CINCINNATI — The Texas Rangers went to the Queen City expecting to build off their early season success against one of the National League’s most underperforming teams.
Instead, after three consecutive demoralizing losses that served to expose the team’s overachieving bullpen, the Rangers slink back to Arlington after being swept in Cincinnati.
Here’s a look back at the series of unfortunate events that presents Texas with their first hardship of the season:
The plays that weren’t made
The series opener went down as a “quality start” in the box score for Nathan Eovaldi, but the veteran pitcher could have turned in a better effort, as could have those behind him. The defense behind the 33-year-old, making his fifth start of the year, was not sharp again.
There won’t be numbers in the error column, but there were three balls that should have found Rangers’ gloves in the first inning. A sun-lost double to Bubba Thompson and a difficult bounced throw that wasn’t scooped out at first base led to an unearned run in a game that was eventually decided by one run.
Did that run determine the end result of the game? Not at all, but for some reason, the defense hasn’t been particularly sharp for Eovaldi’s turns through the rotation.
No relief
While the Rangers were able to overcome the defensive miscues, they lost due to an element that had been a pleasant surprise in the first month of the season, but now has quickly become a liability.
Following both Eovaldi in the series opener and Martin Perez in the second game, starts in which both starters left with comfortable leads, it seemed fairly safe to turn the game over to the bullpen against a last place team having problems scoring runs. Unfortunately, the run of success that the bullpen had been on came to a screeching halt in the first game of the series and continued to burn furiously throughout the series.
After the six solid innings Eovaldi provided, Dane Dunning, who had not given up a run in all six of his appearances, was called on to start the seventh. The tailspin started innocently enough, with a strikeout, fly out and ground out, but then Dunning ran into some control issues. Dunning surrendered a single, a walk, got an infield fly pop out, then walked the bases loaded. That prompted manager Bruce Bochy to bring out Jose Leclerc. Leclerc, who typically needs a batter or two to find the strike zone, had zero margin for error with the bases loaded and two outs.
Leclerc, on cue, walked in the tying two runs before striking out Jose Barrero. Curiously, though, Leclerc was brought out again to start the 9th and promptly walked Jonathan India before Bochy would make the move to lefty Will Smith. A passed ball and a single later and the opener belonged to the Reds by the final score of 7-6 on a walk-off single.
The woes continued into the next night, as Perez threw a much more efficient 6 ⅓ innings on 92 pitches and left with a 6-1 lead. Jonathan Hernandez would close out the seventh inning with a strikeout and a liner to center. In the eighth inning, the Rangers had what was probably their worst half inning of the season thus far.
Lefty Cole Ragans, who is likely still getting accustomed to the bullpen after being brought along as a starter, had not pitched in ten days. While he needed some down time after that four-inning outing against Houston, one can’t help but speculate that Ragans could have used a little game work in between the two games.
Ragans got one ground out but then he hit Stuart Fairchild with a pitch, surrendered a hard hit single up the middle, another single that he deflected, a hard hit line out, a run-scoring single and a walk before Bochy had seen enough. At that point, it was 6-3. Veteran Ian Kennedy would come on and immediately surrender a two-run double before giving up a two-run single. The comeback was complete and the Reds took the second game by the same 7-6 score.
In the series finale, an afternoon affair from Cincy, it was Jonathan Hernandez’ turn to collapse. Being asked to come out for the second day in a row for the first time all year, Hernandez did not register an out in the ninth. He was tasked with protecting a ballgame that the Rangers had tied up in the top of the half inning, but again, defense undid the good work.
Shortstop Josh Smith got a ground ball but had to throw from the seat of his pants to Nathaniel Lowe. Lowe, who so far is in the 98th percentile of outs above average at first, couldn’t handle the bounce and the ball skipped by him, allowing Kevin Newman scamper into scoring position.
Six pitches later, Nick Senzel completed the sweep of the Rangers with a two-run, walk-off homer.
Did anything go right?
It seems trite, since, in the end, it’s the team that scores more runs that ends up winning, and the Rangers lost all three games, but the Texas offense continued to do the job. Even in the finale, when they were facing a pitcher who has been having a great season in Graham Ashcraft, they were able to hang tough and stay in the game.
The other two games of the series, Texas scored six runs apiece and continued to hit well with runners in scoring position. For the year, the Rangers are slashing .360/.407/.626 with runners on. The league average slash line is .257/.337/.414. And it remains a top-to-bottom effort; if one player has an 0-for, someone else is stepping up and supporting the rest of the lineup.
The starting pitching continued to carry their weight in this series as well. Eovaldi, Perez and Wednesday’s starter Jon Gray each went at least six innings with none allowing more than three runs.
Eovaldi suffered from shoddy defense behind him, Perez picked up the pace and was more efficient with his pitches and control, and Gray battled, picking up career strikeout 1,000 on the way. Still, baseball is a team sport, and while it’s the pitcher’s job to keep the team in the game, it’s the rest of the team’s job to actually win the game.
The starters and bats did their best, the bullpen and defense were the undoing.
What else went wrong?
In the finale, the Reds seemed to play a game of target practice with the Rangers’ hitters, as three different pitchers hit three different Rangers on Wednesday. One of them, Ashcraft’s 96-MPH fastball straight into Josh Jung’s knuckles, knocked the Rangers’ third baseman out of the game.
Ultimately, X-Rays were negative and it looks like Jung will avoid the injured list, but his bat was removed for the game in the second inning. Ezequiel Duran, who pinch hit for Jung, was hit by Ian Gibaut, and then Josh Smith was hit by Lucas Sims.
Travis Jankowski also ended up leaving the game with left hip tightness. As one of the hotter hitters on the team at the moment (6 for his last 14 with three runs scored), the Rangers have to hope that Jankowski’s ailment requires a couple days rest and not a trip to the IL.
Next up for the Rangers, the New York Yankees come to Arlington, and Texas is going to need whatever firepower it can get to stave off a spiral of their own making.
Do you think the Rangers will be able to put this series against Cincinnati behind them? Share your thoughts with Matt on Twitter @FisherWritesMLB.
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