I sat down last night to watch this game on TV as did most Ranger fans I would assume still rolling from the high of the night before. The SWEEP chant, taking all three from the Red Sox, RA’s performance, etc, etc, etc. I don’t think anyone thought the Rays were going to be a pushover – but cripes – they were!

Kenny Rogers pitched a four hit shutout, going all nine, and looking pretty good doing it. He fielded his position well, making several great plays. He acted well, like an Ace of a staff. It was quite nice to see, especially after RA’s performance last night. If you put Dickey & Rogers together, their combined ERA is just slightly over 0.5. with 17.2 innings pitched. Absolutely stunning.

Offensively, we sent 11 men to the plate in the first inning, hitting three home runs, for a total of 8 runs. We picked up another later on a sac fly, but the game was really over in the first inning. The three home runs were hit by Mike Young, Alfonso Soriano, & David Dellucci. Dellucci has hit 5 in the last few days, which ties him for the club lead, surprisingly enough. It was just a total bludgeoning in the first inning, and I loved it. :)

My wife was elsewhere in the house when this was happening, so when she passed by after we’d scored the 8, but were still in the first, I paused the TiVo and said “look at this score” – she looked visually stunned at that. “EIGHT? IN THE FIRST INNING?” I thought yup – we’ve got this game won already. I shouldn’t think that way, because it tends to come back and bite you in the ass, but dammit – I knew we had this one won in the first 30 minutes.

Brett Carre: Sorry everyone. Been busy. The good times keep rolling. 19-7!! The hitting was great and Kenny was outstanding. Hell yea!!!

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I started this site in December of 1998. I was running it when we were in the playoffs before. This season, I’ve done things I haven’t done since we were in the playoffs. I drove home, and immediately came to my computer to do the page update. Normally I let the updates go till the morning, and do it as part of my morning “rounds” at work. But this time I didn’t want to wait. I wanted to come home and update while it was fresh in my mind – with all the losing the last few years, I have to say I wasn’t as eager to get home to write about more losses. ;)

Anyway, this game was absolutely awesome in just about every way. It was a crisp, fast moving, game. It bogged down a bit in the last inning and a half, but it was fast, with a time of 2:31. As it started, I wasn’t sure what kind of pitching we’d get thrown against us. Tim Wakefield, with his knuckleball is either totally unhittable, or you get 8 runs off him in 2.2 innings. There doesn’t seem to be a middle ground with him. Add to that the fact that he never really seems to pitch terribly well here, and I expected that we were going to win this game going in. However, we got unhittable Wakefield tonight. One other thing that was very cool was a ball hit by Boston’s 3B Bill Mueller, robbing Kevin Mench. The ball hit him, then popped up in the air, and he caught it.

Fortunately, RA Dickey was more than up to the task of matching him – and bettering him. RA’s line shows 8.2 innings, with one earned run. Actually he should have had a complete game shutout. He was a strike away from it, but appeared to have run out of gas at the end, with an over 130 pitch pitch count. Showalter came out after Dickey put two men on, as it became a save situation, according to some of the sillier rules on that thing (if the tying run is on the on deck circle, it becomes a save, even though the score is actually 4-0). But Dickey got a standing O after he left in the 8th, I assume because most figured he wouldn’t be back out, as at the time, we were up 2-0. He got a second when Showalter took him out – deservedly so. In fact, I saw a few folks with Red Sox caps on applauding him – that was nice to see. Also nice to see were two fabulous catches by Brian Jordan in right – one an all out dive to his left, and the other a long running catch in front of the middle of the bullpen area in right center. Two really nice defensive plays by Jordan. He’s not hitting at the moment, but he is playing D.

Cordero came on, and did get the save, but was a bit wild doing it. He walked two guys, although I felt that he got squeezed by home plate umpire Larry Poncino, and he should have gotten out of it with no walks. But he walked two, the second accounting for the only run the Red Sox got, a gift run. But Coco did get his third save in the span of about 28.5 hours. Not a bad weekend’s work at all. He now has the most saves in the AL. Actually he did last night too, but I don’t think anyone had two saves today to pass him. I’m not sure if he has the lead in the majors, too. Speaking of leads in the majors, the Rangers right now have the best record in all of the majors with a 16-9 record. That’s stunning. Simply stunning.

One other thing that was really stunning during the game was the crowd chanting SWEEP. I generally go to about 20-25 games a season at the Ballpark. I’ve been doing that since 1997, my first year with season tickets. I have to say I’ve NEVER heard that happen before. Ever. Steve Busby, who is paid to attend games for the Rangers, said he’d never heard it. Neither had Showalter, although I’ve been going to Ranger games for more years than he had. Normally when you hear crowds chanting things, you hear a buildup of the sound. It would start on the other side of the stadium (unless it started near you), and work it’s way over. For me, sitting in Sec 329 Row 14, it seemed like it was at full crescendo RIGHT away. It was absolutely amazing, and was something that seemed to stun Showalter & Steve Busby. And myself. I wish I could find a sound file of that. I’d love to have that clip that they played on Ranger Replay a few times with Nadel & Rojas talking about it. The best part of all of this? The absolute best part? We did this on national television. We swept the previously best record in the AL team Red Sox with an almost shutout on national TV. And the SWEEP thing made it out nationally, too. It was almost like a big ol’ middle finger to the rest of baseball who gave us no chance at all this year.

UPDATE: I have an mp3 file of the Nadel/Cotroneo coverage during the broadcast of this. Turns out it was Hank’s Homies who started it, and it took over the stadium. VERY cool.

Driving home from the Rangers game, my wife and I were listening to the Rangers Replay show like we always do. Steve Busby made a comment after a caller who said “I’m now on the bandwagon”. Lynn said to me “You never got off the bandwagon”. Yup. As I said above, I was running the site when we were in the playoffs in the late 90’s. I’m still here – I’ve been doing this site through all the crappy years of the early 2000’s. About time we start winning again – I thought I’d have to stop doing the site for them to win some more. ;) I told my wife that if we’re still holding up this pace with not a lot of slippage by the end of June, I might start to allow myself the luxury of thinking of the playoffs. We’re not there yet, and as much as I’d love that to happen, I think it’s a bit too soon to start thinking that.

But damn – it’s nice to see the Texas Rangers playing this way, and this well.

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Game 2. Pedro. Joaquin Benoit had given up a triple in the first two pitches of the game. Joaquin Benoit had given up a run within the first 5 pitches of the game. I figured it was gonna be U-G-L-Y!. Those blue skies I mentioned in the first game commentary peaked their head up early. After that, Benoit buckled down (what does that mean, exactly? What does one do when they “buckle down”), and got out of the inning only giving up that first run. In fact, Benoit only gave up two runs total in his seven innings pitched. Only one walk, and one home run, but the home run was a solo shot. A really nice performance by Joaquin.

In the bottom of the first, Blalock answered back, taking Pedro deep over the scoreboard in left to tie it. However, in the third inning, the wheels fell off Pedro’s little red wagon. He gave up a total of four runs that inning (and another in the fourth), In fact, I’ll just put the events of the third here, – it’s quite amazing when you realize it was against Pedro Martinez.

Bottom of 3rd
– Rangers third.
– Mench singled to left.
– Barajas singled to center, Mench to second.
– M.Young singled to center, Mench scored, Barajas to second.
– Blalock flied out to right fielder Kapler.
– Soriano doubled to left, Barajas scored, M.Young scored.
– Fullmer grounded out, shortstop Crespo to first baseman Ortiz, Soriano to third.
– Jordan infield single to third, Soriano scored.
– Dellucci walked, Jordan to second.
– Jordan stole third.
– Perry flied out to right fielder Kapler.

That was damn nice. There were a lot of Red Sox fans there, and one of them came up to me seeing me score the game on my Palm Pilot, and we talked about that. This was right as Pedro started giving up the four runs in the third, and he said that he didn’t expect Pedro to last five innings, as Pedro can’t pitch in the cold. And it was pretty nippy last night. I hadn’t even considered that.

So we’re up 6-2 after six innings, and all was going well. We tacked on two more in the bottom of the 8th, and it turns out we needed those, as the Sox came back with three in the top of the ninth after Almanzar got hit in the hand with a batted ball, and while he stayed in the game, he didn’t do anything for the next two batters after that. He came in, and Powell pitched, allowed a hit and some runs to score, and the Cordero came on and gave up a run of his own (actually it was Almanzar’s – Cordero & Powell’s lines show 0 ER), but closed the game out to sweep the doubleheader.

We swept the Red Sox & Pedro – going into that game, the Red Sox had the best record in the majors. Not anymore. Our little Rangers did that. ;) We also now have a full one game lead in the AL West. It’s been ages since I’ve talked about that, except for like the first two or 3 games of a season. It’s nice to see.

Brett Carre: Well, I couldn’t watch this game because for some odd reason the people at my cable company didn’t put it on. However, I did hear parts on the radio and from what I heard it was a very entertaining game. We were down 2-1 when we broke through for 3 in the 7th off of the so called invincible Boston bullpen. Cordero came on in the 9th for his 8th save.

Wish I could have have seen it, but a nice win for the 1st place Texas Rangers.

Game 2 didn’t come on here either. By, now I was extremely pissed, but it was nice to listen to the radio guys for a change. We roughed up Pedro. He have up 6 runs in only 4 innings pitched. Everyone got into the act offensively. Hank went deep in the 1st to tie that game at 1 at we never looked back.

The 9th was a but of the problem. We had a 8-2 lead going into the 9th. Almanzar started the 9th and gave up a couple of hits and a run. He was pulled for Jay Powell who walked a batter and then struck out a man. Powell then faced Johnny Damon who doubled to score two runs to make it a 8-5 game. Buck pulled Powell and gave the ball to Coco. Coco got the final two outs for his 2nd save of the day and 9th of the year.

We are getting a lot of national attention now. Let’s keep it up!!

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Due to the rainout, I had something I really enjoy – a doubleheader. I love these, although I have a complaint. I live in Garland. It normally takes me about 45-50 minutes to drive to the ballpark. Yesterday, I left at 2:30PM, and I didn’t get to the ballpark until about 4:40. Why? Because a tanker truck overturned, and I30 was closed in every direction. As if that wasn’t bad enough, I listened to about 4 or 5 traffic reports on KRLD. THERE WAS NO FRIGGIN MENTION OF THIS ON THE TRAFFIC REPORTS! I mean, what kind of traffic report doesn’t mention a the biggest traffic problem the city has seen in quite awhile? That seriously pissed me off. I had to go across Dallas, UP 35, over past Texas Stadium, and across whatever that highway is to 360 and down. What a mess.

Anyway, Game 1. Going into tonight, I figured with Pedro pitching game 2, that we had better get this guy. And through 6 innings, I have to say it felt like Pedro was pitching. Through six, we managed one run, and only a couple of hits. We had next to nothing against this guy. Ryan Drese through 6 only gave up 2 runs. However, he walked 5 (struck out 6, though), and was generally wild. It’s a testament to his improvement this year (plus our defense) that he gave up 5 walks, and 7 hits in 6 innings, and only two runs. He also stuck out Manny Ramirez three times, which was nice.

In the seventh, EY was hit (barely) by a pitch for a second time, which he wasn’t thrilled with, but it seemed the catalyst for the inning. Dellucci (who is batting very well lately) singled, as did Laird. This was followed by a sac fly and a double, putting three runs on the board. All of those against a Boston bullpen that hadn’t given up a run in something like 30+ innings.

We needed all of those, as Cordero had a shaky save in the ninth, but we did win the game. The sun even came out 3/4 of the way through the game, which was nice at the ballpark, as it started in a light rain/mist. By the time they started working on the field for the second game, there were blue skies.

Turns out the blue skies were an omen. ;)

Brett Carre: Well, I couldn’t watch this game because for some odd reason the people at my cable company didn’t put it on. However, I did hear parts on the radio and from what I heard it was a very entertaining game. We were down 2-1 when we broke through for 3 in the 7th off of the so called invincible Boston bullpen. Cordero came on in the 9th for his 8th save.

Wish I could have have seen it, but a nice win for the 1st place Texas Rangers.

Game 2 didn’t come on here either. By, now I was extremely pissed, but it was nice to listen to the radio guys for a change. We roughed up Pedro. He have up 6 runs in only 4 innings pitched. Everyone got into the act offensively. Hank went deep in the 1st to tie that game at 1 at we never looked back.

The 9th was a but of the problem. We had a 8-2 lead going into the 9th. Almanzar started the 9th and gave up a couple of hits and a run. He was pulled for Jay Powell who walked a batter and then struck out a man. Powell then faced Johnny Damon who doubled to score two runs to make it a 8-5 game. Buck pulled Powell and gave the ball to Coco. Coco got the final two outs for his 2nd save of the day and 9th of the year.

We are getting a lot of national attention now. Let’s keep it up!!

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Well, there were some seriously badass storms in the area tonight, and after a three and a half hour delay at the start of the game it was finally called somewhere around 10:30PM. The game will be made up tomorrow as part of a Twi-Night Doubleheader.
And that’s awesome for me, as I have a ticket for Saturday’s game anyway, so I’ll get two. And I just *LOVE* doubleheaders. I mean, big time I love doubleheaders. I’ll be out there, and lovin’ it!
Hell, if it were up to me, they’d still SCHEDULE doubleheaders (that hasn’t been done in 20+ years or so). Hell, let’s go back 100 years, and have a tripleheader.
I just hope one (or both) of the doubleheader games go extra innings!

Back and forth. Back and forth. That’s the way it went. From the bottom of the third through the bottom of the sixth, both teams scored in every frame. Chan Ho Park was mostly ineffective, although I didn’t get the feeling he was as horrible as he was his first two years here. Even in a bad outing, he seems better. He had a nice looking pitch that would go out, and then curve back in. When it was working, it was georgeous!

However, after the flip flop in the middle innings, we came out of it down 7-6. The really ugly part was Jay Powell walking in a run. It wasn’t so bad, as he came in with the bases loaded (or two on or something like that), so it wasn’t totally his fault. So we’re down 7-6, and then KC brings out Justin Huisman to pitch, and he was brilliant. I was convinced the game was lost.

However, we had some ninth inning heroics. Mike Young homered over the now deeper center field wall in KC to tie the game. Blalock then tripled to right center, and after Soriano K’ed, Brad Fullmer broke out of his slump with a two run home run to cap the comeback. Cordero closed it out for his seventh save in April, and we go back home to face the Red Sox still in first place. :)

Gotta love that.

Brett Carre: Unbelievable! That is all I can say about this one. Down 7-6 going to the 9th and we put up 3 to take a 9-7 lead. Mike Young led off the 9th with the game tying homer and then Fullmer blasted a two run shot to give us the lead for good. Coco came in to close it out for his 7th save of the year.

This game was crazy. A typical AL game with all kinds of runs, walks, and wild pitches. We were down 1-0 after Beltran hit a majestic shot into the fountains off Chan Ho. We came back with 3 in the 2nd capped off by a Rod Barajas two run homer. It went back and forth from that point on until the 9th.

Chan Ho looked very average at best. It’s funny, it seems he has pitched better at night then in the day. His two best starts were at night, in Oakland and in Seattle. Both are pitchers parks so I don’t know how much that weighs into it. 4 1/3 innings for Chan Ho, 6 runs, 4 earned, 2 walks, 4 K’s. Nice job by the pen today. The pen is beginning to become a real strength. Especially the middle relief.

We are now at 13-9 and still in a first place tie with the halos. Now the Red Sox come to town for a 3 game set. Doesn’t this sound funny? The Rangers and Red Sox will battle this weekend in a series featuring a couple of the top teams in the AL. Bring on the Sox!!

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The streak stops at four, although we’re still tied for first place, thanks to the entire AL West losing this day.

Kenny Rogers pitched a really great game. Except to Ken Harvey. Especially in the fifth inning. In something I can’t remember the last time I saw, he hit a ball that was ruled a home run initially. Harvey circled the bases, and then the umpires got together and disallowed the home run. After arguing by both managers, Kenny Rogers served up a fat pitch, and Ken Harvey jacked that one into a bullpen – obviously fair. That event overshadowed pretty much everything else in the game, unfortunately.

We probably could have overcome it had we been able to get anyone in. We had 13 hits and one walk, for a total of 14 baserunners, but only three of them crossed home plate. Kevin Mench continued a torrid pace, going 3 for 4 today. Let’s hope he keeps this up.

It also irked me that KC threw Jimmy Gobble against us. Not that I have anything against him – he seems nice enough, but he’s the pitcher we would have gotten from KC last year if Juan Gonzalez had let us trade him there. Dammit. And of course, Juan was “sick” this series.

Also, Doug Brocail pitched today for us. Doug’s been out of baseball for a couple of years with injury. His return is a nice story and all, but why are we wasting time with 37 year old reclamation projects now? Especially after the team has said they are building for the future with kids? I don’t understand this move.

Brett Carre:The win streak ends at 4 as we lost 5-3 in KC. This game was extremely frustrating to watch. We left a total of 9 men on base and had a rough time hitting with men in scoring position. Herb Perry got things off to a good start with a RBI triple for a 1-0 lead, but that was the only lead we had tonight.

In a crazy sequence of events, Ken Harvey hit balls over the fence on back to back pitches. Harvey hit a ball over the fence that was ruled fair, but soon after was called foul after the umpires got together and called it foul. It did not matter as Harvey belted the very next pitch over the left field wall for a 3 run jack and that gave the Royals the lead for good at 4-1.

Kenny Rodgers pitched just ok. Not great but not terrible. That one pitch to Harvey was the one that proved to be the killer. KC’s Jimmy Gobble gave up a bunch of hits, but he battled and held us to only 2 runs. We got the tying man up to the plate in the 9th, but Herb Perry couldn’t come through.

Our record stands at 12-9. The best news tonight is that every team in the AL West lost. So, we are still in a 1st place tie with the Angles. Hope we can bounce back and put one in the Win column tomorrow.

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The Rangers won this game, although they tried not to. And the fact that we still won the game despite the couple of attempts to toss it away tells me that this team is way different than the last couple of seasons.

We were cruising along nicely, in a rather fast paced game, too. RA Dickey had given up just one run through 6 innings. His pitch count was low, and thanks to three runs we got through the first 7, we were up 3-1, and generally I felt good, even though we left about 4 guys on base the previous two innings. It could have been more for us offensively. We definitely got burnt by the new deeper walls in KC, with three balls either being outs, or doubles off the wall/warning track, which would have been out at the old configuration.

However, in the bottom of the seventh, the wheels came off a bit, but not totally off. Dickey walked two, and gave way to Powell. Powell gave up a single that loaded the bases, and he walked in KC’s second run. However, after that, we got a force out at the plate, and a strikeout to end that threat. Nothing more happened until the bottom of the ninth when Cordero proceeded to give up a hit and two walks to load the bases with no one out in the bottom of the ninth. We got another force out at the plate, and then a spectacular game ending DP by Soriano to Gonzalez, and I was off the couch with a fist pump. Great way to end the game; in fact Soriano had a hand in all three outs in the bottom of the ninth. That was definitely a Wetteland style save (as the late umpire Durwood Merrill used to say, Wetteland was a heart attack waiting to happen, the saves he got). But we got the win, and that’s the most important thing. We’re now 12-8 and still in first place.

Brian Jordan was an 0-fer coming off the DL, but that’s OK – I don’t expect guys coming off the DL to go 3 for 5 their first night back. Adrian Gonzalez is still here, although I’d expect he will go back to AAA once Texiera comes off the DL later this week.

And we finally won in KC, something we hadn’t done since 2001, snapping a nine game losing streak there. Bring on the Yankees! Nah, just kidding about that part, but it does feel good to be playing this way.

Welcome Brett Carre. Brett will be doing commentaries for the game along with me. When I first started the site, Jim Meeks would do commentaries with me. That lasted for awhile, and then Jim fell off the face of the earth (whatever happened to him, anyway?). This weekend Brett came to me and asked if I wanted someone to do commentaries. I wasn’t actively looking, but sure, I’ll do that. So here’s Brett..

Brett: First off, I would like to thank Joe for letting me write my comments along with his. Well, this game was one that we would not have pulled out in the past couple of years. This team is a totally different attitude then those teams.

Offensively, we left a lot of men on base. We managed to get 2 in the 3rd and in in the 7th. Hank had a great night with 3 hits and just missed another one on a great catch by Beltran.

R.A. pitched a hell of a game and is really starting to establish himself as a solid major league starter. R.A. went 6+ innings only giving up 2 runs. What a job by the pen getting out of jams tonight. Jay Powell came in and got a huge out when he got Sweeny to ground out. What can you say about Coco. He gets himself into a bases loaded 0 outs jam, then gets a force out at home, then gets Mendy Lopez to ground into a DP on a great play by Soriano.

All I can say is WOW!! and what a great W. Life is good!!

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