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.