Thoughts on a 3-1 Rangers loss.
Astros 3, Rangers 1
Well, at least the Rangers didn’t get no-hit tonight.
Or shut out, even. So we can take that as a moral victory of sorts.
Dane Dunning pitched well. The only problem was him walking Jake Meyers and Jose Altuve back to back, both on 3-2 pitches, ahead of Yordan Alvarez. Yordan, of course, homered to make it a 3-0 game, and that was church.
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Dunning did strike out seven in the game, walked just three, and gave the Rangers a Quality Start. He pitched well, other than that hiccup in the third inning. But that hiccup was enough to be the ballgame.
All the Rangers relievers who didn’t pitch yesterday pitched tonight. Grant Anderson summoned to the bigs this afternoon to replaced i.l.’d Josh Sborz, came in with two outs in the seventh to face Jose Altuve with two on and two out. Anderson, who has significant platoon splits, potentially had lefties Yordan Alvarez and Kyle Tucker up after Altuve, and would have to face at least three batters unless the inning ended first. Anderson got down 3-0 to Altuve before rallying to strike him out looking, with Altuve never swinging the bat in that plate appearance.
Lefty Jacob Latz then was able start the eighth inning against the lefties. So that worked out. Latz worked a scoreless eighth, and Yerry Rodriguez worked a scoreless ninth, keeping Texas in the game.
One of those three pitchers likely gets sent down when Michael Lorenzen is activated in the next few days, so they were also sort of pitching for their spot on the major league roster.
Anyway, a solid pitching performance that saw the Rangers give up just four hits to the Astros went to waste because the offense was bad. I was joking early on about Ronel Blanco having thrown a no hitter last time out, but he wasn’t going to throw another one, though that got less amusing as the innings went on and the Rangers repeatedly refused to get hits.
Texas ended up with a whopping two hits on the day, one by Adolis Garcia to break up the no hitter in the sixth, one by Justin Foscue in the ninth.
That was Foscue’s first major league hit, and his second major league plate appearance. It came against Josh Hader, lefty closer for the Astros. Foscue came into the game as a pinch hitter for Evan Carter, which was, well, unexpected.
I’ve mentioned before some concern about Carter’s platoon splits, and he generally only played against righthanders in the regular season after being promoted last year. But the team has indicated Carter is going to play every day and is not going to be platooned.
So using Foscue to hit for Carter in that situation, when Foscue has only had one previous major league at bat, was surprising to me.
Foscue’s hit brought home Adolis Garcia, who had walked and then advanced to second on a wild pitch, bringing the tying run to the plate. Jared Walsh was replaced by pinch hitter Ezequiel Duran, who hit it hard but right at Alex Bregman at third, setting up a 5-4-3 GIDP to end the game.
Dane Dunning’s sinker hit 91.5 mph. Grant Anderson reached 93.5 mph with his sinker. Yerry Rodriguez maxed out at 97.6 mph. Jacob Latz touched 96.1 mph.
Ezequiel Duran’s inning-ending GIDP was the Rangers’ hardest hit ball of the night, at 104.5 mph. Evan Carter had a 103.3 mph ground out. Jonah Heim had a 101.8 mph line out. Marcus Semien had a 101.0 mph ground out.
The finale of the series is on Monday, because this is a weird wraparound series that extends past the weekend. Schedulers confusing us and stuff. Bah.
