Ranger TV is back! Yay! I kinda missed that Lin TV Ranger theme song that’s always on during the Ranger games. :) Unfortunately, it started with a totally sloppy game (7 errors for both sides, and 32 hits). The Rangers came out on top, and sometimes it’s fun to see a slugfest, but this game just felt really sloppy to me.
There was a really cool play on one of the errors. When Jon Shave (I think it was him) was playing third later in the game, he made a really wild throw to first base, and the ball went over the first baseman’s head. The ball didn’t go into the stands, it just bounced off the side of the fence and right back to first base. The Twin runner made a really REALLY slight move towards second base (but enough of a move to technically be “going towards second”), and then took his time getting back to first. The umpire saw that, and the Ranger catcher at the time (Hubbard) also saw it, and picked up the ball and tagged the runner out. It was one of those freak plays you don’t see happen very often. Two of the Ranger errors were really close calls, could have gone either way. Taking away both of those still leaves you with 3 errors, which I think is three too many.
On the big time positive side, Mac looked good on the field, and was on base, too. Glad to see him coming around after all the injuries. Got to see the Mateo cannon again throwing out a Twin trying to stretch a single into a double.
It was great to see a big win, and I missed our TV crew (nothing against our radio guys (I love them, too), but I usually watch more games than I listen to on the radio). Overall, the offense looked awesome, but then again, this is the Twins. However, a lot of it was against Brad Radke, who we had shown some interest in. Radke didn’t look all that good today, but then again, neither did Sele.
Commentary by Jim Meeks:
The Rangers banged out a spring-high 19 hits Saturday to double up the Twinkies, 10-5.
Starter Aaron Sele pitched horribly (4 IP, 4 ER, 2 BB, 2 HR) but still managed a win. The Rangers bullpen pitched well however and held on to a Rangers outburst at the plate.
Tom Goodwin had 3 hits and Pudge Rodriguez, Todd Zeile, Roberto Kelly and Royce Clayton all added a couple of hits each.
The bad news is the Rangers committed 5 errors. Clayton now has 5 errors in his last 7 games. I didn’t see the game on TV, nor hear it on the radio, but let it be said that spring training fields are notoriously horrible. Whether these errors were throwing errors or not, I just don’t know.