No commentary – I was having lunch at a great Tex Mex place in Houston (two blocks down the street from NASA) when this game was on. :)

I was driving from Dallas to Houston when this game was on, and didn’t get to hear all of it, as I eventually drove out of range of KRLD.
I did get to hear Mark Clark give up another home run (a bit of a broken record with him, I think) and Todd Zeile hit a home run, but that was about it. No commentary from me, as I hardly heard any of the game.

I didn’t see much of this game, as my wife and went out and did some shopping before we headed out on our trip to Houston this weekend to see the Astros in Houston. I saw the first three innings, and when I left, it was 1-0 Red Sox.
When I came home, it was a much nicer game. Looking at the box score, we had some great pitching again – I’m surprised they didn’t give Wetteland a shot at another save, but I guess he needed a break in these situations.
Didn’t get to see much, but it’s nice to win 3 in a row again. I hope we can pull out at least 3 of 4 in Boston. Not going to update again until Monday afternoon, so I won’t have commentary for the next two days when I do get back to updating, as I’ll be out of touch and won’t be able to see any of the games.
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
Not available.

I didn’t think we had it in us to pull off the split. This game felt really good. Got a long ball, had small ball, had some nice defense, we did just about everything last night. Hell, we pulled off the first triple play in 22 years (only the second in Ranger history).
Roger Clemens was masterful early. He struck out ten in the first four innings, including everyone in the first two innings. However, we ended up getting to him (and the Yankees) in the latter part of the game.
I was flipping back and forth between this game and the Stars game, so I didn’t see everything, but I did see the triple play. What was funny was that the guy who hit into it (Chili Davis) also hit into a double play later. :)
I’ve been impressed with Gregg Zaun the last few days. He’s not the greatest catcher around, but he certainly did his part when called upon. I was very disappointed when Bill Haselman signed somewhere else after last year, but I have to say… Gregg Zaun has grown on me.
“It was a team effort” is so cliched, but here it meant something. This game was won by the team, not by any one player. This was spectacular baseball, the kind of stuff a hardcore baseball fan lives for.
We survived Yankee Stadium, breaking our 7 game losing streak there with a split. Now it’s on to Beantown for four more – I like playing Boston, we always seem to get good baseball playing them.

Oh my – we had some pitching! If I didn’t watch the game on TV, I would have thought it was a misprint!!
Rick Helling was totally masterful, going 7 innings, giving up no runs on just three hits. This is what we needed – let’s just hope it continues over past today. I didn’t feel like writing the last two nights, as what can you say? The Yankees beat us almost all the time in Yankee stadium. What was there to write about?
We won last night, which was really great. Our pitching was totally masterful, and is the kind of thing we’d need if we’re going to advance in the playoffs. Speaking of pitching, this morning’s (Thursday’s) Dallas Morning News seemed to imply that we might be going after Darren Oliver again in July. Ugh. While he’s pitching OK, he’s not totally what we need.
Honestly, there isn’t much to talk about with this game. Lee Stevens belted a two run home run, but other than that, we didn’t do much until Ruben Mateo batted in a run late. We ourselves only had 5 hits for the game, and if it wasn’t for the Stevens blast, this game would have been a complete and total pitcher’s duel (more than it already was).
Was really nice to see the Rangers pick up the win.
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
Not available.

None – don’t feel like talking about the Yankee curse. :)
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
Oh oh.
The Rangers’ slump reached 4 games after the Yankees held the Rangers to just 4 hits. The Rangers lost 6-2.
Ryan Glynn, not to be confused with Nolan Ryan, hasn’t had a good outing yet. Glynn who been more like John Glenn – of the astronoimal ERA’s.
I think it’s time to try someone else on the mound in his stead. (Is Esteban Loaiza ready yet? Would Loaiza do any worse?).
The offense has gone on pre-summer vacation. And it doesn’t get any easier. There are 2 more games left with the “Rangers can’t beat you but everyone else can” Yankees and then 4 more with the Red Sox.
To top it off, Johnny Oates went nuts in the clubhouse after the game, erupting during a team meeting, ended by him throwing a baseball at a locker in disgust over his team’s recent play – especially against the Yankees. The previous time Oates held a closed door team meeting, the team responded positively.
Do they have enough pitching to respond positively again?

None – don’t feel like talking about the Yankee curse. :)
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
None available.

There wasn’t really a whole lot to this game. Mike Morgan, outside of the second inning pitched very well, and the two Ranger relivers that followed (Venafro/Crabtree) each pitched one scoreless inning. Mike Morgan made one big mistake in the second, a three run home run to Kurt Abbott. Other than that, he was great. In fact, the Rockies went down 1-2-3 in every inning from the fourth to the ninth with only two hits in that mix. The three run home run did it.
The Rangers weren’t a whole lot better, except we didn’t go down 1-2-3 as many times. The Rockies did it in 7 of the 9 innings, we did it in only 3. Our lone scoring was the two solo home runs by Juan Gonzalez & Rafael Palmeiro in the 4th. We had a few chances (1st and 3rd with 2 outs in the first, 1st and 3rd with 1 out in the 9th), but we didn’t mount any real offense.
In fact, the offense for both sides was rather scattered, as there were a total of 15 hits for both teams, and 14 of them were by different players (only Echevarria for Colorado had two). We had our chances, and we didn’t come through. Oh well.
On to a hellacious 8 game stretch with four games in New York, and four in Boston. Ugh. Hope we come out of that still in first, and still in decent shape.
Ruben Mateo went 0-4 with a walk – he has one hit in his first two games, a home run. Mateo did try and make a good catch during the game, but missed it – he looked good, and he did change his uniform number from 38 to 21 – no reason given on TV that I heard for the switch.
Commentary by Jim Weeks:
Mike Morgan had his most effective outing of the year, but one bad pitch was belted for a 3 run homer and the Rangers lost.
This is one game the Rangers should have won. They had numerous opportunities to win the game, including in the 9th inning, but it wasn’t to be.
Ruben Mateo, sporting Ruben Sierra (and Roberto Clemente’s) #21, made a bad judgement play in center, diving for a ball he should have played differently. Although he walked in the game, he did strike out twice.
Juan Gonzalez drove in his 1,000th career run with a solo homer.

My wife and I were out for the evening seeing a movie (Austin Powers II), so we didn’t hear/see much of the game at all. We did hear part of a pre-game interview with Jeff Zimmerman where he talked a bit about his brother with the Mariners, and what it’s been like being part of the bullpen this year. Zim did say one thing that I totally agreed with him on. He does not like the nickname “The Zimmenator” that the TV guys have given him.
When the movie was over, and we got in the car, I turned on the radio, and started listening. The score was I believe 8-4 at the time, and while we were driving, I heard Mateo’s name. At that point, I hadn’t found out about the roster move – the short time we listened to the pre-game in the car, they didn’t mention it. Mateo hit his first dinger of his career (didn’t see it, only in replays), and he almost hit two, but seemed to have a good game for his first. There was a miscommunication late in the game with Juan on a fly ball that they almost appaered to run into each other over. Still, good first outing.
So, they had put Goodwin on the DL, and brought up Ruben Mateo. If you read my commentary from yesterday, this is what I didn’t want to have happen, as I figured it would piss off Simms & Kelly (there was an article in today’s Dallas Morning News about that same issue). Anyway, now that he’s here, I would like him to stay, but I have a feeling that we’ll be losing either Simms or Kelly in the process. That’s a shame, we have done good with these guys, but if we could only keep one, I’d rather keep Kelly.
Oh well. Aaron Sele seemed to be pitching well, but caught a really bad break in the bottom of the 4th, and the Rockies scored four runs because of it. :( Not the greatest outing for him, but not the worst – our bullpen picked up the slack pretty good.
I’d write more, but I only saw the last two innings on TV, and listened to one on the radio – by this point, all the big stuff had happened already. :)
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
Not available.

Royce Clayton doesn’t hit many home runs, but when he does, he does it off someone good. Last night it was Darryl Kile giving up a homer to Royce in the 6th, tying the game; Royce’s second of the year. His other home run was last week in Arizona off Randy Johnson. Royce is playing and hitting better lately, but I get the feeling he’s still not all there.
All three Ranger runs were courtesy of the longball. The other one was Rafael Palmeiro in the bottom of the eighth inning, with a two run blast to win the game. He’s definitely Mr. Clutch this season, that’s for sure.
In a disturbing trend in the last month, Rick Helling pitched excellent, but didn’t get any runs, and was removed, and the bullpen swiped his run for him (again Zimmerman, who is now 7-0 in relief). It’s great that he’s pitching well, but our offense needs to wake up a bit earlier during Helling’s games. Helling is lowering his ERA, he’s down to 4.5. That’s still not that great, but considering how much up in the stratosphere it was after April, it’s great to see it somewhere near reality.
In the game, Tom Goodwin injured himself running from first to third, and had to come out of the game. It looked fairly bad when he was being helped off the field, and Roberto Kelly came in for him. With Mike Simms ready to come off the DL, I wonder what will happen. The Rangers said that Ruben Mateo will be in Arlington today, so that brings up an interesting scenario. If Goodwin goes on the DL, do they give the job to Kelly and activate Simms for backup? Do they call up Mateo, give him the job, leave Kelly as the backup (possibly pissing him off in the last year of his contract with us), and leave Simms on the DL (probably pissing him off, too)? Do we bring up Mateo, give the job to Kelly, and have Mateo as a backup? Do we activate Simms, give Kelly the job, with Simms as backup, and leave Mateo in AAA? It’s an intersting scenario. As I write this (1:45PM on Saturday the 12th), the decision still hasn’t been made (or I can’t find it on the net). I’m really curious to see what happens here.
Personally, I’d like to give it to Kelly and activate Simms, leaving Mateo in AAA. That is if the injury to Goodwin requires a trip to the DL, and it isn’t too long term. If it *IS* a long term thing, bring up Mateo give him the job, keep Kelly as a backup, and still activate Simms, and send one of the bullpen guys down to AAA. I think we’re out of options on Simms, and we have to expose him to the wire. I don’t really want to lose him.
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
Rafael Palmeiro’s 2 run homer in the 8th inning led the Rangers to a 3-2 comeback victory over the Rockies Friday.
Palmeiro just keeps coming through with the big hit – he has 4 of the last 5 game-winning RBI’s for the Rangers – all of them late in the ball game.
Jeff Zimmerman, now an amazing 7-0 with an ERA of 1.13 and John Wetteland shut down the Rockies in the last 2 innings.
These two have been outstanding as now the Rangers’ bullpen is 15-1 with 31 saves.
Rick Helling pitched well for 7 innings but Texas had a hard time scoring off of Darryl Kile.
Kile might wind up in a Rangers’ uniform before the trade deadline. This is a pitcher the Rangers wanted a couple of years ago but he chose Rockies’ money instead. The Rockies would want a couple of Minor League pitchers for him and probably Cesar King as well.
Tom Goodwin injured his hip during the game running the bases. There’s no word yet as I write this how serious an injury it is but this may well open the door for Ruben Mateo, by far the highest rated offensive prospect in baseball, who’s having a monster year at AAA.