First Place Texas Rangers, Rangers Sweep Series, Win 3-1 As Offense Goes Off On Seamen

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Kins had an error in the 1st that looked like it might be a sign of a long day.  Otherwise, that's about it for any bad stuff.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Every starter except Soto (giving Pierzynski a day off behind the plate) had at least 1 hit and 1 run scored.  And the Rangers had 4 homers (Beltre, Martin, Moreland and Nellie), power we had not seen to date this season.

Grimm went 6 IP with 1 ER.  Kirkman went 3 IP with 1 ER as well, effectively giving the rest of the bullpen a day off.

And the Rangers won a get away game to boot.

And, and at least for the time being you're watching the first place Texas Rangers.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Next up, Mr. Hamilton and the Anaheim Angels of Los Angeles, CA, West Coast, USA, North America in Anaheim, CA.

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Rangers' Bats Show Up Again and Beat Up on Mermen, Go For Series Sweep Next

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Tepesch took a line drive off his wrist in the 2nd and had to leave the game.

Elvis is batting less that .200 and again went hitless.  And the rest of the lineup only managed 5 hits.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: In only 1.2 IP Tepesch looked good and Wash says, at least preliminarily, he won't miss his next start.

The bullpen came in and along with Tepesch combined for a 5 pitcher shutout.

Berkman and Pierzynski continue to be the early season standouts on offense, each contributed  2 RBI's in the Rangers 5-0 win.

Murph is hopefully starting to come out of his batting funk, he had a solo homer.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Murph was moved down the lineup presumably because of his poor batting.  When is Elvis going to be moved down the lineup or do we really want someone batting .194 in the #2 slot?

With this win and an A's loss the Rangers trail in the division by only half a game going into Sunday's action.

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Rangers' Offense Shows Up Versus Mermen

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: 6 of the Rangers' 7 runs came in 5th inning.  Why point that out?  Because it'd be even better if the offense was clicking all night in multiple innings.

And Elvis Andrus continues to struggle at the plate, he was the only Ranger without a hit versus the Seamen.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Every other starter did have a hit though.  And Yu was great again with 10 K's in 7 IP.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Matt Harrison is scheduled to have back surgery and is going to be out for a while.  Time for the young guys, Tepesch and Grimm, to step up.

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Ogando Gets Rocked by Cubbies

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Ogando only went 2.1 IP with 5 ER's.  And again the Rangers' offense continued to struggle, managing only 4 hits and 2 runs.  And Cruz and Kins were the only ones with hits with 2 each.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Lowe had only 1 ER, Ortiz and Frasor had 0 ER's.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: The Rangers' offensive woes are now becoming worrisome to say the least.  Essentially if the Rangers' pitching staff gives up 4+ runs in a game the Rangers have almost no chance to win.  And that will continue to be the case until the offense gets going, if it can.  Is too soon to be looking for a trade to get a big bat capable of hitting few homers in here?

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Holland Pitches Rangers to 4-2 Win Over Cubbies

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: The Rangers had managed only 5 hits and 1 run through 7 innings at the plate.

In the top of 9 Gentry was called out at home plate for the 3rd out on a throw from the 1B after the pinch hitting Martin had an infield hit.  The replay showed clearly that he was safe.  Terrible call.

Rangers' relief pitching continues to struggle.  And Jeff Baker dropped an easy fly ball that would have ended the game and secured the shutout.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Of course Derek, Doogie, the Dutch Oven, Holland only gave up 2 hits, no runs and no BB through 7 IP and when he left the game leading 1-0.  Then the Rangers added 3 runs in he top 8, including a Beltre 2 run homer.

Jeff Baker started in left and Muph sat.  Wash's decision kinda panned out as Baker had the first RBI of the ballgame (but Baker misplayed/dropped a fly ball in the 9th, see above).  And needless to say Murph's been struggling.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: In the top of 8 while the Rangers were batting (and scoring 3 runs) you could hear Rangers fans at Wrigley cheering, "let's go Rangers," during the broadcast.  Pretty cool.

Does anyone else remember when the Texas Rangers wouldn't even consider "asking" Alfonso Soriano (now a Cub) to play the OF?  Then he was traded to the Nationals and then-manager Frank Robinson did't ask him to play OF, he told him to and eventually Soriano did.  And now he plays OF for the Cubbies.

Oh yeah, it was in the 40's temperature-wise during the ballgame.  Sometimes it pays to live in Texas.  Of course I might change my tune when it's triple digits for 2 months straight in the summer.

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Rangers Lose Finale to Mermen 4-3, Split Series

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Splitting a 4 game series is about as unsatisfying as it gets, your team didn't win the series but at the same time didn't lose it either.  It's like kissing your sister.

And again the Rangers offense struggled leaving 10 on base with no HR's.  And Nick, Bulldog Jr, Tepesch earned all 4 runs giving up 9 hits in 5.2 IP.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: But Tepesch didn't walk anyone and his ground ball to fly ball ratio was 12-4, meaning a lot of ground balls found holes in the infield.  It happens.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Rangers still have not lost a series this year.  Next up inter-league play versus the Cubs in Chicago.  There are way too many key Rangers still batting under .250 (see Murphy, Moreland, Beltre, Gentry and Elvis for example).  That's got to change if the Rangers offense is ever going to get going.

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Rangers Beat Seamen 3-1

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: The Rangers managed only 5 hits.  And Ogando looked shaky in 5 IP.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: But Ogando only gave up the 1 ER and kept the Rangers in it.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: And Wash threw out a funky lineup.  Murph was moved down, Pierzynski was moved up the batting order, Baker played 1B, Garcia played SS, Berkman and Moreland sat, and Elvis DH'ed.  It got the job done in the end though.

Now the Rangers will try to win the 4 game series against the Mermen tomorrow afternoon.

The A's finally lost a game (versus Detroit) and their lead is now 1 game over the Rangers.

In other division news, the the Halos got a taste of Josh Hamilton checking out mentally in a ballgame when he lost track of the outs in the final inning and got doubled up on the base pads to end the game yesterday in a loss against the 'Stros.  Since Hamilton is fond of comparing himself to Jesus, I wonder if Jesus ever lost track of the number of outs when he was running the bases.

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Rangers Lose 3-1 Versus Mermen

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: How many games are the Rangers going to win when they score only 1 run?  Not many, including this one.  Murph and Beltre continue to struggle in the middle of the batting order.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Yu had a good, albeit wasted performance.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: Murph is batting worse than Moreland yet he's #5 in the order.  Is it time yet to move Murph down the order and move Pierzynski, batting well over .300, up?

Oh, and by the way, the freakin' A's have now won 9 straight and lead the division by 2 over the Rangers.

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Rangers Win Ugly Versus Seattle in Opener Last Night

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: Grimm looked rough on the mound.  And not helping matters the Rangers managed only 4 runs on a 11 hits.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: Even though he looked rough Grimm managed to only give up 2 runs, keeping the Rangers in it.  And Everyday Joe Ortiz came in and looked good again giving up only 1 hit and 0 ER's.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: The A's have picked up right where they left off last year, are on an 8 game winning streak and lead your Rangers by 1 game going into today's action.

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Rangers' Offense Stunk Up the Joint...

Glass Half Empty / Afternoon Cloud: ...and they lose the finale/getaway game 2-0 to the Rays.  The offense managed only 5 hits.

Glass Half Full / Silver Lining: And the Rangers wasted a good (even great) pitching performance by Doogie Holland.  He gave up only 2 runs on 5 hits.

Thoughts / Observations / Sidenotes: The poor offense was without Pierzynski and Berkman who had the day off.  I guess that's a some type of excuse for a goose egg.

Next up Seattle.

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