Game 17: Rangers Fall Too Far Behind, Drop Opener

Derek Holland did not pitch a horrible game. He made a key mistake to Alex Rodriguez, and with his former teammate watching, A-Rod hit a three-run homerun that ended up being the difference in this one.

When you give up seven runs, it’s hard to come back especially when the other pitcher is CC Sabathia. There were good moments – the bottom of the order stepped up and got a few runs but the top of the order was not able to cash in their opportunities. There are going to be games like this, and in my series preview I warned about the let down following a long road trip. Now that they got that out of the way, they can head into the remainder of the series.

Like I said, there isn’t much to talk about in this one. The Yankees got big hits when they needed them and the Rangers didn’t. Games like this happen. Even the best teams lose a third of their games and this was one of Texas’s. At least it came in a game where they faced off against CC Sabathia and now face Hiroki Kuroda and Phil Hughes in back to back games. With Yu Darvish and Scott Feldman going for the Rangers, they will likely need the offense to get off to a good start and give their starter a lead to work with. Playing from behind against a team like the Yankees is not the way to go.

I found that Mark Lowe really had a good performance. He hasn’t gotten much work as of late, but I think there are a lot of Rangers fans that would rather see him in closer games than Koji Uehara (who also pitched a very good inning today). Lowe had closer potential when he was with the Seattle Mariners and is the only piece that the Rangers have remaining from the Cliff Lee trade. Lowe will never be a high leverage innings guy while the Rangers have Joe Nathan, Alexi Ogando and Mike Adams but having a guy like that can definitely help out if he can get back to form.

Tomorrow is a new day for the Rangers, and they’ll hope a few more of those hard-hit balls will fall as they try and have a chance to pull out the series on Wednesday.

Like I mentioned, a matchup of Japanese starters – 25 year old Yu Darvish against 37 year old Hiroki Kuroda. First pitch is at 7:05 CDT.