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You know, I enjoy great pitcher’s duels. In all honesty, that’s what this game was. Both Kason Gabbard and Carlos Silva pitched really well. Between the two of them, they combined for 13.2 innings, and combined gave up 10 hits and two earned runs. A pretty good pitcher’s duel. Even the pens were pretty well stacked in the stats categories. But as I’ve written about many times here, I’m no fan of extra inning games. I’m OK if we can get by inning #10, but when we lose extra inning games (which is a lot), it always seems to happen in the 10th. If we can get by that I feel better. It’s a bit irrational, I admit, but there it is.
Kason Gabbard pitched really well again, seemingly having no ill effects from the game he had to come out of early not too long ago. Kason went 6.2 innings, gave up five hits and one earned run. Walked three and struck out three. He deserved better than this. He left with the score tied, and I felt like he should have gotten the win, especially against Carlos Silva, who has historically (although not in recent vintage) been a pitcher that gets bombed a lot. The only real good moment was a towering majestic home run for Saltamacchia, his first in a Ranger uniform. Frank Catalanotto had three hits in this game, but none counted for anything. There were only three other hits in all total for the rest of the team, we were pretty much shut down.
As for the end of the game.. That’s what I get for thinking Jamey Wright had figured it out. The Twins won the game in the 10th on a “walkoff wild pitch” by Wright, allowing the winning run in. That brings up a silly statistical issue I have. The wild pitch technically counts as an unearned run. Screw that. It was the pitcher’s direct fault that the run scored by throwing it away. The rules need to be changed to make that an earned run. I don’t have the exact rulebook text in front of me, but I believe it says something along the lines of a run is unearned when it scores due to no fault of the pitcher. Feh – tell me the wild pitch wasn’t Jamey Wright’s fault – that should be an earned run.
A quick note to a big Red Sox fan of mine… How’s that Gagne trade workin’ out for ya right now? ;)

I was all ready to write a lot about how John Rheincker had a great pitching effort. Went 7.1 innings, gave up just two earned runs, left with a tie, but still, feeling good.
Then came in Willie Eyre, which is in my mind never a good thing. Might be the nicest guy in the world, but I never think good things when he came in. Boy was that fulfilled tonight. Eyre seriously stunk up the joint, got the loss (deservedly so). He only threw 0.2 innings, but gave up three hits, one walk, and four earned runs.
I got so mad at the ending of that game, I don’t feel like breaking it down.

Who would have thunk it? Certainly not me the way I was ragging on Padilla earlier on Wednesday. I don’t think most Ranger fans were really frothing at the mouth at the chance of seeing #44 pitch again. I sat down last night to watch the game, and bam – bam – bam. Padilla struck out the side in the first inning. That was very unexpected. And then something else happened. I fell asleep on the sofa.
Next thing I knew, I woke up right before Michael Young’s double in the sixth, so I missed most of Padilla’s performance. But the first inning was quite good. In all, Padilla went five innings, giving up just four hits and EIGHT strikeouts – wow. There were 15 outs while he was the pitcher, and he struck out eight of them. That was a very nice number. He did give up one unearned run. This was quite the performance. I understand five innings and 80 pitches on first start back from the DL, I’m sure that’s the reason he came out when he did.
CJ Wilson had his first shaky save – although not really his fault. There was a throwing error by Gerald Laird in the ninth, as well as a ball that just ate up Michael Young. Took a wicked hop, and went over his head, but knocked him on his backside at the same time – you don’t often see that, no matter who the fielder is. Two runs did score in the ninth, only one earned. We were helped out by a double play to end the game.
Some nice defense as two Royals were thrown out at the plate, one by Nelson Cruz, one by Marlon Byrd.
Offensively we were led by a two run double by Michael Young, and a solo home run by Ian Kinsler – Kinsler’s home run ended up being the difference, as it was the fourth and final run we got.
Nice win, wish I wasn’t unconscious for most of it. :)

I have to admit, the Rangers game took a backseat this evening. Today was the release of “Madden 08”, and once Samantha went to bed, that was what I was doing – playing football on my Xbox 360. I did check in from time to time, and it was nice to see this line for Kevin Millwood.
Seven innings, four hits, thee runs (only one earned), one walk, and nine strikeouts. A very nice line.
Benoit got into a little trouble with allowing two walks in his 0.2 innings, but CJ Wilson came in and shut things down nicely. This is the way it was supposed to work, except with different people at the back end of the bullpen.
I probably should have watched the game, but I was busy playing football. :)

Going to try a slightly different report..
Three doubles for David Murphy – good.
Kason Gabbard leaves the game early with an injury – BAD
Michael Young home run – exciting
Nice double play by Saltamacchia – cool
Seven different Rangers with RBI’s – nice
Series win – the best part.