At the start of the season, I remembered thinking that Mark Clark would be really good for us, and win over 15 games or something like that. He may yet still do that, but I start to wonder when he’s gonna turn it around. It’s sad, but I think we’d be better off with Bobby Witt (3-0, 4.11, 35 IP), Darren Oliver (2-1, 2.72, 39.2 IP), & Julio Santana (1-3, 9.00, 26 IP) based on what they’ve done this year so far! Well, maybe not Santana, but he’s still better than some of what we have (Burkett – 0-2, 12.00, 9 IP & Clark 2-3, 7.85, 36.2 IP).
Six Ranger pitchers, and not a whole lot good out of any of ’em tonight. That’s really all I have to say about the pitching in tonight’s game.
This game’s offense started rather interestingly. I was running an errand after work, and heard the first inning or two on my car radio. Wow! What a start. Two home runs to start the game by two guys who hardly ever hit any home runs – the HR by Goody was only his tenth career home run! However, after that Rusty Greer had a single, and Pat Hentgen shut down the Rangers for a good number of innings. The Rangers next broke through when Juan hit a solo home run in the sixth. Matter of fact, *ALL* of the Rangers runs in this game were due to the longball, as Juan hit a 3 run HR his next time up, which means he personally was responsible for 4 of the 6 runs the Rangers got, and all 6 were long ball RBI’s – a very American League way of doing things. :)
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
The Rangers lost 9-6 to Toronto Friday.
The game began with Tom Goodwin and Mark McLemore doing something they never have done and will probably never do again; they homered back-to-back. Two batters 2-0 Rangers.
Mark Clark, who has been almost as bad as John Burkett, continued to struggle and surrendered 4 runs in the bottom of the first after Goodwin and McLemore staked him to a magical 2-0 lead. Old nemesis Carlos Delgado hit a 2-run blast for the Jays in helping destroy the Ranger lead.
It got worse. The Jays scored 5 runs off Clark in less than 4 innings. He walked 4 hitters, gave up 7 hits and even uncorked a wild pitch. For each out he recorded in the game, he gave up a baserunner. Simply put, he stunk.
Juan Gonzalez hit a couple more home runs, giving him 7. His 4 RBIs give hime 27, which puts him 2nd in the American League. The reigning AL MVP has been red hot the last two weeks.
There is good news. Anaheim, Seattle and Oakland all lost and none of these teams has any shown any consistancy this year.

Boy, does Fenway Park really play a part in the games played there. The stadium itself really changes the impact on the game played. There was a ball that would have been a home run in any other park except this one, a few doubles (possibly home runs) that were just singles here. Forced plays at second… Yeesh!
I always like playing the Red Sox, because the games themselves always seem to be good games. And this was. It was a good game that the Rangers came out on the short end of. And I’m getting tired of saying that. I want to win these things, not lose them.
I thought Sele was pitching well, but again the wheels fell apart in the middle innings. We just can’t seem to get by the middle innings. I only watched this game in pieces as I was flipping between the game and the regular NBC Thursday night TV stuff. :)
I also wanted to say that I agree with Jim below about Mark McLemore.
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
The Rangers just can’t seem to win back-to-back games anymore.
Since the Rangers swept the Twins (that last game of that series being April 25th), the Rangers have swapped wins and losses and are 4-5.
After winning Wednesday, Thursday became no exception to the recent win-loss rule. Aaron Sele pitched like it was May instead of April. He wasn’t terrible, but he wasn’t effective either. He gave up 3 runs in 5.1 innings against his old mates – and it could have been much worse. He allowed 12 base runners during that span – not including a couple of base runners who reached on Ranger errors.
Offensively, the Rangers didn’t do a whole lot. After I touted Gonzalez yesterday, he woefully struck out 3 times Thursday. The Rangers managed 10 hits and even a small rally in the 9th inning, but they just couldn’t get the job done and lost 3-2.
Something should be said about the play of Mark McLemore. Although he made an error Thursday, he has played pretty well in the field and has been decent with the bat. McLemore was a guy I thought would retire after last season yet he keeps surprising me with his health and talent.

Really busy day at work, didn’t get to this until 4:30PM. Was nice to get a big win, but again we bunched up in the first inning. Couple of homers over the green monster. Juan’s looked like it was going out of the ballpark completely! I thought Stevens played well at first base again.
Rick Helling pitched well, as did our relievers, although Venafro gave up his “out streak”. Nice to get a win.
Commentary from Jim Meeks:
Fenway Park is historically a favorite place for the Rangers to play. Wednesday, the Rangers began a road trip in Boston and seemed to enjoy themselves.
Although the team had some bad news before the ball game concerning Royce Clayton’s shoulder, the Rangers exploded for 5 runs in the first inning off Boston starter Pat Rapp. Pudge Rodriguez capped off the inning with a 3-run homer, his 5th of the year.
Rick Helling cruised, for once. In his 6.1 innings, he allowed no homers, the first time all year he’s accomplished that feat. The bullpen combo of Mike Venafro and Jeff Zimmerman held down the Sox to preserve an 8 to 3 win.
Juan Gonzalez homered for the 5th time Wednesday, in perhaps his favorite park to hit in. Expect a big series from him.

Very sloppy game, and our offense did the “get it all at once” theory which seems to be the norm so far this year. However, when the “all at once” is only 4, and you give up double digits, you can see what happened.
We committed four errors, and this was generally a rather bad played game overall. The Rangers historically always seem to be a rather bad team on a day game after a night game. Don’t know how much else to talk about this. To quote one of Jim’s earlier commentaries.. “Ugly, ugly, ugly!”. I had a more interesting time seeing “The Matrix” yesterday than I did listening to this game!
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
The Rangers played sloppily Monday in all stages and lost to the Cleveland Indians 10-4.
Kenny Lofton was the big stars for the Indians, gathering 4 hits and 4 RBI, including a homer.
The Rangers had only 6 hits, none for extra bases. Rafael Palmeiro had 2 of the hits, raising his average to .329. Lee Stevens bounced into 2 double plays, effectively stymying whatever chance the Rangers had. At one point in the 3rd inning, the Rangers rallied from a 4-0 deficit to tie the game, but that was all the runs they would get.
The Red Shoes also committed 4 errors, leading to 2 unearned runs.
Starter Mike Morgan was unusually bad, perhaps bothered with the flu or perhaps he just a bad outing. His 5 runs in 3 innings was by far his worst outing of the year, raising his ERA to 4.05.

Well, I was over some friends’ house for dinner last night, so I didn’t get to see or hear much of any of this game. However, he did have a cable modem, and I got to see score updates from time to time. Naturally, since I wasn’t there, they started doing good again. Saw that Raffy got his 2,000th career hit, which was cool.
Mark Clark went into the 8th inning tonight – virtually uncharted territory for a Rangers pitcher this year. His ERA is still way up in the stratosphere – upper 7’s. Not good.
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
Pitcher Mark Clark, taking a rotation turn on 3 days’ rest for the first time this season, won the ballgame Sunday, with help from Tom Goodwin, Juan Gonzalez and Raffy Palmeiro.
Clark once again laboured through the middle innings but hung on until the 8th inning. The Rangers’ bullpen – which has been near-flawless since Jeff Zimmerman has arrived – once again stopped the opponents.
Clark was not spectacular – only adequate. But adequacy will win you 15 games as a starter for the Rangers, who have an offense capable of burying any opponent (except the Yankees).
Goodwin had a rare good game, getting two hits, stealing a base and being a general nuisciance for the Indians. He refused to comment to reporters after the game, which makes you wonder what bird got into his craw?
Gonzalez ripped another homer and drove in another couple of runs. He’s on a binge right now, so the opponents better not throw him strikes. Gonzo now has 20 RBI’s and is on a pace to drive in 154 runs. Just a week ago – we all wondered aloud as to what destination Gonzalez’ bat had vacationed to.
Palmeiro had 3 hits including his 2000th Major League hit. He also drove in 2 runs.
The Rangers played solid defense behind Clark, who threw 11 ground ball outs.

Well, I was at this game, and I’m starting to think I’m not a good luck charm for the Rangers. They lost again. :(
In the beginning, it looked like Sele was going to dazzle – the first inning was great! We then went one pitch into the second, and there was a rain delay. My season ticket seats are just one row behind where the rain comes when it rains – it’s quite cool, we’ve never had to move from here because of rain. Twice last season (July 4 and the one playoff game) we had to sit through 3 and a half hour rain delays, so this 20 minute one was something to scoff at. :) Anyway, first pitch back was a home run – cripes! Still, I thought Sele pitched fairly well, but the box score doesn’t reflect that.
Doc Gooden pitched really great – figures. Coming in he had a 0-0 9.00ERA record, and wasn’t pitching well this season. Naturally, he picks a night I’m there to step it up.
Ranger bats were virtually silent the whole night – only coming alive in the 8th inning, but a bit too late. Raffy hit a two run home run that was really sweet, as did Todd Zeile to lead off the 9th, but that was it. Pudge almost had a home run earlier in the game, but it went just foul of the right field foul pole. :(
One nice thing – Kelly Dransfeldt played really well. It was his first major league game, going 2-4 and playing well in the infield. The first Indian batter hit a hot smash right at him, and when the play was over he was shown smiling on the jumbotron. Kelly also got a single on his first ever major league at bat, and I saw the ball being taken out of play, which was nice. Kelly was here because Clayton got put on the 15 day DL.
I’m getting tired of saying we lost when I go to a game. :)
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
None this game.

I’m getting ready to go out to tonight’s Ranger game, so I don’t have much time to write, but I do have a few memories from watching the game last night.
Home Run Derby! Cripes – for the second time this season against Helling, and I don’t know how many times, AND the second time in two nights, the leadoff guy for the other team had a home run. Juan had two, including one towering drive that looked from the camera angle that it was going out of the ballpark (of course, that wasn’t going to really happen). Juan hit his other into the Indians bullpen, which is where Lee Stevens hit one, too. The fourth was Rusty Greer who had his first of the season. The Indians also had four, including two by Roberto Alomar (the others by Lofton & Sexon).
Our pitching was a mixed bag. Helling was just “OK”, and Zimmerman continued to sparkle. Man, does this kid look good. However, we’re not seeing all that many of the other right handers now, so I start to wonder about burnout. Wetteland got another save, and is tied for the AL lead.
Royce Clayton had to come out of the game – he was scheduled for an MRI this morning (don’t know what happened), and the Dallas Morning News this morning said that he’s probably going on the DL. They also said that the Rangers don’t trust Shave to play the position for extended periods (we’re 1-3 with him starting SS this year), and were talking about making a roster move to bring up someone else. Hmm.. Could have used Bournigal. :)
The Indians have such an impressive team, they seem to match up against us very well. If I wasn’t a Ranger fan, I’d probably be a fan of this team – they have a lot going for them.
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
The Rangers used 4 home runs – including a multi-homer game by Juan Gonzalez – and fantastic relief pitching to defeat the Cleveland Indians Friday.
Gonzalez, who prior to Friday had just one round-tripper, drove in 3 runs. Rusty Greer hit his first homer and Lee Stevens hit his 8th. The Rangers banged out 13 hits.
Rick Helling again pitched poorly. For the fourth time this month against Rangers’ pitching – the lead-off hitter hit a home run. This is the second time it’s happened to Helling. He was behind in the count on just about every hitter as he labored through this game, throwing an incredible 119 pitches in just over 5 innings of work. He gave up 4 homers, the 5th time this year he’s given more than one homer in a start.
Jeff Zimmerman continues to be the Most Valuable Player of this team. Coming out of the bullpen in the 6th inning, he stopped the Indians cold, allowing just one hit in his 2.2 innings of work and lowering his already microscopic ERA to 0.55. There are no words that can be used to describe just how well Zimmerman has pitched this year.
John Wetteland allowed 2 baserunners in the 9th but preserved the victory for Helling, who surely did not deserve the win.

Well, we went back to our usual result againt the Yankees – A loss. We lost two out of three in this series with the Yankees (making us 1 for 5 so far this season against the World Champs). However, I liked the way we played. We didn’t just roll over and die, although you’d think we did with the season series results. The Yankees are the yardstick. We still don’t measure up against them, and that’s still because of our pitching. These guys can pitch circles around everyone, but it was nice to see us not just wilt. Of coure the Tigers spanked the Yanks a week ago, what’s that say about them? :)
I had that same kind of bad omen I got on opening day. My wife and I are big fans of the NBC Thursday night TV lineup, so we watched mostly that while flipping to the Ranger game during commercials. Oh man, an inside the park Home Run by Mr. Twinkie, Chuck Knoblauch. Ugh.. Well, we stayed with them for awhile, and then when I got done watching Frasier, I flipped back, and it was 5-0. I thought we were done for, but we did manage to hold them to no more runs after they got to 5. We did battle back, but it wasn’t enough against Yankee pitching.
Old Man Morgan (I don’t like the nickname “The Mo Man” – sounds dippy) pitched well, but some defensive blunders gave him the loss. He only got charged with one earned run, the rest were unearned. The inside the parker was a blunder by Tom Goodwin, and Todd Zeile made a bad throw that Stevens couldn’t dig out which led to a few Yankee runs. Mike ended up leaving the game after being hit on the shin by a batted ball. He looked OK, but Johnny took him out anyway. Given the score, I think it was more to get him out before more damage was done. I wasn’t watching the game completely, but from what I saw, he didn’t seem like he was pitching that bad – just caught a few bad breaks. Mike Venafro looked good from what I saw in the line score (only saw him pitch to two batters) and from what Jim said below. I like sidearm pitchers, they just seem “cooler” to me. :)
I agree with Jim below, it’s a game we should have won, but didn’t. Still, I liked that we didn’t look like total crap against the Yankees. On another note, I wish Don Zimmer well, this is the last time the Rangers should see him, and he seems like a nice guy from what I can tell. I know you’ll never see this Zim, but one Ranger fan wishes you well!
As a side note, after ER last night, my wife and I watched Field of Dreams. It’s a spectacular movie if you’ve never seen it. A bit on the weird side for me, but still very well done. That and Bull Durham. :) Also, what was with the AL West yesterday? 22 runs by the Mariners? 17 by the Angels? Cripes!
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
Two Rangers defensive blunders cost them a ball game Thursday night.
The game’s first batter, second baseman Chuck Knoblauch, hit a liner to center fielder Tom Goodwin, who dove, missed the ball and let it skip by him all the way to the wall. Knoblauch scored on what should have been a single and a three base error but the official scorer deemed a home run.
A bad throw by third baseman Todd Zeile couldn’t be handled by first baseman Lee Stevens in the third inning and the Yankees scored 4 unearned runs in the inning. The Yankees only scored 5 runs total and all 5 should have been unearned.
This marks the first game the Rangers have lost this year due to lousy defense. The Rangers have actually played above-average defensively all year.
Mike Morgan didn’t pitch badly but was charged with the loss.
Mike Venafro pitched 4 perfect innings in relief and probably earned himself a permanent stay with the big club. He’s pitched extremely well since his call-up. Danny Patterson is likely the odd man out when John Burkett returns.
Rafael Palmeiro stroked a 2-run homer in the 8th, but it was too little and too late.
This was a game they could’ve and should’ve won. Let’s hope the Rangers don’t lose the division by one game.

A win against the Yankees! That’s always a good way to end a game. I didn’t get to see it unfortunately. Fox Sports Southwest in my area screwed up again. The game was nationally televised on ESPN, and that was blacked out, and FSS was supposed to be showing it. Well, the showed the damn Astros game again. Methinks it’s time to write to someone about it. :( I was flipping back and forth between the radio and television, as my wife and I were watching a movie, as well as Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
About the Rangers game.. :) We did it primarily with the big inning again. Those are always fun to see, but I prefer a more even win. A win is a win, but for me they seem better when you don’t get all your runs at once. The Yankees started it off again with a home run (we seem to give up a lot of them to these guys), but Todd Zeile evened it up again with a solo home run. Jorge Posada put the Yanks up again with another home run in the 5th, and then we got a couple right back with a Lee Stevens double and a sac fly by Goodwin. Lee Stevens continues to look really good, which might make things difficult for Johnny Oates when Raffy is ready for the field again.
We got into the 7th, and when the Yankees are leading after 6, they’re virtually unbeatable. Then we had another 5 run explosion. It was capped off (IMHO) by Juan Gonzalez’ two run single with the bases loaded – finally delivering in the clutch (they had walked Greer to get to Juan). Zeile (who I really really like this year) then doubled and scored two more. All this put the Rangers ahead for good.
Munoz pitched very well, earning a win (Clark continues to be somewhat unreliable to ineffective, which doesn’t seem like the promise when he came here), and John Wetteland got right back on the horse after last night. He did give up a solo home run to Tino Martinez, but that was about it, earning his MLB leading 7th save.
All in all a good win, but I would have preferred the win be more even, not with a 5 run inning again.
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
It wasn’t pretty, but the Rangers hocus-pocused their way to victory Wednesday over the Yankees.
Coming from behind, the Rangers made the most of their hits in the later innings – especially key were hits from Lee Stevens (who continues to hit left handed pitching well) and Juan Gonzalez, who’s power is MIA but still has 16 RBI (about half of what league leader Manny Ramirez has) and is on pace to drive in over 120 for the year.
The Rangers – like the Yankees yesterday – clawed their way out of a hole. The 7th inning was pivotal as they leveled what is usually the Yankees dead-pan bullpen. They battered lefty Mike Stanton, then took on Jeff Nelson. When the inning was over, they had plated 5 runners on 5 hits.
The rubber game of the series is Thursday..

In the middle of the first inning, I was thinking – Where was this in October? Then at the end of the game, I was thinking Nevermind, had the same result as October.
I went to this game last night, and one the way to the game I mentioned to my wife that I was expecting a loss, but I thought it’d be a good game. I got both. The Rangers lost, but damn, this was a great game, if you’re a fan of baseball. It had a bit of evertyhing. Big bang inning, several comebacks, a couple of long balls, some small ball, it was a great damn game. The place was packed – an attendance of 42,600. I’ve been to larger crowds, but never for a weekday night game. Those usually are in the low 30’s. This was also Tuesday night which meant Tom Thumb half price ticket night, and I’m sure the Yankee fans were in attendance. It really seemed like there were a lot more Yankee fans out last night than there were at the playoff game last October (which I also went to – and sat through the whole 3.5 hr rain delay all the way to the end of the game).
Now, as a Ranger fan, this game both sucked and was great. Boy did Roger Clemens get booed when they announced his name in the lineup, and when he took the field. What was interesting is that the Yankee fans were also cheering him, of course. Was an interesting reaction, but the boos were bigger. The Rangers jumped all over the Rocket in the first inning. We batted around, scored 5 runs, and generally made Clemens seem like oh, I don’t know Bobby Witt did last year. :) Clemens settled down in the second inning, but that was it for him. He came out after the second, which seemed like a surprise at the park – later on I found out it was a hamstring thing. He was replaced by Hidecki Irabu, who dominated the Rangers. Several of his innings were 1-2-3. In fact, the only thing we managed to break through against him with was a wild pitch that we scored on. That’s it. :( The rest of the Yankee pitchers also closed us down, so the Rangers got a big first inning, one small gift, but it wasn’t enough.
Ranger pitching was fair. I thought Aaron Sele was crusining along well, until the 5th when Sele gave up a couple. Still, he didn’t look that bad, and then in the 6th, it fell apart. Jeff Zimmerman came in (to a big ovation from the crowd), and one run scored on him but that was charged to Sele. But he gave up his own first run, a solo shot to Paul O’Neill. Still, I thought Zimmerman pitched pretty great. Wetteland came in and blew his first save opportunity – he looked really weak from the first pitch. Never got it going, and gave up two runs.
Overall, even though we lost, I can say that I enjoyed the game. The Yankee fans were rather well behaved as Yankee fans go. This is now my fifth game at the Ballpark this season, and they added something new since the last game I attended. The large scoreboard over the left field wall, which used to show the current player’s batting average now shows the pitcher’s pitch count – total as well as balls/strikes. It’s a great help for people who score at the park. The info that used to be here has been displaced to the large Coke scoreboard out in center field. This pitch count scoreboard is in addition to the new scoreboard they added at the start of this season that shows ball speed and type. These things are a great addition for scorers, and if anyone at the Rangers reads this (yeah, right) and has something to do with these changes – way to go! I like them!
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
No wonder Roger Clemens chose the Yankees in the off-season over the Rangers.
Clemens was battered in the first inning Tuesday, pulled his hamstring and left the game after just two innings, trailing 5-0 to the Rangers.
As I listened to the game, I had this odd feeling – even as the Rangers were up 5-0, that they would somehow manage to lose the game. My feelings didn’t lie.
The Almighty Yankees pecked their way back into the game. Aaron Sele, held the 5-run cushion for 5.1 innings and Jeff Zimmerman pitched 2.2 and only surrendered a solo homer. By the time the 9th inning came around it was 6-5.
The surest thing the Rangers have is John Wetteland. And as any manager would have done, Manager Johnny Oates sent the dominating right hander to the mound to nail down the victory for Sele in the 9th – and finally put Clemens’ 18 game win streak – and the Yankees – to rest.
It wasn’t to be. Wetteland’s ex-mates scored twice in the frame.
He began the inning ominously with a walk. Two batters and 2 singles later, the game was tied 6 to 6. Two batters later, the Yankees went ahead, 7-6.
The Rangers went quietly in the bottom of the ninth and the Yankees gleefully recorded yet another victory over the Rangers – who just can’t seem to beat the Yankees.