Men wear wigs. Women inject Botox. And to masque their inadequacies, the Rangers rely upon the Houston Astros.
After taking two of three games at Globe Life Park over the weekend, the Rangers have now won 15 consecutive series against their intrastate rivals.
And this had to be one of the strangest series successes.
The Astros waltzed into Arlington and immediately cured the Rangers’ scuffling offense. Sorta. Actually, Houston’s bats are just so meek that, by comparison, Texas broke out for a whopping seven runs in three games – good enough to win two of three games.
Sunday it was Martin Perez’ turn to shut down the punchless Astros, scattering five hits over eight scoreless innings. Friday it was Yu Darvish, who took a perfect game into the sixth inning and limiting Houston to one hit in eight scoreless innings. Somehow Texas lost, 6-5, on Saturday. But for the weekend the Astros managed only 14 hits in 31 innings. Take away the 5-run inning against Tanner Scheppers Saturday and the Astros produced just one run in 30 innings.
That’s one run. 30 innings.
Best thing that happened to the Rangers the last two years was Houston moving into the AL West. Hides a lot of warts when you get to play 12 percent of your games against the worst team in baseball.
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Houston was so bad it helped the Rangers make good history. With 1-0 wins on Friday and Sunday, the Rangers won two such pitching duels in the same series for the first time 1982.
When you only have to score one run to win a game, baseball can be a pretty simple game.
A native Texan who was born in Duncanville and graduated from UT-Arlington, Richie Whitt has been a mainstay in the Metroplex media since 1986. He’s held prominent roles on all media platforms including newspaper (Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Dallas Observer), radio (105.3 The Fan) and TV (co-host on TXA 21 and numerous guest appearances, including NBC 5). He currently lives in McKinney with his wife, Sybil, and two very spoiled dogs.
