Spring Training Game 2 was one that I didn’t realize was on the air. I had forgotten to check the Rangers games not on the radio to see if the opponent’s radio coverage was on. It was, but I didn’t notice that until the score was already 2-1 KC in the seventh. I listened towards the end, but not much excitement there.
Offensively, this was a different beast than yesterday’s game. Yesterday’s had 16 runs and 28 hits between the teams. Today’s game had just 6 runs and 13 hits. Yesterday there was just 3 or 4 Rangers used that didn’t have a hit. Today, it’s the opposite. Just six had hits – nobody had more than one. Of those hits, just two were doubles (Nelson Cruz, Max Ramirez). Not a lot of power here at all.
The other side wasn’t much better. They had seven hits, and two of ’em were extra bases (2B – Billy Butler, 3B – Rick Ankiel), the rest were singles. They just pushed more across.
Zack Greinke started the game for the Royals, and from what I’ve read and see in the box score, he was as advertised. Three scoreless innings, with just one hit given up. Other than the single he gave up, the other nine batters he faced were outs. In the three innings of work, he faced just ten batters. No idea how dominant that was, as the box scores in spring don’t list pitch counts, but one over the minimum is always a cool thing to see.
Rangers pitchers counted four today. Each of them pitched two innings. The best was Dustin Nippert (third). He gave up no hits in his two innings. Feldman gave up 3, CJ Wilson 2, and Neftali Feliz gave up two. Overall, a decent pitching performance, if not too far leaning towards the great side. Eight innings of work, seven hits, four earned runs. Just a lone walk, though (Feliz), so there wasn’t a ton of wildness.
After game one, I had that pipe dream where I was going to see constant spring scores of double digits every day, and a winning percentage of like .850 for the spring or something. Ah, the innocence of Spring Game 1 comes crashing back to earth with Game 2. I shouldn’t be surprised by that.
Saturday we’re back on the radio again.