Texas Rangers: Dominant Pitching Leads To Win In 13 Innings

The Texas Rangers are back on the win column after a hard-fought 1-0 victory last night against the Kansas City Royals. Texas is now 6-10 and remain at the bottom of the American League West standings. Game one of this series is done. Three more to go. Texas winning this series is the way to turn things around for the ball club.

An outstanding performance by the pitching corps. Forcing Kansas City’s batting lineup for finish 4-for-41 and striking them out 14 times is superior and that’s what this team needs when it comes to pitching. Offense was sloppy but they pulled through in the 13th inning, thanks to a double by Joey Gallo and a game-winning single by Delino DeShields. Only the third game in Globe Life Park to go into extra innings being scoreless after nine innings. According to Fox Sports, each of those games have resulted in 1-0 wins for the Texas Rangers.

Andrew Cashner stepped on the mound. He pitched 6.0 innings, allowing a season-low of three hits, surrendering no runs, and striking out a season-high of three batters, earning a no-decision. Despite earning the no-decision Cashner’s performance is respectable. In any case, he needs to keep it up.

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Bullpen perhaps had their best game so far this season. Relievers Alex Claudio, Tony Barnette, and Jeremy Jeffress in the course of two innings, allowing a combined one hit, surrendered no runs, and struck four batters. Matt Bush came in the ninth, allowing no hits, no runs, and striking out two batters. Bush is one step closer of being ready to officially be the team’s closer. Keone Kella pitched the 10th and 11th innings, allowing no hits, no runs, and striking out two batters. Dario Alvarez pitched the final two innings, allowing no hits, no runs, and striking out three, thus earning the win, and giving the bullpen their second win this season. At any rate, this bullpen needs to keep it up. This sort of performance helps lead to wins.

Offense finished 6-for-41 and struck out eight times. The offense is in slump right now. 13-94 in their series against the Athletics and now 19-for-135 in their last four games. Texas’ batting lineup’s batting average is the American League’s worse at .206. Only three players have a batting average over .200.

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Cole Hamels steps on the mound tonight, looking to win his first game this season. The Royals are the worse in the league in scoring runs as they’ve only scored 41. Hamels and the bullpen need to take advantage. The offense needs to wake up.