ARLINGTON, Texas — Consistency has been hard to come by for the Texas Rangers all season long during their defense of a World Series championship. The phrase “one step forward, two steps back” has applied to their pattern too often to put them in a big hole as the All-Star break nears.
Therefore, it was quite refreshing when, after a series sweep of a competitive Tampa Bay Rays team in Arlington, the Rangers were able to travel to division rival Los Angeles and take the series with two wins in a row – and in decidedly convincing fashion.
The finale proved to be a clunker, however, but having claimed the series, Texas set themselves up with an opportunity to end the first half on a high note.
- Game 91: Texas 9, Los Angeles 4 (W: Gray, 4-4, L: Daniel, 1-2)
- Game 92: Texas 5, Los Angeles 4 (W: Leclerc, 4-4, L: Garcia, 3-1, Sv: Yates, 14)
- Game 93: Texas 2, Los Angeles 7 (W: Crouse, 1-0, L: Lorenzen, 5-5)
Sustainable bats
In the sweep against Tampa Bay, the Rangers outscored the Rays 20-5, with the biggest outbreak coming in the finale. In that game, the Rangers scored 13 runs. Typically, Texas’ bats would have gone completely silent upon arriving in the next city. This was not the case in the opener of the Angels series, however.
The Rangers spread out their attack en route to a 9-4 victory in the Big A. This was kicked off and highlighted by a monstrous 457-foot homer from Corey Seager. Six other Rangers registered hits, including multi-hit efforts from Marcus Semien and Wyatt Langford.
On Tuesday, Texas was able to put up a crooked number in the third and scored five runs in total. The Angels had tied the game at 4-4 against future Hall of Famer Max Scherzer and the two teams were held at that score until Adolis Garcia cranked a homer for the first time this month, a solo home run that proved to be the eventual game-winner.
As Texas worked toward its first five-game hitting streak, the offense showed encouraging signs of life. Even in the loss in the finale of the series, the Rangers were able to chip away at the lead that the Angels had established, and had multiple opportunities to complete a comeback, but it was just too little too late.
Lapse for Lorenzen
In an era where starting pitchers increasingly pitch fewer innings, length from starting pitchers is still important. Going at least five innings helps to ensure that the bullpen gets regular rest, rotations, and even opportunities. But surrendering a lot of runs early and putting your offense in a hole to dig out of has longer repercussions on the game.
Michael Lorenzen had been the Rangers’ most consistent pitcher at producing quality starts for some time since debuting with the team shortly after the season started. Now, though, over his last three starts, Lorenzen has had a couple of hiccups as he allowed five in his last start of June and five more in the finale against the Angels.
Even so, he’s gone five innings in each of his last three starts, and has been able to go at least five in every outing but one in his 16 starts so far this season. In the finale, Lorenzen gave up four free passes via base on balls, the same way he had allowed four walks in his last outing of June. Sandwiched between those outings, he allowed five walks in his previous start.
While Lorenzen continues to give innings, the walks are a growing concern and they came back to bite him to ultimately ruin Texas’ winning streak.
All-Star snub
Josh Smith keeps on truckin’ as the surprise first-half standout for the Rangers. Even though Marcus Semien, who incidentally has a worse slash line, is going to the All-Star Game, Smith is still playing like one.
Manager Bruce Bochy is going to have a decision to make when Josh Jung returns to the lineup in the second half, but Smith has forced himself into the lineup. Since taking over full time for the injured Jung, Smith has been fantastic.
In this series specifically, Smith went 4-for-10 with two walks, a homer and two RBIs. While the finale on Wednesday spelled the end for his month-of-July-long hitting streak, he continued his on base streak and is now slashing .346/.433/.500 for the month.
Welcome to the show
Before the series began, the Rangers shuffled things around in the bullpen again. 29-year old Daniel Robert got the call to the Majors, switching places with Grant Anderson in the bullpen. Robert has put up a 2.35 ERA in 25 games for Triple-A Round Rock with opponents hitting .132 against him. His debut started off well enough, striking out Anthony Rendon to start his career.
He came back out for another inning of work in the 8th and was 1 out away from a scoreless debut, but a hanging breaking ball to Zach Neto ended up in the bleachers for a two-run homer. Regardless, the 2017 21st-rounder Robert has the stuff to help augment the bullpen and it certainly couldn’t hurt for the Rangers to try to find another magic bullet reliever.
With the Seattle Mariners and Houston Astros also winning games of late, Texas is now 6.5 behind Seattle and 4.5 behind Houston in the American League West. The final series of the first half begins after an off-day on Thursday in Houston, with a lot of chances to gain ground on the team immediately ahead of them in the standings.
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