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Game two back after the rather unscheduled break, and the Rangers big bats came out in a big way.
I didn’t see much of this, as I was at my bowling league, and was 10 lanes away from the closest TV, but what little I saw looked good. Doug Davis continued to look good early. I’m very confident in him now – moreso than some of our regulars (Helling/Rogers). Arod hit his 46th HR of the year, which I think puts him one behind Jim Thome, as well as Ernie Banks for the all time HR record by a shortstop.
I got home from bowling, and turned the latter part of the game on, and saw the two home runs by Pena & Haselman. Overall a good game to win – kept the A’s from clinching the Wild Card a little, although the Mariners officially clinched the West last night thanks to us. :)

NOTE: I had taken a break from doing game commentary again after the August 26th game, and I was going to start again around mid September, then 9/11 happened, so there was a larger than usual break. This was the first game the Rangers played after the 9/11 attacks.
Well, this game wasn’t really about who won or lost. It was about playing baseball again. A lot has been said in the media about getting back to normal, and I agree with that – however, I also feel that baseball should carry on no matter what happens to this country. I also believe that the crisis in our nation right now will make a labor agreement much easier to reach – or at least it should be. I don’t think anyone, even the biggest MLB supporters, will have the stomach for a bunch of millionaires whining and bitching at each other over how much more money they should make.

Last night however, my wife and I attended a Rangers & A’s game in Arlington. My wife had found some US flag stickers, and I put one on the back of my Rangers cap (I wore the blue cap with red & white “T” lettering, as well as a red T-Shirt, so I was Red White & Blue). We also had brought a flag or two from home, as we weren’t sure how many flags we’d get given at the Ballpark. Anyway, as we were walking up, I could see the gate in the distance, and it looked to me like Ranger players were at the gate – as we got closer, I could tell that Ranger players were at the gate. It didn’t occur to me that the players might be handing out flags. But they were. It was very cool to see the Rangers handing out flags to folks entering the park. I got my first flag from Arod (who is MUCH MUCH taller than he seems on TV when you’re standing right next to him). I also got one from Mike Lamb. I stood there and watched the players (I was at the first base gate) hand out flags for awhile, and it was pretty cool. I also went up and talked to Mike Lamb & Mike Young for a minute or two. Didn’t want to bother them, but I did want to say hi. My wife got a flag from Kenny Rogers who also patted her on the back and said thanks for coming, which made my wife feel really good. Was nice to see the players handing out flags. One note though – there were a lot of cameras there, mostly all pointed at ARod. That’s fine and all, but let’s pay attention to some of the other players there. My wife and I then ended up walking to home plate and the third base entrance to see who was there. Home plate had Ruben Sierra, Raffy, & Pudge (on a crutch). Gabe Kapler was there, who is my wife’s (and probably a lot of other women’s) favorite player. He was just kind of walking around, not saying anything, so I walked up to him and wished him well on his baby on the way (which I had read in the paper) – he seemed appreciative of that and thanked me. Of course, my wife is just standing there going ah-ga-ga-ga, too afraid to say something, apparently. I tried to break the ice by saying hi to Gabe, but she still didn’t say anything more than “Hello”. :)

Anyway, it was great seeing the players there – and the pregame stuff was even more emotional. I’m not generally a person to wear my emotions on my sleeve, but I teared up pretty good with the pregame video – and I even sung the national anthem – most people don’t. Also, for the first time in a long time, I didn’t feel like going “STARS” when they got to that part of the song. Overall, was a very nice ceremony, and I felt for Pat Mahomes, who had a NYPD cap on.

All in all a very emotional night, and I’m glad they still did the stuff after the hour rain delay to start the game. Don’t even care much about the actual game itself, you can read the commentaries below for that – I was just glad to be back out at the Ballpark.

I didn’t see any of this game as I was over a friend’s house for a dinner party. Won’t say anything suffice it to say that we beat Pedro. Even though he wasn’t at his best, that’s always good to beat one of the top pitchers.
Of course, taking 2 of 3 from Boston helps the Yankees which I didn’t want to do. :(

Where do I go with this one? Yeesh!

I went to this game with my wife, who was a major trooper about the length of the thing. I was meeting some friends from online at this game. Turns out it was the first EVER baseball game for the woman who went. Boy, what a first ever game to go to, eh? 18 innings. We won in a spectacular fashion in the bottom of the 18th. Well, maybe not that spectacular, but given how long it’d been going on, we were kind of glad that it had ended. :)

I’m not going to recap the entire game, the summaries below do that well enough. However, there were two totally spectacular defensive plays in the 17th inning by our guys to keep it going – plus a great pickoff by Chris Michalak (two days in a row for that). Arod had the kind of defensive play you see in the first inning, and Chad Curtis had a dive that was also an early inning play, not a 17th inning play. Kudos to both those guys for running it out like that at 1AM!

One thing about this game.. I’ve always wondered during a game how many balls are used during a game. Tonight I decided to count. I kept track of all the balls that were used during the actual game itself. Not counting the ones that were tossed around between innings, just actual game balls. I don’t have my scorecard with me as I write this, but I’m pretty sure it was around 145. I also counted the total pitches for the game, and I’d see three figures on ESPN, MLB, and the AP wire. My count was higher than all of them – all of the ones I listed were all different, too. I counted about 657. Someone else had 602, and someone else had 62something. Either way, it was a lot – I’m never doing that again!

What was interesting about this game is that after we got to the 14th and beyond it became a communal experience for those of us left in the stands (yeah, my wife and I (and my friends) were there till the end). My wife was ready to pass out, and was desperately hoping for the end of the game for quite awhile . However, everyone who was left started talking to each other about who was left to play, and various other baseball things. It was most cool. It turned out to be the longest game (by time) in Rangers history, so it was kind of cool to be there for that!

Oh yeah, speaking of my wife… She really REALLY wanted to see Nomar play, and out of all the players Boston had, he was the only one not used (save for some starting pitchers). That really bummed her out, as Nomar is probably her favorite player.

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Well, this was bobblehead night. I decided to attend this – figured I’d get one. I wanted the Nolan Ryan one, but the game started while I was in the air coming home from vacation. So I headed out early and got mine. I had bought a $5 ticket, but when I did, I was told the entire first 7 rows up in the $5 sections (341-345) were sold out. I wonder how many of those were people who came for the bobbleheads and left. Last time I checked, Pudge bobbleheads on Ebay were getting a few bucks. I’m keeping mine.
As for the game itself.. It was a really great game until the 8th inning. I’ve always said playing Boston brings out the best in both teams, and through 7, we had a great tight game. It was 4-3 Texas at that point, but then we blew it in the 8th giving up a grand slam to Trot Nixon. That pretty much sums it up. :)
Hideo Nomo was brilliant through 6 – not giving up much of anything. At one point, he had given up just two hits, both to Catalanotto. Aaron Myette didn’t look bad, either. Went 5.1 innings, giving up three earned runs. Michalak looked good with his pickoff move. Kolb on the other hand gave up the gopher ball which lost the game for us. Too bad, as he wasn’t awful, either.

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