in their first two frames. 1-2-3 both times. Three groundouts, two flyouts, and a strikeout. Nothing much to say there. Same on the other side, too. We gave up a home run in the second to Adam Jones that put us down 1-0. Given what happened in game one, you kind of thought game two was off to the same feel at that point. But that’s pretty much where it ended.
Before I get to the Rangers offense.. I need to mention Adam Jones’ home run again. That apparently irritated Matt Harrison, as he went all Cliff Lee on the Orioles after that. He didn’t allow anyone else to reach base after that. Period. Retired 18 Orioles in a row until he exited the game after the seventh inning. That’s 1-2-3 innings in the 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, & 7th. He also had one in the second, sort of – he went 1-2-3 after the home run. :) Harrison looked great. His line was 7 IP, 2H, 1ER, one BB, 3K. The one run came on the home run ball. But man, he was dealing. Many people said if we were going to overcome the loss of Cliff Lee, one of the 3-5 guys would have to step up and pick up that slack. If this is what we’re gonna get from Harrison all season, I’d say yeah, that will be covered.
Adrian Beltre, who was VERY close to dipping below a batting average of .100 got himself on the right track this game. He went 3-5 in Game 2, with 3 RBI’s and three runs scored. Hs average is still just .182, but a few more 2-4, or 3-5 nights, and he’ll be where he needs to be. He’s getting a lot of bad breaks – very hard hit balls right at people.
The fourth was interesting, as it started with a walk. Another single, and a second walk loaded the bases. Kinsler grounded out into a force play at home, which made it still bases loaded and one out. I’m thinking “Uh-oh”. Never ever like to load the bases with nobody out and get nothing. Fortunately, we got three straight hits after that. And all three of them were two RBI hits. It was started with a single to right center, which I thought might have split the outfielders, but not quite. It scored Napoli & Moreland. Andrus then proceeded to steal second, which was huge, as almost immediately Hamilton put a single to the same general vicinity as Elvis’ hit, and Josh scored both Kinsler & Andrus. Beltre followed up with a two run home run, for the third consecutive two out, two RBI hit by the Rangers. It added up to a six spot in the third, and you were feeling OK again.
We added a couple more in the fourth when Napoli jacked a home run into the upper bullpen in left center. Moreland singled, and Josh Rupe came in to relieve. Greeted immediately by an Ian Kinsler double, scoring Moreland.
Picked up another on a sac fly by Nelson Cruz in the 7th.
Nelson Cruz finished off the scoring with a three run home run in the 9th, after Beltre had an RBI double. We finally had a reason to play the bottom of the ninth for the first time this season, but before we get to that…
I need to mention Pedro Strop. What a bizarre case of pitching there. His first six pitches were completely filthy stuff. I mean, it was dazzling to watch. He struck out Mark Reynolds & Robert Andino. Reynolds strikes out all the time anyway, but these six pitches would have struck out anyone. He looked.. I mean I said out loud “Wow” after the Andino K. Then he lost it. Gave up a single to Felix Pie. Then balked TWICE in a row, moving Pie over to third. Proceeded to walk Izturis, and then Nick Markakis. Uh-oh. What happened to the guy in those first six pitches? Fortunately, he got Derrek Lee to strike out without any runs scoring, but man. After the second out of the inning, I was ready to proclaim it a better pitching performance than Harrison’s. While Harrison got the job done, the pitching to the first two batters in the 8th was a show, man. No damage done, but man, it was a Wetteland moment for sure.
Mark Lowe came in for the bottom of the ninth. Let a few base runners onboard, but nobody crossed the plate, which is the ultimate point.
Glad to see the Rangers roar back after being shut out. We’re now 7-1, and look to take the series on Sunday afternoon. Which is amusing, as it’s the first of four consecutive games in a row during the day. All three games in Detroit on M-Wed are day games. That almost never happens. Even when you play the Cubs. In fact, five of the next six games we play are during the day.

The Rangers finally dropped a game. We all knew there wasn’t going to be a 162-0 season. I’d say it’s a safe bet we weren’t going 120-42 either. We’re losing a bunch, so it might as well be to a team that’s started the season as hot as we did. I just didn’t think we’d lose quite so convincingly.
Sometimes when you lose, and you know you’re gonna lose, it’s a game with a score like 22-1 or something like that. This was different. We only lost 5-0, but it felt like more. That was mostly due to the Orioles starter Zach Britton. Much has been written about how Showalter has turned around the Orioles. But even the best manager of all time can’t do jack if his players don’t play. We keep hearing about how Baltimore has a bunch of young arms, and we ran into one in the first game of the doubleheader on Saturday afternoon. Britton looked great. Kept us off balance, and while he didn’t punch out a lot of guys, we never got much going. We had just five hits in all. Four of them off Britton, and never more than one in an inning. In fact, it took till the 8th inning for us to get two guys on at the same time. Despite our futility, we had the first ban on multiple innings, but had three of them wiped out by double play. Was a great team effort there. Britton was lifted after 7.2 innings when he allowed two men on base for the first time. He had thrown 103 pitches at this point, and I thought was still looking good, but Showalter must have seen something. He got a nice standing O by the O’s fans there, so that was good to see, even though it was at the Rangers expense. Britton’s season ERA after this game was 0.66. Quite nice. He’s 2-0 now, too.
Colby Lewis was far more pedestrian. Six innings, six hits, one walk, but two home runs. That accounted for the four earned runs he allowed (one unearned, too). He wasnt’ awful, but wasn’t going to scare anyone this night.
Mason Tobin pitched the final two innings, and was pretty good. Two innings, just one hit and a walk. 21 pitches to seven batters total. Good appearance there for sure.
The Rangers streak of not playing the bottom of the ninth continues. Seven games in, and we still haven’t needed that. See what happens when they play the bottom of the ninth in the final exhibition game, and they didn’t have to? :)
So much for repeating the 30-3 score in the first game of the last doubleheader played in Baltimore. :)