What is the story about?
Rangers
2, Angels 1
- I wrote this in the pre-game lineup post:
- “Hopefully the Rangers will break the trend of scoring just one run in regulation in games Detmers and Gore go up against each other.”
- This was the third time this season that Reid Detmers and MacKenzie Gore had faced each other.
- In each of the first two games, Gore and Detmers each allowed one run in their starts, and the Rangers scored just one run in nine innings.
- In one of those games, the Rangers won in extra innings. In the other, the Rangers lost the game on a walk-off with two outs when Justin Foscue made a bad throw.
- Somehow, the Rangers managed combine the outcomes of the previous two Detmers/Gore starts into one package by winning in extra innings in a walkoff due to an Angels infielder making a bad throw.
- We had good MacKenzie Gore on the mound for this one.
- I mean, I guess you could probably guess that, given that the Angels only scored one run, and that one in extra innings.
- But Gore was masterful, allowing just four baserunners in six innings, with two singles, a walk and a hit by pitch. Gore struck out seven and got a 21 whiffs on 100 pitches. He was missing bats with a bunch of different pitches, too, generating at least four swings-and-misses with the fastball, the slider, the changeup and the curveball.
- Gore has a 2.10 ERA in his last five starts, with 34 Ks against just 8 walks in 30 innings over that stretch, and one would like to think that he’s turned a corner, though given Gore’s history, it is just as likely he’s about to turn another corner that will send him back to where he started.
- We got a scoreless Cole Winn outing, which I know excites everyone, and Chase Silseth and Jacob Latz each keeping the Angels off the board for an inning apiece.
- For those of you out there who aren’t math whizzes, that totals up to nine shutout innings, and that should have been good enough to keep the game from going into extra innings.
- I will take the blame for that, due to my inadvertent monkey paw wish about this not being a game that the Rangers score one run in regulation in. I apparently hexed the Rangers bats in the first nine innings, as they managed to get baserunners on, get some hits even, but still not score.
- The Rangers had one hit in the first nine innings with a runner in scoring position. It was a fifth inning one out bunt single by Evan Carter that loaded the bases for Justin Foscue and Corey Seager, neither of whom could drive a runner home.
- They even had Ezequiel Duran on third base with one out in the ninth, after a double and a wild pitch, but offensive catalyst Nicky Lopez struck out, and after pinch hitter Joc Pederson was walked intentionally, Evan Carter also struck out.
- Carter challenged the third strike call, for what it is worth. It was unsuccessful. To rub salt in the wound, that was right after a successful ABS challenge by the Angels on a pitch that was called a ball initially, and would have made the count 3-1 to Carter, rather than 2-2.
- Carter, I will note, was 2 for 4 in the game, with a double to go with his bunt single. He and Corey Seager were the two hitters with exactly two hits apiece, of the 11 Rangers hits.
- Tyler Alexander allowed a double in the tenth — just the third Angels hit of the game — that gave the Angels the 1-0 lead that the Rangers had to surmount in the bottom of the inning against Ben Joyce.
- Ben Joyce throws really hard. He threw 11 pitches Friday night. The fastest of those pitches was 103.0 mph, which is pretty fast.
- A Justin Foscue fly out sent Zombie Runner Evan Carter to third base. Corey Seager struck out, no doubt prompting knowing nods from the “Seager is toast and the Rangers should’ve dumped him when they had the chance” crowd, and Wyatt Langford quickly went down 0-2, challenging the second strike unsuccessfuly and thus burning the Rangers’ final ABS challenge.
- Down 0-2, our intrepid squad seemed doomed. Ben Joyce hadn’t allowed a hitter to reach all year after being down 0-2. True, this was just the fourth 0-2 count Joyce had had all season, what with it being just his 7th appearance on the year, but still…
- Yet, somehow, Langford managed to get wood on a 102.4 mph Joyce heater, managed to flare it the other way, with the ball finding grass, Carter scampering home, and Langford ending up at second.
- I would say it is better to be lucky than good, but you have to be kind of good to make contact on an 0-2 102+ mph fastball.
- An intentional walk to Brandon Nimmo brought up Ezequiel Duran, who already had three hits on the day. And then this happened:
- Duran smokes a ball that Denver Guzman makes a diving play on to prevent a game winning single, or double, depending on your point of view. In retrospect, he should have put it in his pocket and let Joyce go after Jake Burger with the bases loaded. But no, he tried to get the out at second, threw the ball away (and wouldn’t have gotten Nimmo even if he had made an accurate throw, I don’t think), and that was ballgame.
- So something kind of weird…Joyce’s fastball to Duran was 95.8 mph, the slowest pitch he threw by 2.5 mph in the outing. It also had less spin and more downward movement than any of his other fastballs in the game.
- Was he trying to take something off the pitch? Did he just not have a good grip? Was it supposed to be a sinker (his sinker averages 95.8 mph) and he just got too much spin on it?
- Like the number of licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll pop, the world may never know.
- Somehow, the Rangers are back in sole possession of Wild Card 3 right now, a game up on Cleveland and Minnesota, and are just a game back of Houston.
- Amazing.
- MacKenzie Gore touched 96.5 mph with his fastball, averaging 95.0 mph. Cole Winn’s fastball topped out at 96.9 mph. Chase Sileth hit 97.4 mph with his fastball. Jacob Latz’s fastball maxed out at 96.3 mph. Tyler Alexander hit 92.9 mph with his fastball.
- Wyatt Langford had a 108.9 mph GIDP. Elias Diaz had a 106.6 mph single and a 106.2 mph groundout. Ezequiel Duran had a 105.0 mph single, a 102.2 mph single, a 101.9 mph groundout and a 100.9 mph single. Corey Seager had a 102.4 mph fly out. Justin Foscue had a 101.9 mph fly out. Evan Carter had a 101.4 mph double. Brandon Nimmo had a 100.1 mph groundout.
- This is a two game winning streak. I think they should make it a three game winning streak on Saturday.
