Texas Rangers Take A Hit And Deliver Enough Of Their Own To Even The Score With The Yankees

The clouds rolled in, the rain fell and the Rangers won. (Photo: R.P. Washburne)

D-tails: Rangers 7, Yankees 3
• Boxscore, Standings

ARLINGTON – For those whose assumption that the Yankees intimidate the Rangers was only bolstered by Monday afternoon’s events, the game that began on Tuesday night and ended Wednesday morning proved the Rangers can counterpunch with the Bombers.

The early 3-0 Texas lead dissolved as Kevin Millwood ran low on fuel in the middle innings. But the Rangers’ relief corps had just enough to stop New York’s rally at 3-3. And Rangers bats responded with the game’s final four runs and a 7-3 victory though the Yankees put runners aboard in every inning.

After a rain/monsoon/hail delay of almost two and a half hours, many among the initial gathering of 33,397 – the smallest crowd for the last five games at Rangers Ballpark, believe it or not – saw Texas increase its A.L. West lead back to four games.

“The biggest thing was winning after yesterday,” said C.J. Wilson, who coaxed Nick Swisher to hit into one of three Rangers double plays (all started by Omar Vizquel) with the bases loaded in the seventh. “We come back home and lose 11-1. We’re like, ‘Whoa, geez.’ But we’re playing really good baseball. For a lot of us, this is a new situation we’re in, being in front this time of year.”

Some of the numbers made it appear a Rangers win was inevitable. Marlon Byrd hit a bases-loaded single to drive home the game’s first two runs in the first inning with two out; going into that at-bat, Byrd was hitting .412 with two out and runners in scoring position.

After the Rangers regained a 4-3 lead in the sixth inning on Jarrod Saltalamacchia’s first-swing flair down the right-field line, they added two insurance runs in the seventh after Ian Kinsler opened with his second hit of the night and Michael Young doubled him to third; Kinsler came into the game with the No. 2 home batting average in the league (.405) while Young came in hitting .380 from the seventh inning on.

Frank Francisco worked a scoreless ninth, increasing his major league high of 16.2 spotless innings in 16 appearances for 11 saves.

Some numbers that contributed to the win weren’t as obvious.

Wilson retired one batter, but that happened to be the Swisher DP ball.

“He and I go back four or five years, so there are no surprises there,” Wilson said. “I just made a good pitch, and I was lucky that he hit it right at Omar.”

The Rangers officially were 2-for-7 with runners in scoring position. That doesn’t reflect the at-bats by Josh Hamilton and David Murphy that produced runs in the seventh. Hamilton, batting with Kinsler at third and Young on second, hit a sharp grounder to short off left-handed reliever Phil Coke – with the infield back – that scored Kinsler to increase the lead to 5-3. After Nelson Cruz was put on, Murphy sent a fly ball to center to bring in Young for a 6-3 lead.

The Yankees, by the way, were 2-for-12 RISP and left 12 on.

Chris Davis provided the final run with his second home run of the game, his first multi-HR game in the majors (along with another multi-K game). The day began with Davis ending an early BP session by flinging his bat into shallow right field.

Someone watching from, say, the press box would have assumed Davis was a might miffed. Not so, he said.

“It wasn’t out of anger or frustration,” he said. “It was the first time in a really long time that I was hitting the ball well to centerfield and leftfield. I wasn’t pulling off the ball and staying through it.

“It was kind of a rejoicing toss.”

So much for assumptions.

The Rangers avoided their first back-to-back home losses since the beginning of the month though Millwood failed to last six innings for the first time this season. Davis echoed Wilson about the impact of rebounding from Monday’s resounding defeat.

“It definitely boosts our confidence to know we can still be down a few runs and come back, especially against a team like those guys,” he said. “We played a good clean game tonight, and we never got down.”