Rangers
6, Royals 3
- Miracles never cease.
- The Rangers won a game on the road. One where they were trailing much of the game, even.
- One where scheduled starter Jacob deGrom didn’t go, and instead, the team went with a bullpen game, albeit a bullpen game where their two long-ish guys in the pen combined to get 19 outs.
- The Rangers won a game where starter Caleb Boushley gave up a three run homer to the third batter he faced, erasing a 1-0 Ranger lead in the blink of an eye and creating a sense of doom in all of us watching.
- I mean, even more of a sense of doom than we had in the first place.
- Boushley walked two batters in the first inning after the homer, then gave up a single, a double and a walk (albeit a walk of the intentional variety) in the second, escaping unscathed there simply because of a fortuitous strike-em-out-throw-em-out double play.
- One was wondering why Boushley was still in the game.
- And yet things settled down after that, Boushley had a 1-2-3 third and the Royals did little to threaten the rest of the way until the seventh, when the Royals had first and third with one out, and then bases loaded with two outs, though no runs coming across.
- In fact, Kansas City had the type of offensive performance it seems like we would associate much more often with the Rangers this season. Scoring three runs right away, and then doing nothing against a gaggle of relievers the rest of the game? Sounds like Rangers offense mischief to me.
- Wyatt Langford had homered in the top of the first to give the Rangers that brief lead, and Marcus Semien singled home Langford in the third to make it 3-2, before a period of fallowness in the middle innings.
- The Rangers made the final out on the basepaths in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings, just to make things all the more frustrating. Ezequiel Duran accounted for two of those outs, ending the sixth by getting caught stealing second and ending the eighth by getting picked off second. Good marks for picking up a couple of hits in the game, Zeke, but the baserunning could use some work.
- The out on the basepaths in the seventh involved Wyatt Langford running through a stop sign at third on a single by Semien that was knocked down by Bobby Witt Jr. and kept in the infield, such that Langford ended up stopping before getting to home plate and getting into a rundown, eliminating what otherwise would have been a bases loaded, two out situation.
- At least in the seventh the Rangers had managed to tie the game on a Corey Seager RBI single. That’s something.
- And then in the ninth, were able to take advantage of a gift from the Royals. Langford drew a two out walk — his third walk of the game, to go with the leadoff homer and a single — before Seager hit what appeared to be an inning-ending grounder to Vinny Pasquantino, who had hit the homer in the first. Pasquantino booted it, though, putting Seager safe at first. An infield single by Marcus Semien loaded the bases for Kyle Higashioka, who then cleared the bases with a double to left. 6-3 Rangers lead, a moment of happiness to lift our hearts.
- The Rangers can still surprise and amaze us.
- Caleb Boushley’s fastball touched 93.0 mph. Jacob Latz reached 96.8 mph with his fastball. Shawn Armstrong topped out at 95.8 mph with his sinker. Hoby Milner’s fastball hit 88.5 mph.
- Corey Seager had a 109.0 mph single. Wyatt Langford had a 106.8 mph home run. Ezequiel Duran had a 106.0 mph single. Jonah Heim had a 102.4 mph single. Marcus Semien had a 102.1 mph ground out. Kyle Higashioka had a 101.3 mph double. Josh Jung had a 100.4 mph ground out.
- Maybe a split this afternoon? Or is that asking too much?
