Recently in 2001 Game Recaps Category

We finished out the 2001 season with a win. A big win, as it denied the Mariners the all time record for number of wins in a season. As impressive as 116 wins is, I quite honestly don't believe they deserved the all time record. The reason is that the 1906 Cubs who also have 116 wins did it much better, doing it in less games than the Mariners took to get 116. If the '06 Cubs had played 162 wins, I'd say it's a fair bet that they would have gotten to 120 wins, or given their percentage, possibly 125. Even if the Mariners had gotten 117, I don't know if it would have meant as much. For me, it would have been one of those asterisk awards.

Raffy got a home run, his 47th, and combined with Arod's 53, they had a total of 100 HR's, which was really nice to see from the #3 & #5 hitters! Overall, there's not a whole lot else to talk about for this game.

The only other story was the announced firing of Doug Melvin before the game. This came as a big surprise to me, and somewhat of a disappointment. I really liked Melvin, and I'm concerned that he'll go elsewhere, and finish the job he started here with someone else's team. :(

Didn't watch this game, even though there's only two left. I'm probably not watching Saturday's game either, but I will be watching the last one of the season on Sunday.

Boy, what a time to lose a game like this. This is the kind of game that's made for the playoffs, and yet it's the 88th loss of our season. Doug Davis was marvelous, giving up only a solo home run, and going all the way.

Not much else to say about this one, except we were finally shut out for the first time this season - I was really hoping we could have pulled that one off. :(

The less said about this one, the better.

Another game - another mediocre pitching performance by us, and another loss.

Sounds familiar, eh?

Oh yeah, we're forty one games out first now.

Well, normally you'd want to play baseball in October. However, when your team is this far out, and this far behind, it's not the kind of baseball you want to play.

Darren Oliver against Barry Zito. Gee, I wonder who will win this one? Zito was his usual great pitcher. Oliver was his usual not so great pitcher - giving up 7 runs and 9 hits in 5.1 innings.

It's getting pretty hard to write about these guys given what kind of season they've had. Yeah, I know they're playing hard and all, but as a fan, I'm a bit burnt out writing about them losing. :(

Didn't get to see any of this game, but it was nice to get a win. There's still an outside shot we could escape the basement this season, but we'd have to win just about all of our final six games, all against Oakland & Seattle. Most likely not happening.

Yuck!

Home runs all over the place on this one. Arod hit his 50th in the first, Carlos Pena got his third, Raffy had his 46th - hell, even Scott Sheldon got in the act!

I'm writing this 5 days later, I don't remember much about this one than all the home runs. :)

Didn't get to go to the final home game of the season, due to the fact that I have a bowling league that starts at 6PM, and there would have been no way to get from Arlington to Garland within an hour, especially at rush hour traffic. Turns out the game wasn't over until 5:35PM anyway, and unless Mr. Hicks was going to fly me by helicopter back to Garland, I couldn't go.

We ended up the home season 41-41. Not all that bad I guess considering our overall record. Hope we do better next year.

About the only positive thing you can say about this game is that we still have not been shut out this year. Oh yeah, Danny Kolb & Juan Moreno were really good out of the bullpen. Other than that - we sucked. :)

This was bittersweet for me, as it was the last baseball game I'll be going to until next April. I'll really miss it. I would have gone to the Wed final home game, but it's at 2PM. I have a bowling league on Wed, and I have to be there at 6PM. Not enough time to get from Arlington to Garland. :(

Well, after the sweep of Anaheim, I guess we're back to reality with the Mariners coming in.

We lost this game - and it showed - we lookd pretty bad out there. I was at the game, but I admit I didn't pay as much attention, as I was with a friend of mine who I tend to talk a lot with, so I was missing big chunks of the game.

Didn't miss much from the looks of the wire reports.

I didn't see or hear any of this game due to being over some friends' house and watching football.

However, it was really nice to see that Arod broke the HR records of both Ernie Banks, as well as the Ranger team record. Looking good for the first 50 HR season by any Ranger player ever. Raffy continues to hit HR's lately too, getting his 45th.

Rick Helling was great again, going 7 innings, and giving up only one run - he left with 98 pitches, I wonder why he left early?

I didn't see or hear any of this game, but in looking at the box score, I see Raffy really opened it up with two home runs, as well as 3 RBI's. Aaron Myette pitched pretty good, going 7 and giving up 4. Overall a nice win, although I didn't see any of it. :)

I was at this game, one of the last of the season I'm going to. Kind of bittersweet having baseball back after the national tragedy, yet being so close to being over for the season as well. I might feel different if the Rangers had any playoff hopes left.

Anyway, Rob Bell continued to pitch mediocre, he wasn't horrible, but he wasn't great. Arod on the other hand tied Ernie Banks' SS HR record with his 47th, and Carlos Pena had a real mixed bag. He fell a HR short of the cycle, but had a really rough time in the field. He's young, he'll put it together eventually.

I didn't see or hear any of this game - I was watching some other TV this evening - Whose Line is it Anyway, followed by the President, and then my wife watched Big Brother 2's finale - by that point, I wasn't interested in watching what was left of the game, and by the score, eh - I didn't miss anything. :)

Looking at the boxscore, I see Raffy had another home run, and Mike Young went 3 for 4, in addition to Ruben Sierra going 2 for 4 with an RBI. Not particularly stellar offensive performance overall, but still was nice to see another HR by the Rangers. Pitching wise, two folks who have turned out to be busts gave up the runs - Darren Oliver & Mark Petkovsek. Mark gave up three in one inning (on a HR to Eric Chavez).

I'm going to the game Friday night against the Angels. Hopefully we win that.

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.

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.

N/A

The Yankees looked really un Yankee like in this game. Never mind the fact that they lost, they just looked sloppy as hell. They most certainly did NOT look like the three time defending World Champions. Not at all.

Darren Oliver looked like the Yankees usually look to us - which was his first win in almost a month. While we scored eight times, we didn't have any home runs, and only two extra base hits during this entire game.

Figures - if we end up winning on Thursday, I can say that I went to the one game the Yankees won this series. Bummer. :)

Why couldn't they have done this last night?

I was working again in the evening, so I couldn't pay a lot of attention to this, but it was nice to hear the Rangers blast off so many times against the Yankees and El Duque. In fact, I'm just going to list the home runs from the box score. THat about sums up this game pretty damn well, except for Ruben Sierra's 5-5 with 2 HR night. What a night for him!

ALEX RODRIGUEZ (38) OFF O HERNANDEZ IN THE 1ST, 1 ON
FRANK CATALANOTTO (9) OFF O HERNANDEZ IN THE 2ND, 1 ON
RAFAEL PALMEIRO (33) OFF O HERNANDEZ IN THE 3RD, 0 ON
RUBEN SIERRA (15) OFF O HERNANDEZ IN THE 3RD, 0 ON
RUBEN SIERRA (16) OFF WOHLERS IN THE 8TH, 0 ON

#@)(%*)@$%('ing Yankees!

Dammit! Today was my birthday. I've always had this tradition of going to a baseball game on my birthday (or as close to it as possible). Even though we were up against Roger Clemens, I thought we'd make a game out of it. And after the game started, I thought we were going to win it!

It was an awesome game up until the 8th inning. After that point it all fell apart. Rick Helling looked great - he gave up one home run ball, but then lost it after 5, and ended up giving up four runs. Danny Kolb came in, and was spectacular! He went 1.2 innings, with three strikeouts in a span of five batters. The usually good Juan Moreno came in and the Yankees lit him up bg time. A few home runs eliminated our lead, and we never recovered. The wind seemed to be gone. And to cap off the weirdness, Pat Mahomes came in and didn't give up anything. Go figure!

While Aaron Myette didn't sparkle, it was nice to see the Rangers get a win.

Seemed to be the hit batter game, as there was a total of 5 players hit on both sides. None seemed intentional to me, but the press is making it out to be a beanball fest. There was also five home runs in this game, three for the Rangers. Raffy, Arod, & Mike Lamb hit home runs.

Wasn't a terribly exciting game to watch (I kept flipping over to Astros/Pirates, which wasn't much better as it was a blowout). However, the wife was out seeing a movie with a friend, so it was nice seeing some baseball by myself. Sorry, not much commentary from me, today's yet another horribly busy day at work.

Also, we get Roger Clemens on Monday night (along with El Duque & Pedro Martinez) this coming week. Oh joy! :)

Rob Bell is starting to look like the player we traded away to get him. He's playing sloppy, has moments of brilliance, but hasn't ever put it together totally. However, I'm not down on him yet, I still feel he will be great, but with the performance today, it's hard to tell. Of the five runs the Jays scored, three were a direct result of Rob Bell's wild pitches. All three came with someone on third - who then scored. That is not good.

I missed the start of this game, as I was TiVoing the Astros/Pirates game, which overlapped the start of the Rangers game, so when I started watching, it was 1-0, and I came in just in time to see Bell's two wild pitch runs in the first. That didn't set me up in a good mood. However, I was OK with the game as it progressed - going into the bottom of the sixth, we were only down 3-1, with our sticks, I could deal with that. However, we then went down 5-1, which is also not that big of a deal, but the wind was kind of out of my sails. I started skipping through the game, but started watching again in the top of the 8th. Glad I did..

We put three across in the top of the eighth - although it should have been more, Raul Mondesi made a great catch on Pudge with the bases loaded in right, not allowing anyone to score, although Sierra came through right after that with a two run single.

Pudge got another chance in the ninth - Billy "I have the stupidest beard of all time" Koch was in, and I expected us to lose, being down 5-4. However, he was not himself. We scored the tying run on a Catalonotto single, and then after Arod was intentionally walked to load the bases, Raffy reached on an infield single, giving us the go ahead run. Then, Pudge coming up for the second straight inning with the bases loaded did not disappoint. A grand slam of epic proportions - it was one of those instant "Goodbye" balls - a serious grand slam, putting a major exclamation point on this win. I didn't get to see any more, as the program ended on my TiVo (there was something else I really wanted to watch at 6PM, which is about when this happened), but I see that there was another home run in the 9th, giving us two more runs, for a total of 12. Really nice finish, I'm glad I didn't bail out on the game earlier.

Having a TiVo affords you certain luxuries when watching a baseball game gone bad. When things are ugly, you can skip past bad parts in a hurry if you want. Lately I've found myself doing that more and more. When the Rangers fell behind, I started getting bored, and was skipping through a lot. It's to the point where I almost don't even want to watch the Rangers in the field, because the pitching is mostly horrible.

As the game started, I was underwhelmed by the pitching matchup - a mostly failed Rangers pitching duel - Loaiza vs. Oliver. Yawn. However, Loaiza pitched long, if not spectuacularly. He gave up a couple of runs in the first inning (as did Oliver), but that was all Loaiza gave up. Oliver, on the other hand, gave up a few. Then someone came on who I don't have a lot of confidence in anymore - Pat Mahomes. He gave up FOUR home runs in one inning. At this point, I was already watching the game in 60x speed, so I got to see him give them all up in the span of like 10 seconds. :)

That's about the only positive thing about this game other than Arod's two solo home runs.

Oh yeah, former Ranger Jeff Frye hit for the cycle - there was a lot of junk in the press about him holding up for a single when he clearly could have had a double. Feh - I think he did exactly what he should have done. At that point there was nothing left teamwise to go for, he should have eased up and stayed with the single for the cycle. Good for him.

Ugh - another loss. It's really hard to continue to write daily about a team that loses so much, but as I'm a fan, and not actually getting paid for this, I can decide if I don't want to write. However, I don't want to be like Dallas Cowboy fans and care only when their team is winning, so I plow on - but it is hard to write about a team that loses so much. :)

I watched the start of this game, feeling that we'd have a good shot at winning - because Doug Davis, our most reliable pitcher lately was on the mound. IN the start of the game it went pretty good, but in typical Ranger fashion they wore us down, but it again didn't feel like we got blown away, you're watching the game and you go, "just when did we lose this game"? I stopped watching for awhile, and then tuned back in, and we had taken the lead, but gave it back up again. Methinks there will be major changes in the bullpen during the offseason.

I don't have the time to write commentary for this game either, as I'm still working on the big project at work today. However, it was another Ranger loss - there's too many of them this year. 68 is about what you should have for an entire season, not your total at Aug 14th.

I'm back. First off, let me say that I was away on vacation from Aug 3rd to August 10th. I decided not to cover the games from that time, as well as the Indians series at home due to the fact that I wanted a break. Since returning, I've been obscenely busy (working a 20 hr day, and a 16 hour day back to back), and I felt I didn't have the time to go back and update these games.

Because of that, I have no actual commentary for this game either - as I was up at work, and couldn't pay attention to the game. I had it on, but I couldn't really listen to it, because I had so much going on at the time.

Oh my!

Day games are tough for me, because I have to work, so I can't always pay attention. TOday was no exception. However, I caught enough of it - what a blastfest! Four home runs to answer the Yanks 5 last night. We had 18 hits, they only had four. What a thumping!

Kapler had his first home run since June 21st, and overall, our offense was clicking very well. I wish I could have watched it on TV. :)

We won a series in NY for the first time since 1993 - it was really nice to see them win up in New York. Hopefully when we get back to the playoffs, we don't have such a problem up here.

I didn't get to hear much of this one, as I was busy prepping for a vacation - plus it wasn't on TV.

This one can be summed up in a bad performance by Rob Bell - giving up 5 home runs - not good. Surprisingly, we didn't lie down and die - we made an effort of it late, after we were down 8-1, but not enough of a comeback.

Oh, the joy of beating the Yankees in Yankee stadium! Oh, the irritation that the Red Sox lost, and couldn't take advantage of it.

When this game started, I feared the worst. Darren Oliver in Yankee Stadium? I had the feeling of 9-2 going into this game. And, the way it started, I felt I was right - Ted Lilly was perfect through the first four innings or so.

However, Raffy broke that up with a big majestic HR into the upper deck in right field. A couple of innings later, Arod jacked one, as did Pudge to put us up 4-2. We scored a few more runs in the ninth for insurance, and Venafro had some trouble in the bottom of the ninth, so Zim came in, and got a save anyway.

Great game - especially beating the Yankees!

I didn't get to see much of this game (only the 10th & 11th innings), as my wife had some company over. Still, it was nice seeing an extra inning win - usually extra innings means losses.

Hey - someone found Rick Helling! Where was he hiding, because that guy wearing #32 for the first two months of the season wasn't Rick Helling at all.

This is more like it - this is the kind of pitching we were supposed to be getting from Rick & Kenny. If that were the case, we might be making a push for the playoffs, instead of making a push for the playoffs in 2003 in 2001.

What more can you say about this game? Rick Helling was masterful, not allowing any runs. Craig Munroe hit his first major league hit - a home run with his family in attendance. Craig also made a really great defensive catch in right - while it initally looked like it saved a HR, it didn't - that ball wouldn't have gone over the fence, but it was a great catch anyway.

This was our first complete game shutout in quite some time - they were bandying around 1998 & 1999 on the TV. IT's been something like 300 some odd games since the last one. Yikes!

Tampa's Joe Kennedy looked really great, too - another good young pitcher they appear to have there. This was the game I thought I was going to last week, but I ended up going to Saturday's game - a loss. Figures. :)

The Rangers end up having a 6-1 homestand. Which game do I attend? That's right - the 1. Figures.

Going into this game, I figured we'd either have a well pitched game, or a fiasco. That's usually the case when you get two pretty young ptichers going at each other. And for awhile, that's what we got. Aaron Myette looked really good, not totally dominating, mind you - but still an impressive performance. Tampa's Nick Bierbrodt also pitched really well - so far looks like a great pickup for them.

We were losing, and going into the bottom of the ninth, we managed to pick up a couple of runs to tie it at 3 and send it into extra innings. However, Kevin Foster (who I doubt will be here next year) managed to completely blow the game - it all fell apart after he was covering first and came off the bag due to an errant throw. After that, we gave up some more runs for a total of 4 - it seemed to sap the life we got from tying the game in the bottom of the ninth. A wasted effort, but overall a pretty decently pitched game (except for Foster).

Ruben Sierra did have to go on the DL, and was replaced by Craig Munroe from AAA. His first game was tonight, but was pretty much a non factor, going 0-3, and not even having a defensive chance in right field.

Ben Grieve had a grand slam - he only ever seems to hit well when he's here - why not sign him up, and have him play right field? His lack of arm strength shouldn't be that big of an issue there.

The sticks were out for us - that's good, because Rob Bell had probably his weakest appearance as a Ranger, yet still won the game. Overall, it was a pretty sloppy contest, with Rob giving up 7ER in 7 innings, although Juan Moreno & Brandon Villafuerte nailed down the remaining two innings, not giving up anything.

Nice to see Mike Young with a triple, although it was NOT nice seeing Ruben Sierra have to come out of the game - that's probably a trip to the DL for him, which I did NOT want to see at all.

I don't have time to sit down and write a commentary on this one, as I'm terribly busy at work with Max Payne being released (I work for 3D Realms a PC computer game maker, if you didn't know).

Was nice to see Cal hit a home run - what an awesome player!

I don't have time to sit down and write a commentary on this one, as I'm terribly busy at work with Max Payne being released (I work for 3D Realms a PC computer game maker, if you didn't know).

All I'll say is Thank you Red Sox for Justin Duchscherer!

I don't have time to sit down and write a commentary on this one, as I'm terribly busy at work with Max Payne being released (I work for 3D Realms a PC computer game maker, if you didn't know).

I really want to write about this game, but at the moment, I can't. I've been up practically all night (it's 11:15AM as I write this) - I was here overnight at work shipping product.

However, I can say this. The Cal locker thing is bizarre, this was a big see-saw game, I really thought we'd lost it about three times, but we managed to come back and win on a pinch hit by Velarde, and Zimmerman really pulled a Wetteland before getting the save.

I started off watching this game on TV at home, then had to go to the office. When I got to the office, our Jeckyll & Hyde pitcher, Pat Mahomes gave up a grand slam. Blech. After that I didn't really care anymore, and started listening to the Phillies / Mets game on the Internet. :)

What an ugly, ugly game. What a great, great game.

I was watching this and was utterly shocked that Darren Oliver was perfect through 5+ innings. I actually started to think that he might pitch something special, and then he lost perfect, no hit, & shutout all at once with a solo home run given up in the 6th. He also gave up another solo home run later on, but pitched an 8 inning complete game, losing 2-1. Darren gave up only three hits the whole game, but unfortunately, two were solo home runs.

And, the Rays shut us down even more, allowing only a single Ranger run. I felt really really bad for Darren Oliver. This kind of pitching may have increased his stock for a trade. I wouldn't mind trading away that moeny, and giving some of it to Pudge, as the papers this morning are starting to sound ugly about the possibility of Pudge being out of here.

Again, a very annoying loss, but a great great baseball game.

BALTIMORE (TICKER) -- The second game of the Baltimore Orioles' day-night doubleheader with the Texas Rangers has been postponed due to a train derailment near the stadium that has forced the evacuation of the ballpark.

Citing the derailment and potential hydrochloric acid spill, the Orioles postponed Wednesday's game just hours after the completion of a 6-4 loss in the opener.

Wednesday's night game will be made up as part of a day-night doubleheader on Thursday. The first game is scheduled for 1:05 p.m. with the night game getting underway at 7:05 p.m.

Pitching matchups for both games have not been detailed.

We get back to baseball after some delays in Baltimore. It seemed like a week, but it was actually only one day off. Anyway, we get back to the game with a nice 4-1 win in Tampa Bay. Now, granted, when you're playing the team with the worst record in all of ball, you're expected to win, but I'll take the win just the same.

There was a real nice game pitched by Doug Davis, who is looking really good lately, going 8 innings, and giving up just a single run. Jeff ZImmerman came in for the save, and was spectacular.

Don't know what else to say about this one - a real nice game all around.

Thursday's 12:05 p.m. game against Baltimore has been postponed because of a train derailment and water main breakage near Camden Yards that happened Wednesday. As of 8:30 a.m. Thursday, the 6:05 p.m. game still was scheduled to be played. The day game had been postponed from Wednesday because heavy, black smoke billowed above Oriole Park after three train cars derailed in a tunnel and began leaking hazardous materials. As of Thursday morning, the train cars were still leaking and on fire in the tunnel. Doug Davis (4-7, 4.95) is scheduled to pitch for the Rangers on Thursday. Aaron Myette was originally scheduled to pitch the second game of the Baltimore series. Texas defeated Baltimore, 6-4, on Wednesday afternoon in Game 1 of the series.

I didn't get to listen very well to this game, as I was working at the time, but it seemed that Rick Helling had a decent, if not great day, our bullpen is still going strong, and Catalanotto & Pudge had excellent games. Some nice defense too from both sides - looking forward to the old uniforms in Game 2. :)

Another stinker. Kenny Rogers is really starting to pitch poorly in his last few starts. With his back problems of late, I wonder if he's not hurt?

What else can you say about this one? Hello Rob Bell!

Rob comes within a single pitch of getting the first complete game shutout by a Rangers starter in a long long time. Jerry Narron pulled Bell after 8.2 innings for Zimmerman. I would have loved to have him stay in there (as would everyone else at the park by the booing), but ultimately, we got the win, the shutout, and Bell was masterful!

Allowing only 6 hits over 8.2 innings, Rob Bell was awesome! About the only negative thing you could say was that he walked five batters (three of which were Bonds), but it didn't seem to hurt him at all. At the moment, Melvin looks like a genius again, trading away Ruben Mateo, and getting a good, decent young pitcher in return. He must have worn out his welcome with the Reds, because the way he looked last night, I can't imagine why they'd trade him away.

Anyway, it was great! Really hope he can keep this up, now that he's had two great starts in a row.

I, along with lots of others at the Ballpark were here hoping for a Barry Bonds home run. Didn't get it. What we did get we didn't like, either.

This 7-6 loss was particularly annoying because it was one of those where we'd get some runs, and then give them right back. That kept on going on and on until late, when we had a chance to finish off the game, but couldn't come through for a win.

In fact, I wasn't feeling very good, and in a rare display of "weakness", I left the game early. I abhor when people leave, but I didn't get any sleep the night before - just about one hour. Was starting to not feel good. However, I didn't miss much - we still lost.

Of course - after having won 11-0, we then go and lose 11-2.

The only thing worth talking about for this one was the fact that we were almost shut out. However, we broke that up late to remain the only major league team that has not been shut out all year.

I was at this game, and had an interesting time of it. My wife wasn't feeling good, so I brought a friend of mine from work. He likes baseball, but had never been to a Rangers game at the Ballpark. He'd been at Arlington stadium, but in seven years, he's never been to the Ballpark! :)

Anyway, this game was pretty much in the Rangers' control all along - we had four home runs, two from my Rangers rookie of the year, Mike Young. Rick Helling had the Rockies pretty much in hand, allowing just one earned run over seven innings. Our team had an ERA of 2.00 for the entire game, which was great. Mike Hampton was shelled - which was a shock, I was expecting a 2-1 game. I didn't get it, but I'll certainly take the 10-2 victory. :)

Was nice to start the post all-star part of the season with a win. I don't have a whole lot of confidence in Kenny Rogers at the moment - he's pitching like an old man. Sometimes, he's brilliant, but most of the time he's just pitching "old". Tonight, however - he pitched pretty decently, going 7 innings, allowing only two earned runs - definitely a "quality start". Unfortunately, this doesn't seem to be the norm for Kenny lately. I'm open to trading him, but I don't know who would take him, quite honestly - same with Darren Oliver.

Arod was rather sloppy, comitting two of the three Ranger errors tonight. Looking good on the offensive side is Mike Young, who I think will be my Ranger player of the year - I'm really impressed with him this year. Speaking of that, Randy Velarde was activataed, and did not play, but basically has lost his starting job to Mike Young. I hope we keep Velarde around next year as a backup - he seems to be open to that from what I've read in the papers.

A home run from Pudge got things started, and a goofy play in the 8th also was in on the scoring (Kapler struck out, and a run scored on a ball that got away - I had never seen a run score on a strikeout before ).

UPDATE May 3, 2008: I did not write anything for this game, as I had surgery this day, and was really loopy and laid out on the sofa. I'm going to stick in an old wire story for this game. (I put the old format 2001 archives into Movable Type's Blog software in May of 2008, hence this update text).

SEATTLE (TICKER) -- Cal Ripken is no stranger to dramatic moments on a national stage. Derek Jeter is getting pretty used to them, too.

Participating in his 19th and final All-Star Game, Ripken homered in his first at-bat and Jeter added a solo shot as the American League posted its fifth straight win over the punchless National League, a 4-1 triumph at Safeco Field.

Honored Monday and following the sixth inning, Ripken provided the most memorable moment of the 72nd mid-summer classic by leading off the third inning against Los Angeles righthander Chan Ho Park with a line drive over the left-field wall.

Ripken, who will turn 41 on August 24, became the oldest player to homer in an All-Star Game. Stan Musial was 39 when he hit one in 1960.

The blast was reminiscent of his home run on September 6, 1995 -- the day he etched his name into baseball immortality by breaking Lou Gehrig's consecutive games played streak.

The 47,364 fans at Safeco Field demanded a curtain call and Ripken obliged. For his efforts, Ripken was honored with the Most Valuable Player award for the second time in his career, having also won in 1991. He is the only American League player to win the award twice.

"I must have had a shot of adrenaline or long case of the goose bumps, I'm not sure what coming to the plate," Ripken said. "I went up there and said `God, it's hard to see.'

"The ovation, people standing up, and I came out and tried to acknowledge them quickly because I didn't want the game to be delayed for that. I got back in and just saw the first pitch, swung at it, and put a nice swing on it. I felt like I was flying around the bases."

Ripken's fellow All-Stars also felt the enormity of the moment.

"It was just one of those things for the fans and for Cal," Mariners second baseman Bret Boone said. "It was pretty fitting, Cal hits a home run. That's a pretty special moment."

"It's like a dream come true," Chicago Cubs right fielder Sammy Sosa said. "Everybody was clapping and after that he comes up with the home run. It doesn't get much better than that as a human being. ... He is the man."

Jeter, the shortstop of the New York Yankees, made sure Ripken's moment would stand up. After the NL crept within 2-1 with a run in the top of the sixth, Jeter opened the bottom of the inning with a long home run over the center-field wall off Chicago Cubs righthander Jon Lieber. It was his only at-bat in the contest.

"I told him I think it took Hank Aaron 10 or 12 years to hit his first home run in an All-Star Game," AL manager Joe Torre said. "He said he was going to swing 3-0, he didn't care where it was."

Last year's All-Star and World Series MVP, Jeter went 3-for-3 in the 2000 game and hit .409 in the Fall Classic. Ripken often is credited with paving the way for bigger, more offensive-minded shortstops such as Jeter and Alex Rodriguez, the AL's elected starter at the position.

"It's fun, anytime you can play in an All-Star Game it is pretty exciting," Jeter said. "And to do something good makes it even more special."

Chicago's Magglio Ordonez followed Jeter's blast with a home run to right-center field. It marked just the fifth time in All-Star history that there have been back-to-back home runs.

Winless since 1996, the NL managed just three hits, none over the final 3 2/3 innings. The record for fewest hits is two by the NL in 1990.

"We didn't put any hits together and guys were not seeing the ball very well in the shadows and were complaining about it a bit," NL manager Bobby Valentine said. "When you have just one at-bat to adjust, it's a tough thing for the hitters and their pitchers made really good pitches."

The game featured a six-minute ceremony after the fifth inning in which Commissioner Bud Selig paid tribute to both Ripken and fellow legend Tony Gwynn of the San Diego Padres. The retiring superstars received the Commissioner's Historic Achievement Award in the unprecedented stoppage.

"What a wonderful experience," said Gwynn, who was an honorary NL player and in uniform. "It turned out great. ... You want to say thank you because it's really the outpouring that has been unbelievable. I'm sure as we go along it is going to get tougher."

"I always thought the All-Star Game was a special time to celebrate baseball," Ripken added. "To have things go so great in the game, hit a home run, it's been special. It's a great feeling."

The delay nearly cost the AL its lead as Toronto setup man Paul Quantrill, making his first All-Star appearance, ran into immediate trouble following the break.

San Francisco's Jeff Kent doubled into the right-field corner and one out later, Houston's Lance Berkman singled off the glove of Jeter to put runners on the corners.

Torre, the New York Yankees' manager, called on his own Mike Stanton, who surrendered a sacrifice fly to San Diego's Ryan Klesko to halve the deficit.

After a broken bat by pinch hitter Vladimir Guerrero hit and knocked over NL honorary third base coach Tommy Lasorda in a lighthearted moment, Stanton got the Montreal Expos slugger on a flyout to left field.

Seattle ace Freddy Garcia tossed a perfect third inning to get the win and Mariners closer Kazuhiro Sasaki notched the save. It was fitting as nearly all the All-Star festivities served as a celebration of baseball in Seattle. The Mariners had four starters and eight players in uniform, much to the delight of the 47,364 fans.

"I'm just relieved that everything went OK and that it came out OK," said Sasaki through an interpreter. "The way the game went, we were able to come out with a win and that was a great experience."

"I was really nervous," Garcia said. "My first All-Star game and I win it with only seven pitches. It was pretty emotional."

AL starter Roger Clemens was dominant over two innings. Making his second career All-Star start, Clemens retired all six batters he faced, including New York Mets catcher Mike Piazza.

Clemens and Piazza had not faced each other since Game Two of the 2000 World Series, a game that saw Clemens throw a broken bat in the direction of the All-Star backstop.

NL starter Randy Johnson of the Arizona Diamondbacks, a late replacement for teammate Curt Schilling, was nearly as dominant. The former Mariner surrendered a leadoff single to Seattle rookie sensation Ichiro Suzuki in the first but little else.

The three-time Cy Young Award winner struck out Alex Rodriguez of Texas and Manny Ramirez of Boston in the first and Seattle's Edgar Martinez to cap a perfect second.

It was the fourth career All-Star start for Johnson, who has allowed just a run and four hits with 11 strikeouts in 11 innings.

Andy Pettitte of the Yankees allowed a leadoff single in the fourth but retired sluggers Todd Helton, Barry Bonds and Sosa in order to escape further trouble. Atlanta's John Burkett tossed a perfect bottom of the fourth to keep the game at 1-0.

Minnesota's Joe Mays took over in the fifth for the AL, which took advantage of two-base error by Kent to tack on a run in the bottom of the frame.

With Colorado's Mike Hampton pitching, Seattle first baseman John Olerud grounded a ball up the middle that Kent threw away. Hampton retired the next two batters on grounders to shortstop but Ivan Rodriguez of Texas came through with a single up the middle that scored pinch runner Jason Giambi for a 2-0 lead.

After Stanton worked through the jam in the sixth, Seattle's Jeff Nelson, a late addition to the AL squad, held the NL in check in the seventh. Anaheim Angels closer Troy Percival fired a hitless eighth before giving way to Sasaki.

A nice Saturday afternoon win, although I watched most of the game in the evening, thanks to my TiVo. :)

It was nice to see Andres Galarraga & Gabe Kapler come through with pinch hit RBI's - both are in a major slump - the 40 year old now bench warmer is probably in his final days with the Rangers. I'd like for him to gracefully retire. I like the guy, I really like the guy, but it doesn't seem like he has any gas left in the tank. I'd like to see him retire, so we can have some great going away stuff for him.

Anyway, this game was one I thought was going to slip away until the aforementioned pinch hits. Nice to see that, but we also got a decent pitching performance by Doug Davis, who continues to pitch well. Our bullpen gave up nothing in the final three frames. Actually, I thought we were going to get destroyed by Bobby Jones, but he fell apart in the seventh, giving us our lead and the win.

Nice game to come back from - and apart from the 3 spot given up in the second inning, our pitching was pretty damn good!

I started watching this game, and saw the first few innings. I stopped watching after the top of the fourth, as I promised my wife we'd watch a movie. In the middle of the movie, I peeked in to the score, and it was 8-2! When I left, it was 2-0.

Oh well, guess I saw the best parts. :) Mike Young, who is rapidly heading for my fav Ranger player of the year got another home run on the West Coast in front of family. Someone start bringing them to every game we play, please! :)

14-2? Is this score backwards? Seems like it should be 14-2 the other way.

I'll take it. There isn't much to say except that the nine run inning was beautiful! :) I'll just let the log of that inning speak for itself...

TEXAS 4TH: Kapler reached on infield single. Lamb doubled to right, Kapler scored. Haselman doubled to right center, Lamb scored. M Young reached on infield single, Haselman to third. Brian Fuentes relieved Dennis Stark. Catalanotto hit by pitch, M Young to second. Ledee walked, Haselman scored, M Young to third, Catalanotto to second. A Rodriguez homered to left, M Young, Catalanotto and Ledee scored. R Palmeiro hit by pitch. Sierra homered to left center, R Palmeiro scored. Kapler flied out to right. Lamb singled to center. Haselman grounded into double play, shortstop to second to first, Lamb out at second. (9 Runs, 7 Hits, 0 Errors) SEATTLE 1, TEXAS 14.

My annual trip out to the Ballpark for the July 4th fireworks show was not disappointing. The fireworks show was one of the better ones I've seen at the Ballpark - and the show on the field was great, too!

We beat the Mariners who are what, about 200-3 this year? It was a great feeling, the crowd was really into it, especially when Raffy jacked a home run, as well as Mike Lamb's home run (first of the year). Game felt great, and Rob Bell looked pretty good this game. He's looked pretty uneven in his Ranger appearances so far this year, but this one looked good - probably the reason we traded for him was for pitching like this.

However, it wasn't a complete sail - in the 9th inning, we had Zim in to close, and when they started the inning, I said out loud "7 batters till Ichiro hits a home run". Had to explain it to my wife, and said something like "Well, it's a save situation, and Zim will be in. Ichiro has two BIG home runs off Zim this year". Sure enough, the inning got to Ichiro. Narron did something interesting, and pulled Zim to get to Venafro who got the job done.

Talk radio went nuts the next day over that move, but I agreed with it - Zim had already been burnt by Ichiro twice, might as well play for the win, instead of the heart attack. :)

The second half of the season started pretty much like the first half went. Darren Oliver pitched pretty mediocre in this game. He seemed more like last year than he did this year, although he wasn't TOTALLY awful. Ryan Glynn pitched in relief to do nothing to endear himself to the Rangers; turns out he was put on waivers and then assigned to AAA when no one else claimed him. I suspect he won't be here next year, or will be given a shot in spring training, but that's about it.

On the positive side, Arod & Pudge (I refuse to call him IRod) hit back to back jacks in the fourth - but that was the extent of the scoring for us. Yeah, we scored two more, but they weren't "exciting" runs. :)

This was a particularly annoying win. Going into the game I held a deep desire to see the Rangers sweep the Mariners. Didn't think it would really happen, but I thought I'd take a stab and hope anyway.

Into the ninth inning, I thought I was going to get it - at least the start of it. Then Zim put the first two runners on base, making it feel like Wetteland again. However, right after that, Pudge gunned down McLemore who was trying to steal, and then right after that, Zim got a K for two outs. We were down to almost the last strike when Ichiro came up and jacked a two run homer to tie the game.

We then blew it in the 10th by bringing out Petkovsek, who doesn't seem to handle pressure well (at least to my eyes). Oh well, a potential win for us turns into the 60th win of the season for the Mariners.

At least Mike Young continues to dazzle in the field - what a great pickup. Especially now that Loaiza has turned into Loaiza for the Blue Jays.

Another well pitched game. Excluding last night, we've gotten some really decent pitching (overall) lately. However, as the game progressed, I felt that we were going to go down to a 1-0 loss. Mark Mulder was spectacular, allowing only a couple of hits - at least until the 7th. Rick Helling too was awesome. He didn't get the win (as per usual), but he pitched brilliantly, allowing only one run over his 6.2 innings (and 125 pitches).

Bo Porter of all people managed to connect for a 3 run jimmy jack in the bottom of the 8th to put us up for the win. That certainly felt good - especially being there. Zimmerman got the save, but not before he pulled a Wetteland, and put two men on (second and third, no one out). He then popped out one guy, and struck out two more for the save and the win!

Got to sit through my first rain delay of the season. I was at this game, and it didn't start until 8:40 (1:35 after the posted start time). Had a friend with me who doesn't usually come to baseball games, so it was nice to shoot the shit with him.

This one started off early - two home runs in the first inning (Arod & Sierra), and we added another HR later in the game, one by Frank Catalanotto. However, the game was anything but an easy win. We got three in the bottom of the first, they got 3 in the top of the second. We scored in the 3rd, they scored in the fourth. It went on that way for a short while, leaving the game in a 6-5 lead for the A's going into the bottom of the 7th.

In the seventh, we busted out for a four spot. We tied the game up on a Raffy single, scoring Pudge. After that, the A's proceeded to allow the bases to get loaded, and then the most bizarre play I've seen in quite some time happened. Wild pitch by the Mike Magnante, allowing Raffy to score. However, the throw from the A's catcher to Magnante at the plate bounced off Raffy's foot into the Rangers' dugout, allowing the other two runners to score. I have never seen three runs score on a wild pitch before - and I bet most of the people at the ballpark (including the players) had never seen that before, either. :)

A nice gift win. I'll take it, of course.

The Rangers are starting to look like a major league baseball team! Another great pitching performance - this time by Darren Oliver. He went seven innings, giving up just 4 hits and 1 run. He walked a lot of guys (5), but had the defense and the pitching when he needed it - which I suppose is the name of the game, eh?

J.D. Smart - called up again because Cordero had to go back on the DL didn't fare so well, giving up a couple of runs on a home run in his lone inning. Zim came on and got the save in the 9th looking really sharp.

Offensively, the best star was Mike Lamb, going 3 for 4 with an RBI. Ricky Ledee also came through - with a double scoring a couple of runs. A great game - I'm going tonight to see them against the A's - I hope it continues! :)

I thought today was setting out to be a duplicate of the previous game. An extremely well pitched game by our starter. Doug Davis went 7.1 innings. He looked awesome - up until the seventh inning. He appeared to run out of gas, and gave up some runs, and the game was lost, unforutnately.

However, before that, he looked great! Since coming back up from the minors Doug Davis has pitched like he's capable of, and beyond, I think. I hope it keeps up - even though we lost, I have to qualify this as a success for Doug and the Rangers pitching staff. Can't go wrong with pitching performances (and defense again!) like this.

Oh my - what a spectacular game! The 7 run margin of winning does not do justice to the type of game it was. It was 1-1 through 10 full innings - that was the kind of game it was!

Rick Helling was the first Ranger pitcher to go nine innings this season. He looked good, he looked sharp. However, we couldn't get any offense for him - the game was tied 1-1 after the first inning, and it stayed that way until the 9th inning. It stayed that way until the 11th inning, when we finally broke it out.

There was some totally sparkling defense by the Rangers this game - including a great pitchout call by Pudge to get a runner at third - which probably prevented a run from scoring.

Then we go to extra innings. We bust out in a major way against the Angels bullpen, scoring 7 runs in the 11th inning. Usually when we go extra, I figure we'll blow it, but this time we came through.

This was a great game to be a Rangers fan. :)

Sorry - no commentary from me on this one. Too much to do at work to spend the time writing.

Sorry - no commentary from me on this one. Too much to do at work to spend the time writing.

Sorry - no commentary from me on this one. Too much to do at work to spend the time writing.

wo in a row for the second time this week! I'm getting spoiled! You'd think we were the Mariners or something. :)

When the game started - with a triple and a run scored early - I figured it would be another Rangers game. Boy, was I wrong. That was *ALL* the A's got. The one run. From that point on, Doug Davis was masterful, going 7 innings and giving up just 7 hits and one run. It was as if we were an experienced team, playing well like we had done for a long time. If this game is any judge, things are looking good!

Tim Hudson was also brilliant, going the complete game for the loss. He allowed only 5 hits over nine innings, and two runs - however... In the third inning, he gave up three straight hits, allowing for our two runs. Other than those three batters, Hudson was brilliant - it's just that our pitching staff didn't make as many mistakes. We even overcame a Mike Lamb throwing error.

Overall, a totally spectacular game - and played in only 2:44, too! I could get used to this.

What can you say about this one? Four runs - four solo home runs. That was all the offense. Arod, Gabe, & two from El Caballo, who looks to displace Andres Galarraga pretty quickly, I would think.

I didn't see this game either, but I was watching baseball tonight, and they showed all I really needed to see on this one - all the home runs, and the great game saving stop by Raffy to end the game in the 9th.

The team really is starting to look good, even if they're not winning all the time. Something nice to see. :)

I did not see this game - my cable company showed the Astros game instead of the Rangers game - long time readers of my site will know that pet peeve of mine.

Due to this, I watched some TV and a movie - so no commentary from me except to say that I didn't think we'd pull off three in a row - but it was close.

Rob Bell made his Rangers debut tonight wearing uniform number 6. The lowest ever for a Rangers pitcher during the regular season. And Rob pitched like... well... a Ranger pitcher. Was mostly mediocre in the first inning, but I attribute that to nerves. Was great for a couple innings, and then pitched mediocre again in the fifth. Overall, not bad. Overall, not great.

I was surprised that we managed to come through and get some runs - we usually choke when we need to. I was also surprised that Narron left Ledee in there and didn't pinch hit for him with Sierra. However Ledee came through, and it was great to see. It was all capped off by two solo home runs by Pudge late which made the difference.

Dare I hope for three in a row?

Darren Oliver looked great! Except for Craig Biggio, that is (who hit two solo HR's off of Oliver). Those home runs were the only runs allowed in an extremely well pitched game by the Rangers (bullpen included; a bigger shock). The game was mosying along until the fifth, when we tied it at 2-2. However, Arod jacked a three run home run to really put a stomp on the Astros. Didn't seem like the Astros really had a chance to get back into it after that.

Don't know what else can be said about this one - Arod put it over the top after Oliver set it up with some great pitching!

That's probably it for Ken Caminiti. In the midst of having a good series in a return home to Houston, Ken pulls his hammy rounding first, and was placed on the DL. I suspect that will be it for Ken. He'll have to be activated to be released (can't release a player on the DL), but I doubt he'll play much more for us at all, and Ken's comments in the press indicate he doesn't want to be here, he seemed pissed off that we put him on the DL at all. Pudge also had to come out of the game with an injury, but it was just cramps, and he played again the next game.

The game itself was a great pitcher's duel. It went 1-1 all the way through to the bottom of the 8th inning. Doug Davis pitched brilliantly, I thought - he deserved the win, we just couldn't figure out their starter, either.

A loss, yes - but one of those losses you don't mind. The game was great, and the play that won it was over and above the call of duty by the Astros.

A slugfest in Houston. This is about what I expected all the games against the Astros to be like.

The game was actually pretty tame until the fifth inning. Going into the fifth, we were down 5-3. Not a big surprise this year. However, we busted out in the 5th for four runs taking the lead 7-5. The four run inning was fueled by Catalanotto's leadoff home run, as well as a couple of doubles by Gabe Kapler & Ken Caminiti. We did try to give the game away, by giving up three more runs in the bottom half of the fifth, and a couple more in the 6th and 7th. However, we managed to come back.

Cammy was the story of the night, going three for four with a couple of doubles, an RBI, a walk, etc... A OK game, but a great comeback. First time all year we've won after being behind in the 7th.

No commentary from me - I started watching the game, but fell asleep on the sofa. Too many of these 9PM start games make me do that. Plus, I have a relatively new sofa which is really comfy to lay down on. :)

Blech. Another loss mostly fueled by crappy pitching. How many times can we write about that?

Odd news - we traded Doug Mirabelli last night to the Red Sox for a pretty decent pitching prospect. Then Pudge goes and gets hurt. That left Scott Sheldon as our only catcher. Yikes!

A very cool game. For many reasons. First off, we won, which is weird in and of itself.

However, we got great pitching from Darren Oliver, we got hitting from our pitchers, and we had home runs. Raffy had two, Mike Young had one (in front of his family, who was from LA), and Pudge had one for the fourth game in a row.

The guys looked loose, they were having fun in the dugout, and there was much laughter that I saw on TV. We tried to give it away, by giving up four runs late, but we managed to hold on.

However, it wasn't all good. Gabe Kapler had to be scratched before the game with the flu, and Rusty had to come out with a hamstring injury. Hopefully it won't be so bad.

I was right (see yesterday's commentary). We lost. And we did it in such an annoying fashion, I felt thoroughly disgusted after the game.

I have tickets to Sunday nights' game - I can almost guarantee we'll lose that. Whenever we have a big game like this, we lose the next one.

If we strung together a few of these, I might feel like writing about them - this just feels like an aberration.

Oh look - another game where we blow it late due to the bullpen. I'm getting tired of saying that.

Darren Oliver pitched spectacularly. He gave up just a single run. Our bullpen blew it. What more needs to be said?

This loss was annoying. We pitched well. Doug Davis looked good. We were winning. We were robbed of a grand slam late, and I knew then that we'd lose. Usually when something like that happens, we lose the game. I was right. :(

I watched this. I was enjoying it. Where did those 6 runs at the end of the game come from? It looked like we had a shot to win this one, and then ejected that chance with a fiasco in the 7th & 8th.

We stayed right with Seattle early on - getting three jacks, including one from Arod, which was especially sweet.

I'm left just scratching my head over this game.

I wasn't even watching this game, or listening to it.

I found myself more interested with a Bugs Bunny marathon that was on Cartoon Network all weekend. I barely peeked at the Ranger game. No big loss, it was just another loss.

Coming to the game, I was thinking two things:

1. The Indians had already lost today, so we could go ahead and win this game.
2. This was going to be an awesome pitching performance, with Radke & Rogers on the hill.

I wasn't disappointed. I was at the ballpark for this game, and it was awesome! In the first inning, Pudge jacked a home run off of Brad Radke, and I felt the game would go in our favor early. However, Radke turned it up a notch, not allowing virtually anything for quite some time after that. We gave up two unearned runs in the top half of the second, giving back the lead we quickly got. However, Radke walked two (a shocker) in the fifth, allowing an eventual sac fly to tie the game. It stayed at 2-2 into the 10th.

Radke & Rogers both battled, and stayed out there for quite awhile. However, our pitching was better in the pen. Juan Moreno came on, and was virtually perfect. He struck out four in a row over 2.1 innings, allowing nothing. Zim came in and pitched the rest of the 9th and the 10th, and allowed just one hit, but looked like '99 Zim.

That set the stage for the hero of the game, El Caballo. In the bottom of the 10th, we worked the bases full, and Sierra stepped up, hit a deep ball to right field, and it wasn't caught, allowing the winning run to score. It was a great feeling, winning late, winning after coming back and against the first place team's best pitcher.

A great game, and I was glad I was there to see it!

Well, the Twins come in to town. And the result from Game 1 is no surprise. Actually, I was hoping we'd lose all three games, because of a couple of reasons.

1. We're not going to win anything this year, so a couple more against the Twins won't matter.
2. I don't want to help the Cleveland Indians.

I really figured we'd lose, and quite frankly, it's an odd feeling rooting against your own team. It was another typical Ranger loss. We handed it away early, and lost the game. :(

I'm getting tired of writing about losing already. I didn't get that way last year until April. Ugh. Don't feel like writing about losing to a team that we should have kicked the crap out of.

Well, so much for Pat Mahomes in the starting rotation. I suspect he'll be back to the pen. I didn't believe the bit where he was effective in the pen, but really shaky in the rotation. I believe it now. Given how bad the pitching is this year, I suspect he'll get another shot in the rotation, but he doesn't look like he belongs there right now.

Other than that, all I have to say about this game is - YUCK! I turned it off after the first inning. ;)

It was nice to see Raffy get two home runs again - he looked much more like himself this game. The two home runs were typical Raffy home runs. Big, majestic, over the right field wall, and you could tell it immediately.

KC started Mac Suzuki, the pitcher who pitched in the Kingdome a couple of years ago for the Mariners and gave up 9 RBI to Pudge; I was hoping for a repeat, but Mac got tossed quickly. Oh well.

Interesting event; a power failure that caused about half the lights in the ballpark to go out, delaying the game for about half an hour. It looked funny on TV, I wonder what it was like there.

Overall a pretty damn good game, Rick Helling looks like he's figured it out, now with three strong outings in a row.

Despite the 6-3 score, this was an extremely well pitched game. For the longest time, I thought we were going to get shut out by Josh Towers, making his major league debut. He got a bit of the Ryan Glynn problem (read: blister on his finger), and stayed in the game, but probably shouldn't have, as he then gave up two solo home runs to Big Cat and Little Cat. That put us in the lead, which we promptly gave right back up. After 7, we were tied at 2, which usually means death.

However, for the first time this year, we came back and won when losing after 6 innings. We scored 4 in the top of the 8th, capped by a two run Gabe Kapler single to put us over the top.

J.D. Smart came in, allowed an inherited runner to score on a sac fly, but otherwise was damn near perfect. I picked him up on one of my fantasy teams a few days ago. :)

Well pitched ball game, despite the score. Hopefully we can do some damage to Kansas City before the Twins come in to town.

Another loss, but this time out it wasn't a disgusting one; although you could make a point that all losses are disgusting. :)

Ryan Glynn did his usual thing, pitching himself into trouble, however, this time, he managed to get out of them. The runs given up weren't really a direct result of him getting in trouble I felt (one was unearned, too). Sure, he could have pitched well enough not to allow any, but hey, even the best have a problem with that. I felt that Glynn had a great outing, despite the loss, and hope that he could keep this going. Problem was that we didn't give him any runs - we only scored a single one.

J.D. Smart pitched well again for the second straight game, and again I say he's looking like a great callup so far.

One of those losses that isn't too hard to swallow, it was an awesome baseball game, no matter what the outcome was.

Rainout. Not much to say about this. The game was not rescheduled yet.

Well, the Pat Mahomes magic was gone this game. He gave up seven earned runs in 4 innings. Again, he didn't seem that awful, the runs just crept up on him like they crept up on most of our pitchers this season.

The rest of our bullpen pitched well, giving up a total of two hits and no runs in the other four innings. Crabby went 2.2, which was nice. New addition, JD Smart pitched damn well again, so far he hasn't given up anything at all runs wise, which is very cool. Looks like he might be sticking around.

Still, the bottom line is we lost again. :(

Whoa! We won a series! That's the first time that's happened in 5 weeks. Granted, it's against Tampa Bay, but at this point, I'll take anything.

Finally, Rick Helling pitched a game that we held the lead, and a game that Rick didn't give up a bazillion gopher balls (although he gave up one). I really wished he would have tried for the complete game - I know we didn't have anyone get 8 innings this year, so that was a first, but I would have liked to have seen a complete game attempt. There was some stuff in the press about Rick discovering some mechanical flaw in his delivery, and fixing it. Hopefully that's the case, because Rick isn't a 2-6 pitcher. :(

Was the night of Arod again, with two home runs, and 5 RBI's. That was essentially all we needed, but there was other offense. Pudge looked good, Caminiti looked good.

However, the injury bug bites us again, with Randy Velarde taking a hit. Hopefully it's not too bad, I don't want to have to deal with another DL situation. :(

We're going to Baltimore, hopefully we can do well there. Our home run streak continued, though - 17 games in a row now.

(I'm not going to be writing much about this game, as it was a casualty of me being out of touch for awhile due to a business trip).

I didn't think we'd get to three. Actually, I watched very little of this game, about the first hour, because I was busy watching the series finale of Star Trek: Voyager last night (which I enjoyed).

When I turned off the Ranger game, we were winning 5-2, which looked good for me. However, it wasn't good for the Rangers, as they then gave up 8 more runs after I stopped watching. Good thing I did, or I would have been more annoyed.

We have a chance on Thu night to actually take a series, and if we don't take a series against the Rays, then we deserve the crappy record we have.

Our home run streak continued, though - 16 games in a row now.

(I'm not going to be writing much about this game, as it was a casualty of me being out of touch for awhile due to a business trip).

Two in a row! I think I'm gonna faint. :)

Kenny Rogers looked crisp, one of his better performances this season - going 6, giving up nothing. Venafro gave up the only two runs of the game, one was unearned. Overall a pretty good game, although it's against Tampa Bay, the team we're competing with for worst record in the AL. :(

Gabe Kapler had a solo home run, our 15th game in a row with a home run, setting a new club record. The record is 25 games, held by the 41 Yankees, the 94 Tigers, & the 98 Braves.

(I'm not going to be writing much about this game, as it was a casualty of me being out of touch for awhile due to a business trip).

Whoa! A win! And with a 3-2 score, no less. Usually we lose these, or when we win, we score 12 or 13 runs. It did keep us from getting swept, which we don't do a lot, but we usually lose 2 out of 3. Our last series sweep was in mid April against the A's.

Pat Mahomes started, which I thought was overdue, and got the win. He went 5 innings, giving up two runs. Our pen (including Juan Moreno) went the other four innings, giving up nothing, and getting Zimmerman a save in his new role as closer (Crabby was demoted to setup).

(I'm not going to be writing much about this game, as it was a casualty of me being out of touch for awhile due to a business trip).

Didn't see the game personally, but we lost again, and Rick Helling didn't get the loss, but did give up four earned runs in 6 innings. Not all that great. We did beat our old pal Esteban Loaiza insofar as he didn't get the win, while his team did.

(I'm not going to be writing much about this game, as it was a casualty of me being out of touch for awhile due to a business trip).

Didn't see the game personally, but from looking at the scores, it seems to be another typical Ranger game this year. We aren't that horrific, but one or two things appear to do us in, and leads to a huge inning. :( All the runs were given up by Aaron Myette - our pen, surprisingly didn't give up anything!

(I'm not going to be writing much about this game, as it was a casualty of me being out of touch for awhile due to a business trip).

It seems that when we get a win, we win by a lot - scoring 10 runs in the second inning. Figures, I was out of town, and couldn't see it. :) Pudge returns, which forces out Mike Hubbard, who was designated.

(I'm not going to be writing much about this game, as it was a casualty of me being out of touch for awhile due to a business trip).

What went wrong: We lost the game. Ryan Glynn had another blister attack, and had to leave the game. Crabtree totally blew it at the end of the game, giving up three runs, and giving Cleveland the win.

What went right: Except for Crabtree, we had an excellent game. Glynn gave up nothing before his blister, Mahomes pitched well after him, and Venafro & Zim gave up nothing. Arod had another home run, and overall, the team looked good. Just not Crabtree, who might want his old uniform number back.

Well, I was at this game, it was the night before I left for E3 in Los Angeles. I wanted to go to a baseball game before I went out of town. The Rangers lost, but I had a great time at the game. Decent weather, my wife was with me, and what made it awesome for me was the pinch hitting by Ruben Sierra in the bottom of the 6th. I was busy with my scorecard, and my wife pointed out that Sierra had come out for a curtain call - glad she did that, or I would have missed it. Was really nice to see that, and for me, it was the highlight of the day.

They were also filming stuff for the Disney flick "The Rookie". Dennis Quaid (who I loved in Frequency & Innerspace) was at the park, and ran out in the middle of the 7th to film stuff. There were a few errors on the filming, like the Devil Rays uniform being current instead of what they were wearing in 99; same for their logo. Also, Quaid ran out from the Rangers' bullpen, not the visitors. Oh well, it'll still be cool to go see that in the theatres and see the Ballpark in Arlington (remember, Arlington Stadium made a cameo in my all time fav baseball movie - Bull Durham).

The White Sox looked silly in their 1915 era throwback uniforms. However, not silly enough that they couldn't beat us. I've never liked playing against James Baldwin. He always seems to beat us, although usually more dominatingly than this. We lost again, and our exciting 1 game winning streak was over. :)

Rick Helling gave up a few more home runs - returning to his form of a couple of years ago. This is probably the worst Helling has pitched with the Rangers.

Well, this was the kind of game we were supposed to get. Tons of runs, enough to clobber the other team to death. We scored 16, and gave up 6. Seems what we should be doing here, although these kinds of games are few and far between.

Arod had two home runs, his 200th and 201st of his career. He's got 200 at age 25. Assuming he hits like this, he'll have 400 at 32, and 600 at 39. That's assuming he keeps up his current pace. :) Arod also had 6 RBI's in this game - Kapler & Catalonotto also had 3, and the others were scattered around the club.

Aaron Myette got the start, and looked good in the first, but was knocked out in the second. We've had pitchers stay in longer giving up more runs, I guess Narron wanted him out before too many scored and killed his mind too much. Pat Mahomes probably pitched himself into the starting rotation with this performance, going 4.1 innings and giving up nothing.

(I'm not going to be writing much about this game, as it was a casualty of me being out of touch for awhile due to a business trip).

An interesting pitching matchup - two pitchers who have pitched a perfect game going after each other - Kenny Rogers & David Wells. Both pitchers gave up 5 earned runs, Kenny going 7 innings, David going 9. The game went into extra innings, and unfortunately, Mike Venafro gave up a gopher ball to a guy who doesn't hit a lot of home runs - Jose Valentin.

Overall another decently pitched game by Kenny Rogers, unfortunately it was wasted due to the bullpen giving it away. Oh well.

Ewww. I don't even feel like writing about the games in this series. We're awfully close to having the worst record in all of baseball at the moment. :(

Ewww. I don't even feel like writing about the games in this series. We're awfully close to having the worst record in all of baseball at the moment. :(

Ewww. I don't even feel like writing about the games in this series. We're awfully close to having the worst record in all of baseball at the moment. :(

No time to write one at the moment - if I get the time later on Tuesday, I'll write this.

Well, I was hoping that the Rangers could build from last night's spectacular game. Then Kenny Rogers pitched the first inning, facing eight batters, giving up a bunch of hits, but fortunately only two runs. Then he proceeded to have 4 or 5 perfect innings, and I thought we had picked it up.

However, we got to our usual nemesis - late innings. In the 7th, it all fell apart. We were up 4-3, and then gave up four. At that point, we were down three. Disappointing, but not insurmountable. Then Arod hit a solo HR in the 8th, putting us within two. Then Pat Mahomes blew it in the 9th - throwing almost 40 pitches, and giving up another 3.

This game really annoyed me, because we pitched like we were going to take it in style for the bulk of the game, and then it all got away at the end - I was so annoyed, that I stopped scoring the game in the top of the 9th.

Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy! There were total of 6 errors in the game, 3 by each side - including one play where we had two at once! Can't win like that.

OK, it's the fifth day of the fifth month. Jerry Narron has 5 kids. There were five hits by the opponent this game. Hmmm...

Goofy number plays aside, this was a spectacular game. I have to say, driving out to the game, it was raining the whole way. I didn't think we'd be playing this game, either (see last night). However, once we got to the ballpark, it stopped raining. Sat in our seats, and my wife and I noticed that it started clearing up. It was like the heavens parted to get the game in - perhaps it had something to do with the fives above! :)

What more can you say about this game except Ryan Glynn. Driving out, I felt we'd lose, but I have to say, he blew everyone away, players and fans alike. Ryan was VERY strong, pitching 8 innings, giving up only three hits, with no walks, and not allowing anyone to get to second base the whole game! I felt that Ryan should have been given a chance to go out in the ninth and get a complete game shutout - I suppose if we had more than 3 runs, he probably would have gotten that chance.

Be curious to see if Ryan can follow this up next time on the hill.

Also, during the game, there was a very cool message on the scoreboard from Johnny & Gloria Oates. What a class guy - I will miss him. Johnny has meant a lot of me personally (growing up as a kid, he was the catcher in Philadelphia for a couple of years). I agree it was time for a change, but I'll miss him. I hope he turns up somewhere.

Rainout. And it was good, because our pitching was getting shelled again. Down 6-0 in the fourth, it all got washed away.

This means that I'll get to go to Narron's official debut tomorrow - as I have tickets for that game. It seemed to me that Davis couldn't get the ball up - he was continually too low.

The big news of the day was Johnny, of course. I covered that on the news page, and I haven't written anything of my own yet - I want to wait a week or so to let it sink in. A lot of online folks just write knee jerk things, and I want to wait until I've had a chance to process my feelings. Since I've been a Ranger fan, Johnny has been the only manager I've known - I didn't start following them until 1995 (I didn't move to Texas until Dec 92).

Ewww. Ewww.. Ewwww..

A major stinker all around. Bad pitching, and what looks like a really bad team (on the whole). Nothing is working right now, and I really hope we can bring in someone to help out with the pitching.

As much of an Oates supporter I've been, I wonder. I know he doesn't pitch, but perhaps a change in direction is needed.

I wasn't watching this one from the start, as my hometown Phillies were on ESPN2. I don't get to see many Phils games, so I mostly paid attention to that. However, I saw the score of this one roll in on the ticket on ESPN2. Blech.

Quite frankly, I'm getting tired of writing about bad games. I'm sure the Rangers are tired of losing them. We're down, but we're not out. We're just compounded by the horrendous pitching and the awesome start by the Mariners.

I just hope this doesn't turn into a fiasco like last year's did. I've also got an uneasy feeling about too many injuries this year. :(

AH CRAP! - I had just got done telling my wife that Zimmerman looks like he's back to his early 99 form when he goes and gives up a three run home run to lose the game in the 10th. The Mavericks game was more exciting than this! The Tigers are a team we are supposed to beat up on. This is NOT good.

I was going to go to this game originally - today was the 10th anniversary of Nolan Ryan's 7th no hitter, and he threw out the first ball. I almost went. Glad I didn't - I would have been irritated.

We don't seem to be able to hold any kind of lead - although our bullpen doesn't seem THAT bad. I don't understand it, honestly.

Arod should have done enough, with two home runs - but we let them back in the game, and then Zimmerman (who has been pitching great otherwise) gave up a three run jack in the 10th to lose it.

Frustrating! I'm not watching tomorrow night, but only because my hometown Phillies are on ESPN2, I'll watch that game instead, I only ever get to see less than 6 games a year with the Phils. :)

I'm not writing a lot, as I'm writing this on May 2nd, and the game has faded a bit from my memory - my wife and I went to Round Rock over the weekend to check out some minor league games at the Dell Diamond. This weekend was a minor league weekend. :)

I'm not writing a lot, as I'm writing this on May 2nd, and the game has faded a bit from my memory - my wife and I went to Round Rock over the weekend to check out some minor league games at the Dell Diamond. This weekend was a minor league weekend. :)

This is about the type of game I expected this year. Lots of offense, mediocre pitching, and we prevail in the end. Unfortunately, that's not what we've gotten a lot of this year so far.

It was really nice to see Gabe Kapler get a grand slam - and Jeff Zimmerman looked really good coming in from the pen - he appears to be pitching like 1999 again - was also nice to see Rusty Greer get a couple of jacks. He really seems over what ailed him last year.

I'm not writing a lot, as I'm writing this on May 2nd, and the game has faded a bit from my memory - my wife and I went to Round Rock over the weekend to check out some minor league games at the Dell Diamond. This weekend was a minor league weekend. :)

It seems like so long ago when we swept the A's, and life was great. Now, we're 8 games behind the Mariners, who are 18-4, and appear to be running away with the division already!

This loss was annoying, we should have won - Kenny pitched decent, if not great, and we got screwed by a (lack of) an interference call late. Sure, the case could be made if we played better, the win shouldn't have had to hang on an umpire's call, but there we are.

And we go into Cleveland this weekend to face Juan Gonzalez - my guess is that he tees off on us.

A particularly annoying loss, I felt. Doug Davis was cruising for the first couple of innings, it was shaping up to be a masterpiece. We left a zillion batters on base during the first couple of innings, too. I should have known from that.

We were up 3-0 through the bottom of the 5th, when it fell apart. Davis gave up four runs in quick succession to the Jays, and we never recovered. We did tie it up in the 6th, but the momentum wasn't there.

I don't have a whole lot to say about this game, as I didn't see most of it due to the 6PM start time. Was nice to see Pudge get another jack, especially off Billy "I have the stupidest beard of all time" Koch.

Not available, due to personal issues taking up too much of my time.

Not available, due to personal issues taking up too much of my time.

Not available, due to personal issues taking up too much of my time.

Not available.

Topes win! Topes win!

OK, it's not quite that bad, but we managed to get out of Seattle without being swept. We did manage to have a winning record on this road trip against the West, which is good. We're in second place, only 3.5 games out - so things aren't as bad as some online folks would have you believe. :) We're certainly scoring runs, but we're giving up way too many. It appears that Ryan Glynn has lost his spot on the rotation. Let's see what else happens.

Anyway, last night Raffy continued his surprising onslaught against Safeco field with another home run and a couple of RBI's. Chad Curtis also had a jack - our offense is quite well. However, we again gave up too many, too many from the pen, and let the Mariners back in the game, when they had no business being in the game. That can be a huge problem.

Doug Davis got the win - he wasn't stellar, though. That's our problem so far. He only went 5.2 innings, which is killing our bullpen. Crabtree is on the DL now, and R.A. Dickey was called up from AAA to help out. My guess is he goes to the pen, and isn't a rotation guy. On the other side, we roughed up Brett Tomko pretty good, so much so that Seattle had to bring in Aaron Sele from the bullpen - the first time he's ever done that in his career.

Ichiro Suzuki continues to be hot, going 13 games now with his hitting streak. Is it just me, or does he appear to slap at everything to try to drive it to left field? Every time I see him hit, that's what it seems like.

Back home - although we'll be tired, not getting in until about 6AM on Thursday. :)

No commentary from me on this game.

What a circus atmosphere. I probably would have been really into it if I was in Seattle - I know I would have worn Ranger colors, too. For some reason, I just don't see myself getting assaulted in Seattle. Now, I wouldn't try that if say, Derek Jeter came to Texas, and we were going to the Bronx. :)

However, I was sitting in my living room, and that's not the same thing as being there. I would have liked to have been there, but from what I could see, it was definitely a circus. You'll see in the photos below some of it - but the loudness was surprising. I knew he'd be booed a lot, and cheered when he messed up, but it still didn't compare - even though some of the cooler stuff was announced. My favorite thing a fan did was sit there with a fishing rod with a dollar bill attached, trying to reel in Arod. Now that was funny, yet uncool at the same time. I laughed at that one.

As for the game itself? Well, Ryan Glynn had NOTHING. He has always had a problem with walking a lot, and he did that tonight too. However, he just seemed to have even less than his usual mediocre to bad outing. If Helling has a night like this Tuesday, I can see the folks clamoring for a change. I have to admit I'm surprised at Glynn, as he didn't pitch this way in spring training.

Our bats kept us in the game for the most part - Raffy did his best, hitting two home runs in the game - the first two in Safeco this season, but we just gave up too many. I have a feeling that will be the story of the season.

Hopefully, I get to use this graphic a lot this season. :)

It was really nice to see us bust out in this fashion, scoring over 30 runs against the A's. I don't like the fact that we're giving up so many - we have the worst ERA in all of baseball so far. We won't be able to carry the team that long on just the sticks. We need some better pitching. Still, a win is a win, and I'll take as many as we can get. Especially when we have to chase the Twins (!) for best record in baseball. :)

Anyway, Arod continued his onslaught this weekend in Oakland, going 2 for 3 with 5 RBI's for a total of 13 for the weekend. It was really awesome to see our offense wake up. Our pitching? Well, Oliver gave up too many and exited too short for a starter. Our bullpen let them back in the game when they shouldn't have.

It seems that anyone pitching as closer has inherited John Wetteland. First off, Crabtree couldn't pitch - he was having back spasms. Second, Venafro, who did pitch for a save, proceeded to walk the bases full before getting the job done. I wonder if we can have a closer that goes 1-2-3 anymore! :)

As I started watching this game, I felt good. Kenny Rogers looked pretty good early on. We jumped on Barry Zito for a bunch of runs early on, going up 8-0, on the strength of the bottom of the lineup, who really delivered well.

However, the biggest bat was Arod, who seemed to be the Arod that was envisioned when he was signed. He went 3 for 5, with six RBI's, a 3 run home run, and some pretty good defense. This is the ARod that I suspect Seattle is so annoyed at losing. I know I would be. :)

However, as the game went on, our bullpen stupidly let the A's back in the game - they tied the game up 8-8 in the 8th inning. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. When you're up 8-0, you deserve to win. :) Anyway, ARod came through in the 9th again, delivering an RBI to put us up 9-8, after Curtis & Velarde (both great surprises so far this season) singled, setting the table.

Mr. Wetteland (ahem, excuse me, Tim Crabtree) got his fourth save in true "#35 fashion". He put a couple on before getting the job done. Crabtree said he learned a lot from Wetteland, he wanted his uniform, and so far, he's filling John's shoes very well - taking all aspects of John's pitching (especially the heart attack style of saving games). :)

This is the type of game that the 2001 Texas Rangers were supposed to have been playing all along. The big bats break out in a major, major way, and our pitching keeps 'em down.

Quite frankly, I expected to win this game, but not quite by this large of a margin. The game started off great enough, with home runs by Rusty Greer & Randy Velarde to lead off the first. That's all we really needed. :)

However, we didn't stop there, really teeing off on Cory Lidle. Arod finally got his first home run as a Ranger, which was nice to see. Geez, just about everyone had a contribution here, only Pudge was hitless, going 0-6.

We ended up getting 4 runs off of Mike Magnante, and one off of Jeff Tam. Our pitching on the other hand, was stellar. Doug Davis did our tired bullpen a job, going 6.2 innings, giving up just one run. Zimmerman & Venafro, who pitched the remaining 2.1 innings didn't give up anything, which was nice to see.

I hope that these offensive stats are the start of something nice, not just an abberation.

Ewwwwwwwww... That's about all I have to say about this one. Major stinker. As I'm writing this 3 days later, I don't feel like jogging my memory to remember this piece of crap. :)

Well, of the three games against the Angels, this is the one I figured we'd lose, because of Ramon Ortiz. Never in my dreams would I also expect us to get beat by Benji Gil! Man, Benji Gil was on fire against us - I doubt it was because of us, but he certainly seemed like a far better shortstop than at any time he played with us. It was even interesting to hear Bill & Tom almost fawning over him.

Not a whole lot to talk about in this one - the main story was Ramon Ortiz shutting us down for 7.2 innings - he ran out of gas at the end, and gave up a couple of runs, but was outstanding in his pitching. I went to look for him on my fantasy leagues, and of course, he was taken on 3 of 4 - I nabbed him for another one, dropping Doug Davis from that team.

Anyway, Randy Velarde continues his early season onslaught, getting a double and an RBI - he's been a spectacular pickup for us - surprised me, that's for sure. Speaking of pickups, I'm rather glad we have Caminiti, even though he's not batting all that great so far - his defense at third is a major upgrade over Lamb or Tatis.

Hopefully, we'll do better tomorrow.

Well, here starts the chain of games that keep you up past midnight. I was watching on my TiVo, so it made it a little better, as I didn't start watching the game until 9:45, but when you can take the commercials out, it goes faster. :)

Darren Oliver has already won as many games as he did last year on his second start of the season. That's great and sad at the same time. However, he again pitched like he didn't really want it - being wild all over the place, not being terribly consistent - but showing just enough to get the job done. Makes me wonder if he pitched against someone good like the Yankees or the Indians - he'd be 0-2 instead of 2-0.

Tim Crabtree really tried to give the game back to Anaheim, it seemed. His first pitch hit a batter, and the next pitch was a double, scoring the guy he hit. However, he got it together, and the game finished with a 7-5 for the home eleven.

A Rod got booed pretty loudly when he came up to bat - I'm not terribly sure why. I can certainly understand him being booed in Seattle, or in one of the other cities where he had talked to about signing, but it kind of surprises me about him being booed all over the place. I wonder if he'll get booed in Minnesota, too? Ruben Mateo looked good, getting three RBI's on a base clearing double, finally coming through with the bases loaded.

Mark Petkovsek pitched well again, proving probably that his first two outings were an aberration. Overall a good game, if a bit wild with Oliver on the hill. Still, a win is a win. :)

What an incredible series of baseball. Sure, we lost two of three, but there was some damn great games here. None was a blowout, all were tight to the final out - and with 17 more against the Mariners, this bodes well for a good season of baseball!

I wasn't too thrilled with the game after the first 4 or 5, when we had left 9 on base. I forget offhand how many we left on base altogether, but we made the game a lot harder on ourselves than we had to by leaving so many men on base.

It was a tight game again, with Kenny Rogers rolling along, his only blips were two solo jacks given up - otherwise, he looked good (if not awesome, he didn't seem that crisp to me, but he got the job done). He was pulled for a situational pitching match up in the 7th, one I didn't agree with either (Kenny looked miffed on TV). Zimmerman got out of that inning, however in the next inning, the Mariners scored two runs on a pinch hit two run home run by Mark McLemore!?!?! - Where was this power when he was with us - two home runs for Mac in two games? Guess that's what happens when you lose your starting job. :)

Anyway, at this point, Randy Velarde had already been brought in as defensive backup earlier in the inning, and he provided the win - with a home run to take the lead and the game. Tim Crabtree got his second save in as many chances in the 9th. A great win, a great series of baseball!

We're off tomorrow, and then we're off on a 9 game west coast swing against our three division opponents.

Another really damn exciting game - that's two in a row. I wonder what Sunday afternoon will bring?

Both starting pitchers in this game (Doug Davis & Brett Tomko) seemed to suffer the same problem. They pitched well the first three innings, but melted down in the fourth. Actually, Doug didn't leave till the fifth, but gave up a run in the fourth, and several in the 5th. Tomko got knocked out in the fourth after a two run jack by Andres Galarraga, and a massive home run by Ken Caminiti - it was one of those blasts that you don't even doubt. Even before the camera had switched from Cammy to the right field porch, I knew it was gone. My wife, who was elsewhere in the house, heard me get excited about that, and came in to watch. Fortunately, with TiVo, I can back it up, and watch it again - I don't have to wait for their replay, I can make my own. :)

Anyway, at this point, we just cruised for the rest of the game, going into the 9th only down one run. Things were feeling pretty good actually, until the 9th - when Tim Crabtree (getting an inning of work) gave up two runs, putting us down three. This gave us the unfortunate circumstance of going up against Kaz Sasaki down three, which is almost as bad as going up against Mariano Rivera down three.

Anyway, we actually managed to pull off two, in a very exciting fashion, capped off by a two run double by A-Rod. That was A-Rod's third double of the night, breaking out of his "slump". :)

Petkovsek pitched well, throwing 2.1 innings of scoreless relief. Combined with his two other fiasco appearances, that LOWERS his ERA to 12.6. This is what we signed him for, I know the first two appeareances were abberations, but still - 12.6? Jeff Brantley also threw a scoreless frame.

Another loss to Seattle, but damn - another great game!

What a cool game! We lost, obviously, but it had a lot of the feel of that massive win last season against the A's when we came back to win 17-16 or something like that.

The only huge negative to this game appeared to be Rick Helling, who looked totally lost out there. He didn't have any control, his pitches were all over the place, and he just generally appeared like he had pitched yesterday. The Mariners jumped all over him, and forced him out in the fourth inning. Rick's ERA is now 11.00, a positively disgusting ERA - this is something I would have expected out of the 5th starter, not the first. However, we did have some nice spots pitching wise - and I refer of course, to Pat Mahomes. Pat pitched 4 2/3 innings of scoreless relief. In fact, the only person he didn't retire was the first batter he faced - everyone else he got out, which was awesome to see. When he was pulled, I was wondering aloud why, because he was cruising so well. Anyway, Venafro came in, pitched to one batter, and then was pulled for Zimmerman. Zim did his "thing" by giving up a home run ball, but not right away like usual. He waited until the 10th inning to do that, which cost us the game. Zim didn't pitch all that bad, but his annoying tendency to give up home runs in pressure situations is really starting to bother me.

A big night offensively for Raffy. He scored a couple of runs, and drove in 5, including a massive 7th inning grand slam, which really put us back into the game. In the bottom of the 8th, we had a chance to take the lead after tying, but a play very reminiscent of Pete Rose happened - Ken Caminiti barreled into Seattle's catcher at the plate, completely bowling him over. However, Tom Lampkin held on to the ball, and Ken was out.

After that, I just had one thing to say. Kaz Sasaki & Ichiro Suzuki. Blech. :)

Well, this one wasn't as good as the two before it. It was more like opening day.

It struck me as one of those games where we didn't particularly pitch bad, but the hits that the other team got really counted. Ryan Glynn, while down only 3-2 when he left, was pitching fairly well. For the second night in a row, a Ranger pitcher was hit by a batted ball. Glynn came out immediately, and while nothing is broken, you never like to see a pitcher hit by a ball - whenever it happens I think of Bryce Florie. Jeff Brantley came in to relieve Glynn, and caught the Jeff Zimmerman disease - giving up a home run on the first pitch of relief. That made it 6-2, and it just went further downhill from there. Can't win 'em all, but you never like to see losses. :)

The best thing of this game was Randy Velarde, who has proven to be a great pickup for us. He had a home run this game, as well as a double, and great defense. Also, Chad Curtis has played extremely well in center field. Makes me wonder what we'll do when Ledee & Kapler come back - my guess is Porter goes back to AAA, and Curtis becomes outfielder #4.

First off, sorry for the delay in writing. I was sick on Thursday, and had to go home and rest. :)

It was great going to the park again (for a game, anyway) for the first time in the better part of 6 months. I really missed going to games - and I probably would have enjoyed it better if I was feeling good (I haven't been feeling all that great the last couple of days). I had gotten free seats for opening night from the Rangers, so the fact that I didn't have to pay made it all the nicer, too. :)

Anyway, I had a different feeling going into this game with Darren Oliver on the mound. If he was pitching last year, I would have been scared to death. I also saw him in Round Rock last year when the Drillers played the Express - Darren was there on a AA rehab assignment. He wasn't good there, either. However, this night was different. While not a stellar pitching performance, he pitched well enough to get a win. He went 5 innings, giving up no runs, although he did walk too many (with a rather high pitch count) - which accounted for his loading the bases in the first and second innings. He walked 5 in 5 innings, but K'ed 6 Angels, too.

On the offensive side, I walked in thinking - it's game 3, and no home runs - we have to get one tonight. We did. Galarraga got his first as an American Leaguer, scoring 3 - Pudge followed up later with a solo jack.

All in all, it was a great game - and my wife had treated me to a Schlotsky's sandwich for our dinner at the game. Much better than any of the food at the Ballpark. :)

For the first time in a couple of years, I did not attend opening day. When tickets went on sale, the only ones that were available were mostly crap seats anyway, and since I'm going two other times during opening week, I decided to blow it off this year. I'm still happy with that, as I avoided a lot of crowds, but I did miss it.

I listened at work, and I have to say, this was the most into it I was listening at work for awhile. So much so that when the Rangers turned that double play in the bottom of the ninth, I jumped out of my chair screaming with my fists in the air! Fortunately, I have my own office, so no one saw that. :)

Our eight hits were pretty evenly spread - the only ofers were Rusty and Raffy. Pudge, Cat, & Curtis scored our three runs. Not a whole lot of offense here, but there was just enough to win - because our pitching was pretty damn good. Kenny Rogers went 7+ innings, giving up just two earned runs. Zim came in and was in 99 form, shutting down the threat in the 8th, giving up donut.

And Tim Crabtree. He took Wetteland's number, he also took his "give them a heart attack before getting the job done" mentality. :) The defense really bailed him out in the 9th - it was a cool inning. Glad he got the save.

My first game of the season is Wed night. Can't wait!

And so it begins. I have to say, I was far more worked up this season for the first game than I was the last couple of years. I can't pin it down to any one reason. Sure, I'm excited about the new players, the game in Puerto Rico was a lot of fun to watch, but I just can't pin it down to one thing. I went out to the Ballpark early and checked out the scene there - had my picture taken, picked up a magnetic schedule, and some other cool free stuff they were doing. However, I did not stay and watch the game there. I was recording everything on my TiVo at home, so I could watch it at my leisure, in a more comfortable environment. I love the Ballpark, but watching an entire game on the Jumbotron is hard on my eyes. Anyway, I came back home, and it was cool, because when I left the Ballpark, the radio pre-game came on, so I was listening to that on the drive back to Garland.

I got home, watched the pre-game stuff, and then when my wife got home from work, we proceeded to watch the game. I have to say, I truly loved the lineup intros. The crowd's reaction to Pudge was just awesome - was a "chill down the spine" moment. Really great stuff there.

We got off to a pretty good start I thought - ARod singled in his first two Ranger at bats, scoring a run. However, a problem I didn't like last year cropped it's head again. We went 0-10 with runners in scoring position today. This is not good. The ballpark itself played all kinds of havoc with the game (and yesterday's, too). Rusty Greer got screwed out of a popout that was blown way out of his reach, Pudge got jipped of a home run by the wind, and the Blue Jays got a home run that probably should not have been a home run, but because of the tiny power alleys in this place, it was a home run.

Anyway, you can't totally blame it on that - we didn't execute with men on base - we certainly had enough runners early to have a 6-1 lead, but we were tied 1-1 most of the way through the game. Rick Helling didn't pitch all that bad, but got burnt by his usual nemesis, the home run ball; a bigger problem here than anywhere else. Our bullpen was totally ineffective in the 7th inning, giving up 4 runs on a gob of hits - Mark Petkovsek faced four batters; all four got hits. Jeff Brantley looked good in the 8th, though.

ARod had a bit of an inauspicious start as a Ranger. He went 2 for 4 with an RBI and a run scored, he also committed an error, and a couple of other plays that should have been errors. The one error looked like a true error, but the other two looked like turf issues - he slipped on the turf once (which happened to Caminiti, too), and tripped over his own shoelaces once. I blame the first one on first game jitters, and the others on crappy turf. Either way, ARod has already made more money than I'll make in a couple of years salary. :(

Lookin' forward to Tuesday afternoon for some real home Ranger baseball. :)

No coverage from me due to my server downtime.

No coverage from me due to my server downtime.

No coverage from me due to my server downtime.

No coverage from me due to my server downtime.

No coverage from me due to my server downtime.

No coverage from me due to my server downtime.

No coverage from me due to my server downtime.

No coverage from me due to my server downtime.

After performing so weakly against the Phillies, I was dreading facing our nemesis - especially with the recent depressing news about the state of our outfield depth.

Doug Davis continued to look good, going 5 innings against the 3 time defending champs, giving up squat. No hits, no runs, although he walked four and struck out six. Can't complain about the results here. Pudge woke up too, smacking two jacks today. Jeff Zimmerman pitched a scoreless inning, too.

However, the back end didn't pitch so well today. Mike Munoz, who's been spectacular this spring, gave up two runs (although they were unearned), and Tim Crabtree gave up three earned runs in his 1.1 innings of work. Not that great, but we won - and against the Yankees, you'll always take that - especially when it makes the Yankees 7-16, the worst record in all of the majors this spring. ;)

Well, we broke the streak at four. However, it was tempered by the news that Kapler got hurt at the end of game 1 of this doubleheader. Gabe Kapler felt a twinge as he lunged for first base on the final out of an 8-2 seven-inning loss to Philadelphia. It's not yet known how much time he'll miss. Could be a week, could be 5. :( That could make our starting outfield on opening day Mateo / Porter / Curtis. Doesn't look like we'll be moving any outfielders now.

On the better news side, Rick Helling looked pretty decent. He went 6 innings, giving up two runs on two hits. Not all that bad. Hopefully this is the kind of performance we get out of him, not the one last time out. Crabby came on and pitched the last inning, not giving up anything.

On the other side, Bo Porter continued his case to make the team, which could be strengthened with the injury to Kapler, along with Ledee not being ready for opening day. Porter had two home runs, three RBIs in four at bats. There were 6 other hits scattered amongst the Ranger lineup. Offensively, we woke up during this game, this looks like what the Rangers of 2001 are supposed to be like.

For the second straight game, we played the Phillies. For the second straight game, we gave up eight runs. For the FOURTH straight game, we lost. Sigh.

It would appear that our offense has gone into hibernation the last few games. There's always the talk of the Spring Training "dead arm period" for pitchers; it would appear our batters have gone there, too.

Our pitching was weak to poor over the 7 innings of this game. Pat Mahomes, Jeff Brantley, & Mark Petkovsek all gave up a lot (see box score below). While I didn't see or hear the game, the box score shows a mess. Not much good to say about this one pitching wise.

Offensively, we didn't do a whole lot. Of the two runs, only one was an RBI according to the box score (although both were earned). Phillies pitching gave up only 5 hits (two by Gabe Kapler).

A pretty sad game.

No commentary from me available - I've been way too busy with moving my web sites, and other work related issues.

Not available.

Well, what can you say about a game like this?

We played chicken with the Orioles, and it was us who blinked in the bottom of the ninth. From the sounds of it we just gave it to them at the end. That's too bad, as it wasted a totally awesome pitching performance by our staff. Once again, we pitched like a real baseball team, not that mess we had in 2000. Pat Mahomes (who is expected to make the staff, it would seem) took the loss in the ninth inning. Doug Davis was awesome, going 6 innings, and scattering 5 hits, and no walks, giving up donut.

Mahomes really wasn't that bad - he went 2 1/3 innings, giving up just three hits and a run (which was actually unearned), but when you don't get anything of your own, that 1 is pretty massive.

Not a whole lot to say about 1-0 losses, except that it wasn't 10-0. :)

Eww.. A big stinker of a game.

Rick Helling sounded horrible - although the radio guys on Sunday said that he was experimenting with more breaking pitches than usual. I realize spring is a time to try things, and take your lumps, but you never want to see this happen anytime. :) On the positive side for Helling, he finished out his outing by retiring the last 8 batters he faced - so he eventually figured it out, but in a real season game, he would have been long removed before that happened.

We only had 7 hits - only two by one player (Ruben Mateo, who scored our only run). Pretty lackluster effort all around.

A pretty well pitched game on both sides of the coin.

We didn't give up anything until the ninth inning, when Mike Munoz gave up a home run and the only two runs the Blue Jays got all day. Glynn went four, Chris Haney went two, Jeff Zimmerman went two - all giving up no runs. Munoz gave up two, and got a save (!).

On the other side of the coin, Ruben Mateo had a two run home run in the fourth for two of the three runs we got. Not a lot to write about on this one. :)

Well, it's two nights in a row we lost at the end of the game, although it's not as annoying as the Yankee loss; but then again what's as annoying as losing to the Yankees? :)

This game was looking good, being up 3-1 into the 8th inning. We were up on two home runs - one by ARod, and the other by the pleasant spring surprise, Bo Porter. I'm hoping we can move someone (Curtis, or Ledee) so we can add Porter as the 5th outfielder. That speed is something we just don't have otherwise.

Our pitching was pretty good for the most part. Darren Oliver continues his good spring giving up just one run on four innings. Mark Petkovsek went 3 innings giving up nothing. Danny Kolb (who looks like he'll start the season on the DL) had a bad outing giving up 3 earned runs in less than an inning - Tim Crabtree came in and stopped that, pitching 1 1/3 giving up nothing. Overall, some great pitching, except for Kolb.

Even though it's a loss, the team's lookin' good!

The Yankee curse continues, damnit! We were down to the last strike in closing the game out in the bottom of the 9th, and then they come back. Crap - crap - crap! It's too bad, as I thought Kenny Rogers pitched good at the start, as did everyone who followed him - except Pete Munro.

You know, in the couple of years I've been doing this site, I'm tired of writing about the Yankees beating us, so I'm not going to do it now, either.

The spring fun continues. Heard something at the start of the broadcast where we have the #1 pitching staff in baseball to this point, and the #1 defense in the AL. Quite impressive. I realize we're less than a dozen games into spring training, but I'll take that now, it's always nice to hear.

Our offense got off to a steady start - with 1 run in each of the first three innings. First was a home run by Chad Curtis to lead off the game. Andres Galarraga came through with another solo home run in the next inning, and Doug Davis looked great. While his line showed that he gave up two runs, they didn't really belong to him - it was one of those fielding gaffes that wasn't technically an error; the most annoying kind to a pitcher, I'm sure.

After the fifth inning, I had to stop listening to the game, as my wife and I had a few things we needed to take care of, but by this time, we were already up 4 to 2. We've now won 4 in a row, and the test comes tomorrow night against the Yankees.

Not available - too busy with work today.

Still no "Arod vs. Ken Griffey Jr" - as we didn't bring Arod to the Reds park.

Well, today's game falls into the "great game, not a lot to talk about" department - at least for me. Games like this are great to watch (and not too bad to listen to), but there isn't a whole lot to report about when it comes time to talk baout the game.

The pitching on both sides was great - we only had two runs, and they had one. Ryan Glynn went three innings, with 3 strikeouts, and more importantly, no walks. Mark Petkovsek went two, giving up nothing, Mike Venafro pitched two scoreless as well. Jeff Brantley gave up our only run (quite frankly, I don't expect him to make the club, so I don't care). Aaron Meyette got the save in the ninth, I guess Tim Crabtree didn't make the trip - I would imagine he would be tested in a true save situation would he have been here.

On the offensive side, the only thing we had going was a big two run home run by Pudge, but it turned out that's all we needed.

The only other news is bad - being from the injury front. Ricky Ledee who got hurt yesterday has a torn hamstring tendon in his left leg. He'll be out a minimum of two weeks, and may need surgery. He's unlikely for opening day; longer if surgery is needed.

Gabe Kapler was hit in the hand with a pitched ball - was sent back to Port Charlotte immediately, more will be known later.

Chad Curtis, from a purely selfish standpoint, must like this, it increases his chances for playing time.

I didn't get to hear all of this game, I was out doing some furniture shopping today. I got to hear the first three innings. When I left the house, we were winning 4-1, but we should have been leading by more - we left the bases loaded at least once that I can remember. We scored 10 runs, all by different players. We had 14 hits, by 11 players - pretty balanced attack. In the second inning, Galarraga hit a home run that sounded great on the radio (almost hit the ospry nest), and looked pretty impressive on the Fox 4 TV replay I saw later in the evening. Arod came into this game batting .571, and Frank Catalanotto also has a batting average above .600 I believe. Both did nothing to sour that today - Arod going 1 for 2, and Catalanotto going 2 for 3. Speaking of hitting, in the 5 run 6th, we had consecutive hits by 6 or 7 (I don't remember, I was driving at the time) straight batters!

Darren Oliver already has more wins this spring training than he had all of last season, which is pretty sad. Still, I'm hoping he can pull it together this year - he looks good so far, but then again Eric Nadel pointed out today that he had a good spring last year, too. We also had some good defense saving Oliver, as the Orioles had singles in the first 4 out of 7 batters (3 were bloops). We did have double plays in both the first and second. This kind of saving didn't happen a lot last year. Hope it's a good sign for this year.

In other notes, Ricky Ledee sounded like he pulled his hamstring - he's getting an MRI on Sunday, and a prognosis will be made then as to what might be wrong with him. Also, several kids fell 3 feet when a railing in the stands collapsed before the game started - no one was seriously hurt, though. And, we moved 6 players off the spring training roster, all pitchers not expected to make the club anyway.

Where was all this offense yesterday? :)

Don't have time to write about this - I'm extremely busy at work today. However, there isn't much to say. First bad game of the Spring. Only thing worth writing about is ARod, who was 2 for 3 with a solo home run.

Kenny Rogers went three innings, and gave up 3 runs, but NONE of them were earned. That's not promising. Chris Haney didn't give up anything, and Mike Munoz pitched another scoreless frame.

However, that's about the gist of it. :)

When I saw the line score start up for this game, I had forgotten we were hitting against Esteban Loaiza. He didn't do all that bad, giving up just two hits and one run in two innings. For some reason, I just felt that we'd tee off against him, I guess not. Then I saw the game going back and forth on the scoreboard, and figured we'd end up losing. Had to go back to work and couldn't watch that, so I was surprised when I saw the final score in our favor. Don't know why, but it always seems when we play against a former Ranger, we never do good.

Pudge looked good, he had two RBI's (one off Loaiza, one off Pedro Borbon). Pudge was the standout offensive player of the day. No other Ranger had two hits, and no one had two RBI's. The rest of the hits and RBI's were scattered all over the box score.

Doug Davis pitched three innings, allowing one run on four hits. Unfortunately, we gave up three home runs - one each off of Doug Davis, Pat Mahomes, & Mike Venafro (who got a save). Fortunately, they were all solo home runs. Pat Mahomes didn't fare too well today, giving up 3 hits & 3 runs in his three innings of work. Petkovsek was perfect in his two innings.

Overall, not a bad game, but not a great one. Nice to see a comeback win, though.

A great pitcher's duel, but we ended up on the wrong side of the stick.

I listened over the Internet with the MLB Radio coverage - and I have to say. I miss Eric Nadel. Listening to someone else call a Rangers game is just wrong. These guys obviously don't have a lot of experience (the MLB guys) calling a game, and it showed. While they were enthusiastic, and fairly knowledgeable (I thought) - something wasn't right. There's only one other game with these guys for the Rangers this spring training, but I have to say, I want Nadel.

Anyway, not much happened during the game, it was a good pitcher's duel. At the time I'm writing this, the box score isn't available, so I can't give a lot of detail (as I was working while listening, and couldn't take notes). However, Rick Helling only allowed one hit over his three innings of work, and as I recall, the one run we gave up in the fifth was due to a fielding issue.

We had a great comeback in the ninth with an RBI single by Bo Porter, after we were down to our last out. A passed ball helped, and Porter's single tied it in the ninth. Not much else until the bottom of the 11th when Spike Lundberg gave up the winning hit to the Rays.

Nice to hear the game, not great to lose, but sounded like some great pitching again on both sides!

Our hope of an undefeated Spring Training comes to an end today with an 8-5 loss to the Twins. :)

Once again, we got pretty good pitching, with one exception. Brian Sikorski had a major meltdown, giving up 6 earned runs on seven hits in two innings. Other than Sikorski, our pitching was great, giving up 6 hits over 8 innings, and 2 earned runs. The two earned runs were by Glynn & Benoit. Jeff Zimmerman struck out the side the one inning he pitched, and Mike Munoz had two strikeouts the one inning he pitched. Again, some great pitching to start the spring.

On the other side of the coin, we had two guys go 2 for 2 (Dransfeldt, Sheldon, with Sheldon getting a dinger). Sheldon also had a couple of RBI's, and probably does himself good this spring. The remaining hits were scattered through the lineup with everyone else getting just one. Seemed like a pretty balanced offensive attack.

Losses are never nice, but hey, overall we got some mostly decent pitching here.

Arrrgh! What a game to have seen on TV. However, all we got was an Internet box score. Was kind of fun "watching" the game with a few people over at the Newberg Site forums. :)

Anyway, a lot of power early in this one, accounting for a lot of the runs. Three run hoe runs each by Galarraga, Caminiti, & ARod in the first four innings gave us more than we needed to win this one, having only given up two runs of our own. Kapler, Velarde & Ruben Mateo also got in on the RBI train today. Interesting in that the three home runs were all by players who weren't on the team last year. It will certainly be a different look when we all head out to the Temple in April, won't it?

Darren Oliver's ERA so far is 4.5, I believe - and is 1-0! :) He gave up only one hit, and it was the solo home run - from reading about the game, he didn't seem to pitch so bad. I really want Oliver to do good - I was a fan of his coming back here, and 2000 was a mess. I'm hoping he can turn it around, but I'll be first on the bandwagon if he shows signs of being like last year's pitcher again. Crabtree was perfect in the ninth, which is a good sign. Our pitching was one again really good, giving up only 2 runs over 9 innings - I can live with that, even if we didn't have the offense that we have this season. The other run we gave up was given up by Kevin Foster, a pitcher not really expected to make the club.

The thing that's sad about this is that the reported attendance at the stadium was only 2,051. Damn. A doubleheader and only 2,000 people show up? Oh well, guess that's why we're moving to Arizona.

This is the part of Spring Training I don't like. Games are being played, yet we don't get to see or hear them. What we usually get during these non broadcast games are at most about 10 seconds of clips on the local news (which of course would rather talk about Troy Aikman's choice of playing next year as opposed to something GOOD like the Rangers in spring training), and a box score online. Sigh.

Speaking of the box score, Kelly Dransfeldt was the star of this game, going 2 for 3 with 2 RBI's. The remaining 6 hits we had were spread out over the other players. Pat Mahomes was perfect, not giving up anything for his two innings (nice to see), and Mark Petkovsek gave up the only Pittsburgh run. Overall, 6 hits for 7 innings and one run. Not too shabby.

This was a short 7 inning early morning game to make up for rainouts in both the Pirates' and Rangers' schedules yesterday. When I got up this morning, four innings had already been played! :)

Sat down to listen to Game 2 of Spring Training - instead I listened to one inning of baseball. The game was rained out (as was about 5 or 6 other Florida ST games, too). Because of this, the Rangers will play a doubleheader tomorrow - one was the originally scheduled game against the Pirates, and the makeup a 7 inning early morning game against the Pirates too - as they were rained out.

Not much to say about this one - the Rangers played one inning, and we gave up an unearned run due to a Kenny Rogers throwing error on a pickoff move. That allowed a run to score on a single shortly afterwards. That was it. The Rangers did nothing at all in their one at bat - 3 up 3 down.

Was nice to see the regular 9 for 2001 all in the starting lineup - although a lot of doubt remains as to what order they'll actually bat once the season opens.

"...Ranger Baseball is on the air!"

With those words, we started the 2001 Ranger campaign. Right around noon, we heard that familiar Ranger radio intro, culminating with the words "Ranger Baseball is on the air!". Shortly after that, we heard the familar voice of Eric Nadel introducing the team, the news of Rusty's 3 year extension, as well as just the general great feel of Ranger baseball!

The last couple of years, the first Spring Training game on the radio has been during the week, and during those years, my wife would bring me a special lunch to the office (here's a picture from 2000) - this time, since I was already home, we had the baseball lunch at home. Hot Dogs, sauerkraut, and French Fries. Having some Coke in a Ranger mug (you know, the ones they sell beer in at the Ballpark) made it pretty cool. Enjoyed the game immensely!

Of course, the main attraction for a lot of people, I'm sure was Arod and how he'd perform. Well, during the time he was in the game, he had two singles (although he got thrown out trying to stretch one into a double), as well as a walk, and one really spectacular sounding defensive play. After one game - I pronounce him a success. :) Seriously, it sounded like a great game for the Rangers - the only negative I could find was Zimmerman's gopher ball. Way too early to be concerned, but Zim did have a habit of giving up gopher balls right away when he came into games last year. Some power by Raffy in the first with a 3 run jimmy jack on the way to a 5 run spot that inning. We also had a home run by Frank Catalanotto later in the game - since to see some power from the get go.

There was a good mix of players who will be on the club this year, as well as minor leaguers we won't see. Pudge was back in action, which was nice to hear, as well as guys like Bo Porter, Trafis Hafner, & Mike Hubbard.

Great to hear the Rangers - and we get another game tomorrow. Unfortunately, that will be it until next weekend.

"...Ranger Baseball is on the air!"