What is the story about?
Rangers
6, Rays 0
- This Cal Quantrill thing is getting weird.
- Seven innings for Quantrill. Two hits. Two walks. Just five strikeouts, and nine swings and misses.
- In his last five starts, Quantrill has allowed a total of four runs.
- In his last nine appearances — covering seven starts and two relief appearances — he has a 1.55 ERA over 46.1 innings.
- He’s not missing bats — his whiff rate is in the 10th percentile and his K rate is in the 24th percentile.
- Quantrill is throwing strikes, with an excellent 6.1% K rate, a mark close to 20% lower than his career 7.4% walk rate.
- And while his 18.6% K rate is still quite low, its higher than his career 17.5% mark, and better than the previous three seasons, when he was in the bottom 10% of the league in K rate.
- He’s benefitted from a .244 BABIP, and his home run to fly ball rate is much better than league average. Both of those are things that are largely outside of a pitcher’s control, at least over the long run.
- Quantrill now has a 2.79 ERA on the season, which would be the second best of his career, behind only 2020, when he only pitched 32 innings.
- The peripherals don’t support that — he has a 4.02 xERA and a 3.96 FIP. However, both of those numbers are better than anything he’s done over the last few years.
- And so on Thursday he stymied a Rays team with the best record in the American League, a pretty decent offensive club.
- Jakob Junis and Chase Silseth even managed to keep the Rays off the board for the final two innings, preserving a shutout.
- That’s the 13th shutout for the Rangers this year. That seems like a lot, to me.
- Okay, I went and looked…its tied for fourth most in the majors, behind the Phillies (16 shutouts) and the Tigers and BoSox (14 shutouts).
- The Rangers offense returned to its run-scoring ways after falling flat in the finale against the A’s.
- Corey Seager hit a home run that turned a 2-0 lead into a much more comfortable 4-0 lead, and we always like that.
- A 4-0 run lead feels much better than a 2-0 lead. A 2-0 lead, you feel like, is perpetually in danger. You’re always worried, on the edge of your seat.
- A 4-0 lead, though? Its not like it is insurmountable, of course, but you can feel more at ease. Kick off your shoes. Maybe smoke a bowl, if that’s your thing.
- Meanwhile, in the wild and wacky American League playoff race, the Guardians lost to the Blue Jays, and the Orioles lost, and the Astros won. Texas, thus, is still two games back of the Astros (really three, because of the tie-breaker), but are just a half-game back of the Guardians, are tied with the Jays, and are 1.5 games up on the Orioles. Texas also has the tiebreaker over each of those three teams.
- Of course, Texas is now a game under .500, and we all know how this team tends to fare when they are a game under .500.
- Cal Quantrill touched 94.5 mph with his fastball, averaging 93.7 mph, and 94.8 mph with his sinker, averaging 93.6 mph. Jakob Junis hit 93.3 mph with his fastball. Chase Silseth topped out at 96.3 mph with his fastball.
- Elias Diaz had a 105.7 mph groundout. Joc Pederson had a 104.6 mph single. Jake Burger had a 104.6 mph single and a 101.3 mph single. Corey Seager had a 103.2 mph fly out and a 102.5 mph home run. Logan O’Hoppe had a 101.9 mph single.
- A good start to the four game Rays series.
