Thoughts on a 6-1 Rangers win – Lone Star Ball
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Photo by Duane Burleson/Getty Images
Rangers 6, Tigers 1
And the Rangers have their first series win since sweeping the Angels back on April 15-17.
There’s a lot of things to feel good about from this series. The Tigers have been one of the best teams in baseball so far this year, and Texas went into their house and took two of three. The Tigers are fourth in runs scored per game this year, and the Rangers held them to six runs and fourteen hits over three games.
Yes, the Rangers were shut down by Tarik Skubal on Friday, but he won the Cy Young Award last season and has been really good this season. And in the other two games, the Rangers scored 16 runs on 22 hits.
This game going the Rangers’ way makes a big difference in how we perceive things. A loss, and the Rangers lose the series — their seventh series loss in a row — and have a losing road trip. With the win, Texas takes the series, has a .500 road trip, and is just a game under .500 heading into a seven game homestand.
Nathan Eovaldi continues to be amazing. There’s a certain artistry to the way he pitches right now. Eovaldi threw 95 pitches in all today. He threw four different pitches — a fastball, a curveball, a cutter and a splitter. And he threw them all almost the same amount — 25 splitters, 24 curves, 24 cutters, 22 fastballs. And he threw every pitch between 20% and 29% of the time to righties, and between 20% and 30% of the time to lefties.
So Eovaldi was throwing four quality pitches, he was commanding them all, and he was mixing them all against both handed hitters. If you’re a Tiger hitter, you can’t go up there looking for anything in particular, and you don’t know which of his four effective pitches you’re going to have to deal with.
The Tigers put up just two hits and one walk against Eovaldi, who struck out seven and lowered his ERA to 1.78 on the season.
Chris Martin pitched the eighth, and Jacob Latz was to handle the ninth, but he loaded the bases with one out so Robert Garcia had to finish things out. Garcia allowed a sac fly, which was the one run that Detroit got, which annoyed me out of proportion because I wanted the Rangers to get a shutout.
Offensively, the Rangers banged for the second game in a row. A Marcus Semien two run homer got them on the board in the top of the second, and it looked like Texas might bust it open in the second when Wyatt Langford, with the bases loaded and two out, crushed an 0-2 pitch. Alas, it went straight to Riley Greene in left field for the third out, and then Riley Greene doubled to start the bottom of the second, and there were immediate fears that the Rangers blew an opportunity and now were going to let Detroit tie it up or something.
But no, Eovaldi handled it, and Evan Carter singled in a run in the third to make it 3-0. A two run homer by Josh Jung and a solo homer by Jonah Heim rounded out the scoring.
Carter ended up going 2 for 5 and stole a base, which is good to see. And Ezequiel Duran, starting in place of the aching-hammied Corey Seager, was 2 for 4 on the day with a double. Given Duran’s struggles with the bat in his previous times up this season, that’s good to see.
Nathan Eovaldi hit 96.7 mph with his fastball, averaging 94.7 mph. Chris Martin touched 96.2 mph with his fastball. Jacob Latz maxed out at 96.5 mph with his fastball. Robert Garcia didn’t throw a fastball, but his changeup topped out at 89.8 mph.
Josh Jung had a 107.4 mph home run. Wyatt Langford had a 106.6 mph line out and a 100.7 mph double. Josh Smith had a 106.0 mph ground out. Ezequiel Duran had a 104.6 mph double. Marcus Semien had a 103.5 mph ground out, a 101.3 mph homer and a 100.7 mph line out.
Its a two game winning streak. It would be nice if the Rangers can come home and keep this rolling. Let’s all think positive.
