Rangers Beat Halos 7-3, Win Series
Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: The wind was jet streaming out to right field, which, as the national ESPN announcers pointed out about 27 times before first pitch, could help the visiting team. Yu got off to a little bit of shaky start in the top of the first giving up 2 runs.
Wash pulled Yu due to a blister that affected him throwing his change-up after 5 IP. In the 6th he was due to face the bottom third of the of the Halos' order with righties due up, instead lefty Robbie Ross came in. Why not throw a righty? Ross put two on before getting out of the inning. Also the blister only affected Yu's change-up and he had only thrown 85 pitches. So why not just have Yu not throw the change?
For at least one game, Hamilton broke out of his slump with a single and a double. I also question if you can call it only a "slump" since it dates back to last June.
Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: The wind was jet streaming out to right field, which of course could help your Rangers and did. Berkman and Murph went yard back to back in the first putting 3 runs on the board. Soto, giving Pierzynski a breather behind the plate, had a double and then scored on a hit by Kins. Speaking of Kins, what did I say? It's an odd (versus even) year. Kins also had a 3 run homer to increase the Rangers' lead from 1 run to 4 in the bottom of 6.
Here is yet another example of Yu being strong to very strong: in the top of 3, with no outs, Yu walked Pujols and then gave up a double to Hamilton. Pujols held at 3B. Then Yu struck out Trumbo and Kendrick and induced an inning ending fly ball to CF. Nice.
Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Pujols doesn't look right when he's running. In fact it's painful to watch him run.
Why Leonys Martin instead of Gentry in CF? Again I know it's a small sample size but right now Gentry is playing better this year. And given how well Gentry played last year for the club I would have thought it'd be his spot to lose.