Survival Skills: Texas Rangers Starter Scott Feldman Outlasts Opponent In 7-1 Win Over Mariners

D-tails
• Boxscore (Rangers 7, Mariners 1); Standings; The Depot live game blog; Post-Game Show comment thread
• Rangers don’t waste second chances; Biceps soreness leaves Frank Francisco unavailable
• AL West glance: Boston rallies to beat Angels; extends Texas lead to 1½ games

ARLINGTON - Josh Hamilton officially returned Tuesday night. Derek Holland officially arrived.

And, perhaps most importantly, another Rangers starter won another round of Survivor: The Pitchers Mound. You know, the objective: Outwit, outpitch and outlast the other guy on the little dirt island.

The Rangers assured themselves of another night in first place with a 7-1 win over Seattle that was powered in part by a Hamilton homer to start a six-run, seventh-inning rally and by 1.2 flawless innings of relief from Holland, which earned him the first win of his major league career.

It was a nice return from the DL for Hamilton and a milestone moment for the rookie, but they pale in comparison to a trend that is emerging from the Rangers’ starting rotation. They are consistently outlasting their pitching opposition, which changes the balance of games and series.

“It’s the way you win,” said 2B Ian Kinsler. “Your pitcher outlasts the opponent in the first game of the series and you get into the bullpen earlier and they have to pitch longer and then in the second game of the series, it gives you another advantage because now they have the tired bullpen. The more you do it, the better your chances.”

Feldman, the Rangers No. 5 starter, outlasted Jason Vargas, who was moving from the bullpen to the rotation and thus limited anyway. While Vargas was done after five innings of one-run baseball, Feldman took a shutout to the seventh. After he allowed a run and gave way to Holland, who stopped the rally with a pair of ground balls, the offense rallied for six runs against the second and third Seattle relievers of the night.

It was the 13^th time in the last 16 games a Rangers starter has outlasted his opponent. The Rangers are 10-3 in those games. They are 14-7 for the year when the starter outlasts his opposition.

“It’s no secret they have been leading the way for us,” said 3B Michael Young, who returned from missing all but three innings of the weekend series at Chicago with three hits and a pair of walks. “We are saving our bullpen and keeping them fresh. We have confidence when we are in the field that we are going to be back in the dugout quickly. We’re taking a lot of pride in pitching and defense right now and that’s a lot of fun to be a part of.”

For the first six innings Tuesday, Feldman barely needed the help of the defense. Employing the new Rangers pitching philosophy of commanding the fastball and throwing it until opponents make you move to something else, Feldman smothered the struggling Mariners.

He got a bit of help from C Jarrod Saltalamacchia, who threw out Ichiro Suzuki trying to steal second base ahead of a Ken Griffey Jr. walk in the first. That eliminated the possibility of two on and one out for cleanup hitter Adrian Beltre. Instead, Beltre bounced into a fielder’s choice to end the inning. It was the first of nine ground ball outs he piled up through the sixth. Add in two strikeouts, the caught stealing and the stab of a low line drive by SS Elvis Andrus and Feldman allowed only five fly ball outs through the sixth.

He entered the sixth approaching 100 pitches, a threshold he’d reached only six previous times in his career. So after he allowed back-to-back singles to Franklin Gutierrez and Kenji Johjima, the latter of which tied the game at one, Feldman was pulled with a career-high 109 pitches. Holland got a pair of ground outs from the bottom two hitters in the lineup.

“The main thing is not to worry about the other starter, but about yourself,” said Feldman, who has been followed by Holland into games four times this season with three ending up as Rangers wins. “It’s about working quickly and getting our guys back in the dugout as quickly as possible to swing the bats. It’s not in my mind to just go longer than the other guy, but if you do it, usually, it means you’ve pitched pretty well.”

By the time Feldman departed, Seattle’s Vargas was long-gone and the Mariners bullpen, which had compiled a 6.43 ERA over the past week was on the scene. Though RHP Miguel Batista had danced through a bases-loaded, one-out situation in the sixth, Mark Lowe and Sean White were not as fortunate in the seventh. After Young singled with one out and Hamilton fell behind 0-and-1 by chasing a ball in the dirt, the center fielder vowed to find a pitch up in the zone. He even choked up on his bat a little, though he said afterward he wasn’t exactly sure why.

Whatever. It worked. He caught a fastball up in the zone and drove it over the left field wall for a two-run homer that gave the Rangers the lead for good. It began a flood of hits that produced four more runs in the inning.

It made for a nice return for Hamilton. And it clinched Holland’s first major league win.

All of it, however, was made possible by Feldman’s game of survivor.