{"id":82816,"date":"2025-06-06T04:38:13","date_gmt":"2025-06-06T04:38:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/82816\/"},"modified":"2025-06-06T04:38:13","modified_gmt":"2025-06-06T04:38:13","slug":"theres-plenty-of-blame-to-go-around-after-texas-rangers-ninth-inning-collapse-vs-rays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/82816\/","title":{"rendered":"There\u2019s plenty of blame to go around after Texas Rangers\u2019 ninth-inning collapse vs. Rays"},"content":{"rendered":"

TAMPA \u2014 The Rangers<\/a> on Thursday were swept by Tampa Bay. They took a multi-run lead to the ninth and lost on what can only be described as a two-run, walkoff \u2026 routine grounder.<\/a><\/p>\n

Welcome to the 2025 Texas Rangers: The Gang That Couldn\u2019t Cover First. <\/p>\n

If possible to pour a bit more salt into their cuts, already stinging from the sweat of a humid night, it was that this was the second straight night a one-run loss turned on the Rangers\u2019 inability to do the most basic act in baseball: Cover first base. If there was any difference from the previous loss, in Thursday\u2019s 4-3 defeat, you had a multiple choice of guys who didn\u2019t get there. <\/p>\n

Allow us to explain. Besides, it will give manager Bruce Bochy<\/a> a moment to calm down. Because he needed it after the way the inning, the day and the whole series unfolded. <\/p>\n

Rangers<\/p>\n

Be the smartest Rangers fan. Get the latest news.<\/p>\n

The winning two-out \u201chit\u201d by Taylor Walls was actually a five-bouncer to the right side that, thanks to modern technology, we definitively know left the bat at 88 mph. In ye olde times, this was known as a \u201cslow grounder.\u201d Marcus Semien, who\u2019d given the Rangers a lead with his first multi-homer and multi extra-base hit performance in more than a year<\/a>, moved three steps to his right, scooped it up and looked to first base for the game-clinching out. Except no one was there.<\/p>\n

Neophyte first baseman Josh Smith, playing off the bag, had seen the ball go towards the hole on the right side and had attempted to use his middle-infield athleticism to make a play. Pitcher Robert Garcia, thinking that Smith would stay home, didn\u2019t automatically break towards first. There was nowhere for Semien to go with the ball as Jonathan Aranda, whose daring dash Wednesday accounted for the winning run, scored to tie the game at three. And while Semien swiveled his head looking for a play, Junior Caminero, the trail runner, never stopped coming around third. Semien\u2019s hesitation before throwing home allowed the winning run to score. It really was a nice evening for him up until that moment.<\/p>\n

Ballgame. Series. Hey, maybe even season, the way this thing is going. It was the Rangers\u2019 eighth loss in their last nine road games, their fifth walk-off loss and their eighth one-run road loss of the year. Oh, and they dropped five games below .500, a season-worst.<\/p>\n

It capped off a day on which the Rangers demoted Rocker<\/a>, activated Chris Martin from the IL<\/a> to replace him and then watched Martin have to sit down when his shoulder started popping during warmups in the bullpen ahead of a planned eighth-inning appearance. So, he\u2019s probably going back on the IL. <\/p>\n

And did we mention that on the play that preceded the walk off, Josh Jung had fielded a bad-hop grounder, looked at second, had no play, and by the time he got the ball to first, it was too late. This from a defense that has been perhaps the best in the AL thus far.<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t get any more 2025 Rangers than that.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe got the ground balls,\u201d Bochy said, exercising every ounce of self-control not to destroy the office at George M. Steinbrenner Field. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t turn them into outs there. It\u2019s hard to lose a game like this. These guys played well and you hate to see it unravel there in the ninth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bochy was asked who the \u201cculprit,\u201d was on the muffed play: Smith or Garcia?<\/p>\n

\u201cBoth,\u201d was all he could muster.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Smith] hasn\u2019t played a lot of first base, but he\u2019s done a great job there. He just was maybe thinking he had to knock it down or something. He obviously thought that Marcus didn\u2019t have a shot. But we still have coverage there. And Garcia thought where it was hit that [Smith] wouldn\u2019t go for it. He did. And you saw what happened.\u201d <\/p>\n

Smith was already playing off the bag and the Rangers, along with most other teams, are playing further off the bag in these situations than previous years. He believed that if the ball got through, the winning run would score anyway, so the primary need was to knock the ball down. He didn\u2019t get to it, turned towards the outfield and saw Semien two steps behind him, fielding it. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s just a super in-between ball,\u201d said Smith, whose eight starts at first this year are the first eight of his career. \u201cMy feeling on it was Marcus was kind of up the middle a little bit, and so if anything was hit soft to my right that I felt like I could get, I\u2019d have to try to make an effort for it. I\u2019m just trying to be aggressive there to go get the ball. In hindsight, I wish I wouldn\u2019t have but, if for some reason, Marcus doesn\u2019t get there and that ball gets through, it\u2019s game over.\u201d <\/p>\n

Said Garcia: \u201cI didn\u2019t trust my eyes after I made the pitch. I look over before the pitch and see where guys are playing. After that, I assumed, and didn\u2019t get over there. I looked where the ball was hit instead of just looking at and going to the base. I should have gotten over there.\u201d <\/p>\n

It was a \u201cshould have\u201d kind of night for the Rangers. <\/p>\n

This wayward season has been filled with them.<\/p>\n

\"Texas<\/a>Texas Rangers activate reliever Chris Martin, but trouble in warmup offers new setback<\/a><\/p>\n

Martin, who turned 39 on Monday, had been on the injured list with right shoulder fatigue since May 19.<\/p>\n

\"Texas<\/a>Rock bottom? Watch the Texas Rangers\u2019 unbelievable walk-off loss against the Rays<\/a><\/p>\n

Texas blew a 2-run lead in the ninth inning and got swept by Tampa Bay.<\/p>\n

Find more Rangers coverage from The Dallas Morning News here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Click or tap here to sign up for our Rangers newsletter.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TAMPA \u2014 The Rangers on Thursday were swept by Tampa Bay. They took a multi-run lead to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":82817,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2393],"tags":[4805,5,3321,395,360,386,4,149,185,1567,69,3240],"class_list":{"0":"post-82816","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-texas-rangers","8":"tag-article","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-bruce-bochy","11":"tag-josh-jung","12":"tag-kumar-rocker","13":"tag-marcus-semien","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-rangers","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-texas","18":"tag-texas-rangers","19":"tag-texasrangers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/114634575487144623","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82816"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82816\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}