G75: Rangers lose to Angels 5-2; drop 2.5 games back

When Anaheim came into town, I think most Rangers fans weren't particularly looking forward to it. We started the month up four and a half games, and the Angels came into town now up a game and a half. That's not a particularly fun thing when you factor in the sluggishness the Rangers have exhibited the last few weeks. I saw the inbound Angels as something bad. They're not firing on all cylinders either, but right now they seem better than us, and I wasn't thrilled with that mindset.

Game one didn't help most Rangers fans. They dropped it 5-2. Our offense was mostly flat again. Granted, we had eight hits, and three of them were from Marlon Byrd. Outside of the Birdman, just five hits. Two of them were home runs, however. Byrd & David Murphy went back to back in the third inning, but that was the only two runs we got.

Pitching wise, Pidente was more than flat. He wasn't very good. Five innings, five earned runs on ten hits and two walks. Throw in a home run for good measure, too.

The only really positive thing to take out of this game was that our bullpen was great. Four guys combined for four innings. Only two hits and one walk were allowed, but no runs.

But at the end of the game I had a really bad feeling.