Got a bit behind this week, taking a mulligan on this game.
G125: Rangers beat Twins 4-3
Got a bit behind this week, taking a mulligan on this game.
G124: Rangers dominate Twins in 4-0 near no-hitter
Rich Harden came off the DL for this game, and by most accounts, was pitching for his job. The talk was that if he had a bad outing, he’d be banished forever. He seriously answered the bell. In probably his best outing as a Ranger. He went 6.2 innings, picking allowing no runs, yet walking five. He left the game in the seventh with a no hitter, actually. He came out with 111 pitches. Early on, he went to a three ball count on most everyone. That’s why he lost his chance to go deeper. Shame, as he was pitching well enough to carry on, but as he just came off the DL, he needed to be protected for later on in the season, which ultimately is more important.
Matt Harrison finished the inning, then Darren O’Day had his own no hitter of an inning. Then Neftali Feliz came in, and gave up the one hit, a single by Joe Mauer to break it up. Shame that didn’t happen, yes. But I’m more glad we got a win, and a convincing one against a real playoff team after the weak showing recently in that department.
The Rangers had a spread out offense. Of the starters, only one had no hits (that being Treanor). Everyone else had at least one, and it was enough, given the stellar pitching of the Rangers staff.
Great win.
G123: Rangers club their way to win in Baltimore, 6-4
Tommy Hunter took the mound on Sunday afternoon in the series finale and tried to shake a couple of rough outings, one including a vomiting session. He did pull it off. Had a great outing. Eight innings, five hits, three earned runs on one home run. Quite a good outing, indeed.
The other side of things were pretty much summed up quickly with this:
Josh Hamilton’s three run home run in the first off of Kevin Millwood gave us the lead we never gave up. Then a second three run home run by Vlad Guerrero in the fifth – again off of Millwood.
That was the extent of the scoring for the Rangers, but it was enough. Thanks to Hunter, who seems to have bounced back nicely.
G122: Cliff Lee homered in Rangers loss, 8-6
Fell a bit behind this week, not going to write huge amounts of games this week.
I will say this. Cliff Lee had by far his worst outing as a Ranger. Just 5.2 innings, 10 hits, all eight runs were earned by him. Four home runs. It was a mess.
The best on the Rangers site was Josh Hamilton (what a shock), who went 3-5 with two runs scored, and three RBI’s. Michael Young also had three hits, but beyond that, not a ton of other stuff.
Blah.
Arias Done
- IF Joaquin Arias designated for assignment
- IF Alex Cora recalled from AAA [ Link ]
Several DL moves
- C Matt Treanor activated from 15 day DL
- P Rich Harden activated from 15 day DL
- C Taylor Teagarden optioned to AAA
- P Scott Feldman placed on 15 day DL, retro to 8/22 [ Link ]
Some Cool Baseball Art
Hey, if you’re on Facebook, and like baseball art, you should check out this page I ran into not too long ago. It’s by a fellow named “Kyle Banister”, and he does some great baseball art. Noticed about a week ago he had posted a nice picture of Josh Hamilton, and I had asked his permission to post it, and he was cool with it. You can see it here. He simply calls it “Hamilton”, and it was hand drawn in colored pencil and black marker. It’s quite nice, and I thought I should let others know about this guy.
While he doesn’t have a website yet, all of his art and whatnot is up on the fan page for him on Facebook. So if you’re on Facebook (who isn’t these days), go check out the Kyle Banister – Baseball Art page, and “like” it. He’s got a lot of good stuff there. I also particularly like his pencil drawing of Ubaldo Jimenez.
Here’s a blurb Kyle has written about himself:
Before admitting he was an artist, Kyle owned and operated a successful sign and lettering company. For nearly 20 years Kyle used his talents to help others communicate and realize their dreams. In 2002 he gave up the sign business to pursue his own dream, to become the artist he was born to be.
While producing signage for others, Kyle learned and mastered a variety of mediums. And he uses all of these in his art today, often mixing them to achieve what he sees as the best look for a particular piece of art. That is why you may see an array of styles in one of Kyle’s shows. He is just as comfortable painting with 1-Shot Lettering enamel on Plexiglas as he is digitally coloring an original pointillism drawing. Some have criticized Kyle’s work saying that the use of so many mediums will slow his march to success. But Kyle is OK with that as long as he can stay true to himself, and his art.Kyle’s favorite subjects are History, Baseball and Women, not necessarily in any order. He loves to travel doing research for the many projects he has planned. His strongest asset is inexhaustible creativity, he never is at a loss for a new art project. Kyle says, “It’s as if God leaves notes on my forehead after a nights rest.”
Kyle’s art is quite a journey. So come along and enjoy the ride.
G121: Rangers return favor, shut out Orioles, 2-0
On my 45th birthday, the Rangers gave me a quite nice baseball present. They broke their four game losing streak with a dominating performance by CJ Wilson.
I tend to use the phrase “dominating” on this website perhaps a little more than I realistically should, but man – it certainly applied tonight. CJ was masterful (uh-oh, another overused adjective) in this one, and was EXACTLY what we needed this night. Nolan Ryan himself in his prime couldn’t have done any better in stopping the skid. CJ went 8.2 innings, allowing just THREE hits and a walk, and struck out a dozen Orioles. At one point, he got 16 Orioles in a row out. I mean, WOW! 118 pitches when he came out of the game, he still had a realistic number of pitches left. I confess at the time wishing Washington would leave him in there, but you can’t argue with the result. Rangers win, Feliz got his first save of the month, and his 30th overall.
Thing is, the Orioles pitcher (Jake Arrieta) probably pitched well enough to win the game himself. He didn’t have quite the line as CJ, but you can’t argue with what he did as a good performance. 6.2 IP, 8 hits, three walks, two runs (one earned). Quality start for sure, and on any normal night, he probably would have won. But not against Wilson on this night – that’s for sure. The Orioles pen was good though – four guys combined for 2.1 innings of shutout ball. We couldn’t pad the lead at all against those guys, but we didn’t really need it.
Interesting bit late. Buck Showatler got tossed out of the game not long after Nick Markakis did (first time EVER for Nick). Showalter had a lot to say when he was out there. He did turn all kinds of red, which my wife even noticed. Now I point that out, because my wife needs glasses, and if she’s not wearing them, what she sees on the TV is a huge blur to her. She was laying on the sofa at the time (as the kids were both down now, and she was resting). She said “Wow – even without my glasses, Buck Showalter looks rather beet red”. He did seem to blow a few blood vessels. Not quite Earl Weaver levels of Orioles manager ejections, but it was a good show for sure.
Nice that we broke the streak, and as I write this on Friday night, the Angels have already lost, and the A’s are currently losing. Assuming that holds up, we’ll end the night eight games up on both of them. That’s quite amazing, considering how lackadaisical we’ve played over the last week or so. Not to have lost any significant ground during this time. Wow.
Kirkman recalled
- P Michael Kirkman recalled from AAA
- P Derek Holland optioned to AAA [ Link ]
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