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I thought about using the Simpsons clip with Homer and “I’ve seen teams suck before..”, but I just used that a couple of weeks ago. But it was appropriate. The Rangers stunk up the joint pretty good, losing to Kansas City, 8-1.
Ugh. What is it with them? If they were good, it wouldn’t be so much of a puzzle, but they’re not. Gah!

A lot happened in this game, but if you’re a Rangers fan, the thing that was probably the coolest thing was the return of Hank Blalock. This was his first game action since going on the DL back in May. Was nice seeing the Hammer at the plate again. Especially with Mark Teixeira gone, I think this team needs a shot of “familiar” instead of seeing a parade of guys from AAA this year like we have. That’s usually good, but this fan was happy to see someone familiar instead of someone trying to make their mark, know what I mean?
Anyway, Hank went 2 for 4, but the second one was the memorable one. It was a grand slam in the 8th off of Scot Shields, a guy who usually torments us. Was quite nice to see that. In fact, all eight of our runs were off of the longball. Blalock’s grand slam was four, Ian Kinsler’s home run was two, and Brad Wilkerson’s home run was two more for a total of 8 runs. While one would like a more balanced attack, you can’t argue with the results; we won the game.
Kason Gabbard started the game for us, and didn’t pitch all that well. Went six innings, gave up 5 hits, which isn’t too bad, but also walked 5 (bad), and gave up 5 earned runs. I like the 5-5-5 deal from Domino’s Pizza, but definitely not from my starting pitchers. Wes Littleton came in, and was almost perfect in his two innings of work, only walking one batter, and nothing else. CJ Wilson gave up two earned runs in his relief appearance, and tried to give the game to Anaheim, but didn’t break. He earned the save, and we got the win.
Now we go home to play the Royals, a team we should utterly destroy, but never seem to be able to beat.

For some reason I always find it amusing when we win a game over an opponent by the same score they just beat us by the day before. I can’t explain that. :)
As this was September 1st, this means it’s time for callups. We brought up two guys, both of which would have likely been here anyway if it wasn’t for extenuating circumstances (injury, punishment). Neither is your classic “September callup”. These would be Hank Blalock, who was activated from the 60 day disabled list. He didn’t play in the game, but it was nice to see his name off the DL. Edinson Volquez was also brought up, and started the game.
Edinson had a few too many pitches (94 in 5 innings), but pitched well enough to get the win. In his five frames, Edinson gave up 7 hits, 2 walks, and three earned runs. Struck out four. Not dominating, but not really bad, either. I’m sure he’ll be in the mix for the starting rotation in 2008. Jamey Wright pitched well in relief. He’s been like Benoit in that regard. He’s pitched extremely well out of the pen, not so much as a starter. Wright went three scoreless innings and looked pretty decent. He gave way to Joaquin Benoit & CJ Wilson, who combined try to give the game to the Angels, but we hung on in the end.
One amusing note was Marlon Byrd. In one of the middle frames, a ball was popped up to him in center, and he completely lost it in the sun. When it finally came down, he had to twist out of the way to save himself from being bonked in the head. It was comical, but fortunately it didn’t cost any runs. Next time up though Byrd deposited a Dustin Moseley pitch into the bullpen, redeeming himself. That was the only home run the Rangers had this game. We did have three doubles (Byrd, Murphy, Wilkkkkkerson) and a triple (Kinsler). Byrd went 3-5, Kinsler was 2-3, and Salty was 2-4. A pretty nice offensive game.
Not a fan of our games on national TV, I much prefer our own guys. I wonder what Tom Grieve does on days like that? Play golf? :)
Michael Young Watch: 1-5. .304 average, 164 hits (36 to go in 26 games)

I didn’t get to see much of this game due to my projects still going on – I was swamped with several big ones all at once, so the Rangers site took a back seat. But I did see some of this one.
This game qualified as a back and forth game. We’d score, they’d score. That happened several times, so it was one of those games where you figured it was going to come down to something small happening late.
Vicente Padilla started the game, and his line tells you it wasn’t a particularly well pitched game. One one hand, he pitched into the seventh, which is good, but then you see he gave up six of the Angels 7 runs on 10 hits, ad one walk. Also for a guy who gets strikeouts, he had zero again. That’s a bit of a concern, I would think. He gave up one home run, a two run shot to Garret Anderson. Mike Wood came in and pitched 1.1 innings of scoreless ball. Frank Francisco finished up, and got the loss. He wasn’t really terrible, as he gave up just one hit and two walks. But they were bunched, so that didn’t help.
Offensively, we had a bunch of hits. Ian Kinsler led off and had three hits, all of which were good solid hits. He looked good. Michael Young also had three hits, and is going to need several more of those to get back to 200 hits. He’s at 163, and needs 37 in 27 remaining games. Definitely doable, but will need several three hit games to accomplish that. Jarrod Saltamacchia had two hits (one a double). Ramon Vazquez also had two hits, so it was nicely spread out. Nelson Cruz had a solo home run in the 7th. We did leave nine men on base, and with 14 hits total, there was definitely opportunities
Random remark: Our old friend Darren Oliver got the win as he was the pitcher of record in the 10th.
Another remark: Scot Shields is one of the better relievers out there. Wouldn’t mind having him, but I somehow feel that Joaquin Benoit can be that way – which is quite an accomplishment given how many times in the last 4 years or so his job hung on by a thread.
Final remark: Nice to see Ron Washington extended. Would have preferred it be for more than one year, but I’ll take it. Makes you wonder if that was done in part for Torii Hunter. We’ll see.

No time to do an update for this game. Way too busy with other projects at the moment.