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Well, the other half of the Rangers team stayed behind in Surpise to play the Royals, and this half of the squad didn’t fare as good as the one that went away to play LA.
The story of this game was the effectiveness of former Ranger pitcher Robinson Tejeda. He went four innings, gave up four hits and three walks, but also struck out seven Rangers of the 12 outs recorded. Another former Ranger, Jamey Wright followed with two innings of shutout ball. The remaining two KC pitchers also threw goose eggs. I wouldn’t get too worked up about Tejeda. I followed him in Philly, I obviously followed him in Texas. You should know as well as I do he has these flashes for short periods, and relapses.
Anyway, our offense was pretty darned ineffective. Only one guy had anything going on, and that was Joaquin Arias, who had three of the seven overall hits the guys wearing Texas on their chests got, however none of his hits led to a score. The only run we got at all was a double by Marlon Byrd, who scored Hank Blalock. That was it.
Pitching wise for Texas, Vicente Padilla threw three, gave up three hits and two walks and three earned runs. Meh. One of the hits was a two run home run. In fact, the other run of the game was against Frank Francisco; again a home run.
So no, neither game on Friday was particularly fun for a Rangers fan.
Saturday brings something unannounced. A Rangers game on television. It’s not the Rangers guys, but the game will be on MLB Network on Saturday afternoon, presumably using White Sox coverage (assuming it’s not blacked out).

In the first of the two split squad games, the Rangers played against the Los Angeles Dodgers of Los Angeles in Phoenix. While this was the road game, it wasn’t the usual road spring game in that about half our regulars were here, and half were left behind in Surprise to play the other game. Really seemed like a split squad from a quick glance at the scorecard.
Anyway, the Rangers jumped out early in this one. In the first inning, Josh Hamilton hit a two run home run, and then was immediately followed by a solo home run by Nelson Cruz. And then.. well, that was it. All of our scoring was done by the fourth batter of the game. We had just three more hits the entire rest of the game (one of them was a second hit by Hamilton). So a promising started just ended there with a “promising start”.
Of course, the big ol’ “4” in the error column of the linescore has a lot to say about it. Two of the errors were by pitchers (Mathis & Harrison). Duran missed a catch, and Adam Melhuse threw one away. Sloppy play there for sure. Only one run was unearned, and we did turn four double plays in the game.
Pretty much all of the Dodgers offense was also early. Our starter in this one was Doug Mathis, who went three innings, allowing three of the four Dodger runs (one was the aforementioned unearned one). The Rangers threw eight pitchers out there in all, which is a huge number when you consider that Mathis threw three innings. The only other Ranger pitcher to give up a run was the final one, Thomas Diamond who walked two, not really helping himself at all.
Somewhat annoying that we got out to that kind of start and then nothing.
Fun note in that the Rangers did not take Andruw Jones with them in the split squad game against the Dodgers. :)

This is the time of year where you here a lot of platitudes about how scores don’t matter, we’re just working on things, it doesn’t matter, etc, etc, etc. Even Jamey Newberg wrote about Brandon McCarthy last night saying we shouldn’t get so up about it for the same reason we shouldn’t get too worried about Millwood and the 10 ER the other day (but come on Jamey, that was bad even for spring!). Still, I agree with Jamey’s base point. It’s hard not to get excited about McCarthy’s performance.
Four innings pitched on just 47 pitches. One hit. No walks, no runs, and three strikeouts. While I couldn’t see it, I heard bits of it, and it sounded pretty good. Man, I hope this is it, that he’s finally figured it out. I’m so tired of hearing about bad Jon Daniels trades, I would love one of the ones generally accepted to be in the “bad” ledger to be good after all this time. It is a good thing to see.
The pen was pretty darn good itself. Of the four relievers (Jennings, Eyre, Guardado, Feliz), only one run was allowed. That was Eddie, who gave up a solo home run. Netfali Feliz was almost as good as McCarthy. He went two innings, gave up no hits, but did walk one. The other three guys had just a lone hit each. The only walk was Feliz’s one. So yeah, it was a very well pitched game.
Our offense was pretty good, what with fifteen hits in all. It was fairly balanced. We had a couple of ofers, and several guys with multiple hits. Always nice to see. Taylor Teagarden homered again. Four more doubles from the doubles machine that is the pro team in Arlington…
Random feel good remark: One gets the feeling we made the right choice in moving Gerald Laird out, we’re probably going to be fine with our catching tandem who takes up 21 letters on the back of two uniforms (where have you gone Ed Ott).
Seattle on the other hand was not even close. They sounded sloppy on the radio. Whenever your line score has just about as many errors as hits, it’s not a good day. The Mariners managed only four hits off our guys (as was detailed above), but they also committed three errors in the field, leading to two unearned runs against Jarrod Washburn. A reliever by the name of Roy Corcoran was the big stink bomb for the M’s, giving up four earned runs in just one third of an inning (with three hits and two walks). Based solely on this season, one gets the feeling that Seattle isn’t going to change much in 2009.
Although I will want to see the M’s at least once, as I’d like to see Griffey in person again. I remember being at the last Seattle game in Arlington in 1999 thinking that would probably be the last time I saw him. I was right for a long time – I never saw him in person during any of his years in Cincinnati. Always liked him, be good to see him again.
Also, shouldn’t we be hearing about the first round of spring training roster moves by now? We’re due to send out several guys to minor league camp about now, aren’t we?

Blame me for this one. In my office at work is a guy who is a big Giants fan, as he was imported from San Francisco. In the sixth inning, I send him an email with a link to the box score, and merely said this.. “You’re losing, bitch!”. You know, the usual fan garbage. So about 45 minutes later, I get an email back from him saying “Rally time, bitch!” At that point, the Giants had tied the score at 4. Then in a real Karma moment, the Giants put up single runs in the 8th and 9th to take the game 6-4. So blame me, my mouthing off cost us the game! ;)
Scott Feldman started the game for us, and threw quite well. Three innings, no runs and just one hit. Walked two, but it didn’t hurt him. Brendan Donnelly followed, and didn’t fare nearly as well, as he went just one inning, and surrendered two. Everyone else after that gave up a single run. Only Feldman escaped unscathed. On the ledger is Luis Mendoza, Casey Daigle, Elizardo Ramirez, & Bryan Corey. Daigle & the Lizard’s runs were unearned, though.
It was another one of those games where no one dominated offensively. Nine different Rangers had one hit each. Six were singles, and there was one double (Andruw Jones), one triple (Mike Young), & a home run (David Murphy).

This one can be traced to the big old ugly number in the top of the second inning by the Dodgers. They plated seven runners. If that wasn’t ugly enough, they surrounded it with a run in the first, and two in the third. The score was 10-5 after three innings. Pitching was NOT the name of this game.
Kevin Millwood led the stink brigade this game. Mark Clark & Chan Ho Park only dreamed about being this bad. Three innings, twelve hits, two walks, TEN earned runs. The only saving grace of that is that none of them were home runs, but that’s really weak. Millwood faced 21 batters in his three innings of work, and ten of them scored. That’s pretty awful. Of the remaining three runs the Dodgers scored, only one of them was earned (against Mr. Anna Benson), although Benson threw the same amount of innings as Stinky Kevin, and surrendered one tenth of the runs.
We were kind of out of it the entire game. Never led, much less be tied (excluding the 0-0 start of the game score).
Offensively the leader this game was Brandon Boggs. He went 3-5 with an RBI and two runs scored. In fact, the longball was the order of the day for the Rangers, and if it wasn’t for that 7 spot we gave up, we probably would have won this. The four home runs were by Brandon Boggs (solo shot), Hank Blalock, Andruw Jones (two run), and Taylor Teagarden, who had a three run home run. In fact, that’s all seven runs the Rangers scored right there. Good classic Rangers – 100% of our runs on the longball. :) Jones’ home run was his first of the spring, and I’m sure Ned Colletti loved that little factoid.

I don’t have much time to write about this one, I didn’t even think about writing about it (as I was too busy at work today) until after today’s game had already started.
I did get to hear a little of it. I had to spread some weed killer down on my lawn, so I slapped on the headphones,and walked around out there. After that was over, I played some MLB:09 the Show and listened some more, and then my family and I had to go to a Sunday night church event, so I had to stop. At the time I stopped, the score was tied 2-2. I missed the big party.
That was Greg Golson’s grand slam in the ninth which sealed the win, if it didn’t win it. That was definitely the big offensive highlight, as the rest of the offense was scattered. Which seems to be a pattern so far this spring.
Pitching wise, nobody embarrassed themselves out there Matt Harrison gave up both runs the Cubs got over his three innings of work.
Sorry about the cut short. I didn’t want to take a complete mulligan, but I didn’t have time to sit here and invest a lot of time into this report. :)

The first Rangers game on TV this season comes way earlier in camp than it usually does. I talked about the schedule before, so this isn’t new, but we have five TV games this year, as opposed to the usual two. As with most Spring Ranger games, it was filled with ads for the team itself, the gift shop, tickets, etc.. That’s not a problem, just stating what I saw.
BTW, there was a “commercial” that ran twice during the game talking about new scoreboards and such featuring Chuck Morgan. On Wednesday, I’m going out to the Ballpark, Chuck Morgan was kind enough to let me come out there and take a few pictures of what the stuff looks like. I’ll bring those to you when I get them done.
As for the game itself, it was lightning fast. It was 2:03. When I told my wife about that, she said “That’s a big surprise, given the usual substitutions in the spring”. It did make me think. There were no subs made during play. All the subs were start of inning ones that don’t delay anything. And other than the trip to the mound in the ninth with the trainer, there were no mound visits that I recall, either. Extremely fast game. That did help keep the chatter down with people in the booth you don’t care to see (Mayor of Surprise, woman from Southwest Airlines – does anyone except them really care?)
Still, part of what made the game move was pitching. We had a lot of the good kind. In all, each team had just seven hits. The only Ranger to give up a run was Eddie Guardado in the ninth. Vicente Padilla was especially good. He went four gave up no runs on just a single hit. Outstanding. Dustin Nippert went two innings on three hits. Warner Madrigal & Elizardo Ramirez also tossed scoreless single innings. Even Guardado who gave up the lone run had just one hit.
Offensively, the only guys who really appeared to have anything going on were David Murphy, who finally got the first run of the game in the fifth with a solo home run. Murph was 2-3 overall. The other guy was Andruw Jones, who was 2-4 with a double (which was a dicey call, it should have been a single and an error I think). The only other run came on a Josh Hamilton sac fly, which was not too far away from being a grand slam as I recall.
Taylor Teagarden threw out two Sox trying to steal – both times it wasn’t funny – they were dead on nailed. That was nice to see.
I would have preferred a slightly longer game for the first one on TV, but I couldn’t complain too much. Was nice to see the Rangers back on TV with a new game (not the games that turn up on ESPN Classic or MLBN now). :)

Meh. The first game of the season I got mad at, and it only took nine games, none of them really counted, either.
We were hanging in there, hanging in there, were losing 4-2 after six innings. We scored two to tie in the sixth, and then three more in the seventh to take a lead. Then we blew it, let them tie the game in the bottom of the eighth, and then lose the game by allowing the Royals to walk off with the win.
Netfali Feliz was the one that had a hard time and gave up the three runs to let them tie it after we had taken the lead.
Brandon Boggs had a good game. 3-5 with a double, a home run, 3 RBI’s, and two runs scored. Since this was a spring training game, those stats doubly didn’t count.
Darnit!

For the second straight game, both the Rangers and their opponent were kept in check offensively – at least hits wise. In yesterday’s game, both the Royals & Rangers had six hits. In today’s game, the Padres had five hits, and the Rangers had six.
Amusing thing about the Rangers six hits is that two guys (Kinsler, Hamilton) had two each. That left just two other guys with hits at all (Blalock & Metcalf). While we’re looking at those kind of numbers, three of the six hits were doubles (Kinsler, Hamilton, Blalock). A strength of ours in 2008, that was. One of the remaining three was a home run (Kinsler again). So it was a pretty power heavy set of hits, even if there weren’t a lot of them.
Kinsler did the 2-2-2 thing. Two hits, two RBI’s and two runs scored.
Elvis Andrus had his first stolen base of the spring, too.
Taylor Teagarden threw out David Eckstein trying to steal (while Benson was on the mound).
Scott Feldman though was perfect on the mound. In his two innings, he gave up donut. Spring training box scores generalky don’t have the number of pitches, so I can’t comment on how easily the two innings went, but that many zeroes (the good ones) are always a good thing to see on a pitcher’s linescore. The remainder of the Rangers pitchers (we used six more) were all pretty decent. Derrick Turnbow was the only one who really wasn’t. He gave up just one run, although he probably should have given up more, since he walked THREE in one inning. In fact, he didn’t give up any actual hits, so one of those walks was with the bases loaded, apparently. Mr. Anna Benson also threw two innings in direct relief of Feldman, and he too gave up no runs. I don’t know what to make of him. He’s bounced around, not been much of anything the last few years. Although he could be OK in a Sydney Ponson sort of way if he holds it together.
In all a nice win (even if I was in meetings all day and couldn’t listen) We’re now 5-3 in spring training, which is always a good thing.