Rangers Lose 5-3 to O's

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Scooter Feldman gave up an early run (first inning) and a big crooked number (4 runs in the 4th inning).

And the Rangers didn't have a runner in scoring position till the 6th (Kins had a solo homer before that with no one on).  And Josh went 0-fer with 3 SO's including a strikeout to end the inning in the 7th with 2 runners on.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: But as mentioned, Kins did go yard to tie the game at the time in the 3rd.  Hopefully he's starting to work his way out of his offensive funk.  Soto went yard with Murph on base to make it 5-3 O's is the bottom of the 7th.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: The other night the local broadcast guys referred to the O's as the east coast Rangers.  That's kind of true.  In the field they have Chris "Crash" Davis and catcher Teagarden (Omar Quintanilla also played for the Rangers less than 15 games).  They also have Hunter, O'Day and Strope on their pitching staff.  And Showalter (Dr. Gaius, see below) as their manager.

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Thank You Ryan Dempster, Rangers Beat Orioles 5-1

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Dempster again gave up a first inning run.

The Rangers had 9 LOB, 4 of those LOB when the Rangers were down 1 run in the early innings.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: After giving up the early run and 2 hits in the first inning Dempster only gave up 2 more hits the rest of the way and retired the last 11 Orange birds he faced with 8 strong IP.  And Nathan capped it off by striking out the side, all swinging, to finish the game in a non-save situation.

In the 4th Soto had the RBI, scoring Nellie (did anyone notice that it looked like Nellie was cringing after sliding into home on that play?), to put the Rangers up to 2-1 at that point and up for good as it would turn out.  David "Charlie" Murphy again had a multi-hit, multi-RBI game.

Elvis had a great defensive play, going towards 3B he back handed a grounder and made a jump-throw from at least 2 feet deep in the left field grass to get the batter out at first.  How has he not won a gold glove yet?

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Nathan set a franchise record by recording his 22nd consecutive save this past Saturday.  Now if the Rangers make the postseason let's see how he does converting saves then.  And let's see if this is the Ryan Dempster we'll see down the stretch.

As I've had mentioned to me by a good friend, doesn't ex-Ranger manager and current Orioles skipper Buck Showalter kinda look like Dr. Zaius from the original Planet of the Apes movie?  Kinda?  Compare for yourself below:

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Rangers Win 2 Out of 3 Versus Blue Jays in Weekend Series

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: In the loss in the first game of the series Yu walked 10 in 7 IP.

And the Rangers mighty, potent offense (written sarcastically) managed a whopping 4 runs in the first 2 games of the series.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: But, the Rangers won game 2 of the series because they were bailed out by a great group effort by the pitching staff (6 pitchers saw action), including 4.1 IP by Oswalt in which he  gave up only 1 ER.

In the last game of the series the offense woke up scoring 11 runs with Young going for 5 RBI's in the game.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Dempster didn't make to the trip to his native land of Canada because of "personal reasons."  Some speculated that it was passport (lost?) issues.  Weird.

The Rangers look like, in some games, they cannot put runs across the plate and in others they drop double digit runs their opponents.  How about this?  How about some offensive consistency?

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Rangers Avoid Sweep in Bronx, Win 10-6

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud:  That's what happens when you put a 3B/1B in right field (Olt).  You get an error.

The pitching staff is continuing to give up crooked numbers/big innings, like today with a 5 run 6th inning.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: However, through 5 IP Doogie Holland had a 1 hitter going and the Rangers offense had staked him to a 4-0 lead.

6 Rangers had multiple hits with David "Charlie" Murphy leading the way with 3.  Beltre and Gentry both had 3 RBI's.  The offense finally woke up after managing just 6 hits in the last 2 games and 2 runs in the last 3 versus the Spankees.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Even after losing 3 straight before today's win and even if both the Halos and the A's win tonight the Rangers will still lead the division by 6 games.  That would still be at least the 2nd biggest division lead in all of baseball at the end of the day.

I came up with the nickname David "Charlie" Murphy as an homage to Charlie Murphy, Eddie Murphy's younger brother who is also a comedian and pretty darn funny in his own right (see his appearances on the Dave Chappelle Show).  Charlie Murphy doesn't seem to get the due and respect that he's earned/owed.  Sound familiar?  Of course, they share the same last name so it works on that level too.

David Murphy has been playing great baseball this year and has played well for the Rangers going back a few seasons but, he's still not quite an everyday player.  And to be clear Murph wasn't considered an everyday guy when he first started out with the big club.  Sure, he's gets a boatload more starts in the field nowadays so he's not quite as unappreciated as he has been in years past...

But you know who hasn't been an everyday player this year but maybe deserves to get more starts in the field down the stretch and next year?  Craig Gentry.  Craig "Charlie" Gentry?

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Rangers Lose, Again, 3-2

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: 4 hits by Rangers.  Again, not good.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Josh went yard twice, albeit on solo efforts.  Wasted good effort by Scooter Feldman.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Welcome to playoff style baseball Texas.  Looks like it might be a problem.

Soto is our catcher with Napoli on the DL, forgot to mention that.

Is it just me or does Soto have a double hitch when he throws it back to the mound?

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Rangers Lose to Spankees Again, 3-0

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud:  I know hindsight is 20/20 but, Harrison was in a pitching duel with Kuroda.  Harry was at 106 pitches, had only given up 5 hits through 6.1 IP, he still looked like he had good stuff and still had a shutout going.  And the Spankees had 2 switch hitters due up in Texiera and Swisher so there was no match up (lefty vs. lefty for example) that you were going for. But, Wash pulled Harry and Ogando gave up 2 homers for 3 runs.  Ballgame.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Harry looked good (and in my opinion at the time should have been left in to finish his pitching duel with Kuroda).

Tanner Scheppers looked great in relief even with the ump not giving him pitches that were well within the strike zone.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: To go on even more, with the way the game was going for the Rangers at the plate why doesn't Wash leave Harrison in so long as he keeps his own shutout going?

But, bottom line is that the Rangers aren't going to win too many ballgames when they can only manage 2 hits (the first one in the 7th inning).

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Rangers Lose to Spankees 8-2

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Dempster giving up 5 runs in the 3rd inning was not good.

Kins got picked off at 2nd and Elvis got picked off at 3rd in the game.  Those are essentially free outs they're giving the other team and at the same time they're taking themselves out of scoring position.

Rangers sure seem to get picked off a lot more often than Rangers pick off opposing base runners.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Murph, Hamilton and Nellie continue to produce at the plate.

And it was one bad inning by Dempster in the 3rd, he looked great (perfect) before the 3rd inning and after the 3rd he was good to OK with 6 IP.  Hopefully the 3rd is just an bump in the road.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: I had sure hoped that the last start from Dempster before this one would be indicative of what we could expect from him going forward.  Again, I hope the 3rd inning was just an anomaly for Dempster.

It's a long, 4 game series.  Let's hope Harry can step up tomorrow and have a strong outing.

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Rangers Win 8-3; Win Series Versus Detroit

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Yu continues to walk too many batters to make everyone comfortable, walking 5 in 6.2 IP.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: The offense was great, again.  And Josh Hamilton went yard and had another multi-hit, multi-RBI game.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: A's and Angels lost today, increasing the Rangers lead to 6.5 and 8 over them respectively in the division.  According to all the TV talking heads after the Greinke trade the Halos were supposed to start gaining on and eventually overtake the Rangers.  So far, not so much.

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Rangers/Holland Win 2-1 In Pitching Duel Versus Detroit/Verlander

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Shaky first inning by Doogie Holland, gave up a solo shot in the first inning.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: But, that homer and 2 other hits and 1 BB was all that Holland gave up in 7.2 IP.  Josh continues to hit in August.  Nellie and Olt had the 2 RBI's.  And Olt had the pinch hit game winning hit.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Oh please let Holland pitch like this down the stretch.

Rangers are up 5.5 and 7 games against the A's and Halos respectively going into today's day game.

Yu is up today, he and Wash had a talk after his last in a string of tough starts.

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Rangers Lose to Detroit 6-2

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Scooter Feldman was harmed by the long ball (Prince Fielder's 3 run homer in the 6th).  Lowe didn't look too good in his first appearance since he went on the DL.

Nellie sometimes looks bad in right field, like tonight where he made an awkward dive for a hit that went into the right field corner that resulted in an in the park home run.  Nellie left the game with some back issues.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Josh went yard.  In fact the top of the order looked good as did Young.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes:  Maybe the team to watch out for in the division is the A's.  As of this post the Seamen of Seattle were beating the Halos.  A's lost tonight

Let's have an honest look at how Napoli has been doing at the plate.  This year.  I know it's easy to remember how great he did the last half of last year and in the playoffs.  But that was last year.  What have you done for us lately?  Napoli and his agent probably wish now that they could have worked out a multi-year deal during the offseason with the Rangers.  Right now he's pretty much not batting any better than Soto(or Yorvit before that).  Keep that in mind if you start to see Soto get more chances behind the plate.

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