Anyone hate this team yet? I DO! After the Astros give up six runs in the 3rd, the Rangers win 9-3. Let's spiral further into depression!
*With the loss tonight, the Astros have lost four straight at home, and six of their last seven to the Rangers. Since 2007, the Rangers lead this series 13-6.
*In their last seven games (@NYY, @KC, vTEX), the Astros are 1-6.
*Wandy can't be trusted. He's the first ten-game loser in the Majors. And it's not bad luck, I don't care what stats you throw at me. In his last two starts, Wandy has allowed 11H/14ER, 6K:9BB, in 8IP. He's thrown a total of 166 pitches, faced 43 batters, and posted an average game score of 22.5.
*In his last five starts, Wandy's ERA is 9.74. This is his 4th Disaster Start (more ER than IP) this season.
*For the third straight game, Wandy walked as many batters as he struck out. 8K:11BB.
*The Rangers' 5-7 hitters went a combined 7x15, 3K:0BB, 7RBI. That's brutal.
*The two-out run barrage continues: All six of the Rangers' 3rd inning runs came with two outs.
*More Wandy: His 2010 OPSA (OPS against) is .845. In May, his OPSA was .943; in June it was .873.
*Rangers hits vs. Wandy: doubled to right, singled to left, doubled to deep right, singled to left.
*Coming into tonight, the 2nd-5th batters that Wandy faced had an OPS of over 1.000.
*The Astros pitching staff walked seven batters. Amazingly, only two of those baserunners scored.
*Fulchino, jacked up elbow and all, pitched after all (ridiculously), and gave up three baserunners (2H/1BB) in 1IP, throwing 25 pitches.
*And Wesley Wright, fresh off getting screwed around with whether or not he's a starter or reliever (because that worked SO well with Paulino last year) gave up two runs in 2IP. He has appeared in six games for the Astros this season, and given up runs in three, only two of those outings have seen him not allow a baserunner. Let's go ahead and send him back to learn how to start, because this isn't working so well.
*But hey, the Astros got nine hits! When they get 9+ hits, the Astros are 16-12. They've also been outscored 134-135. Hilarious, huh?
*Let's rundown the OPS' of the Rangers vs. the Astros, by starting lineups tonight:
#1: .694 (TEX) .649 (HOU)
#2: .842/.719
#3: .745/.737
#4: .931/.648
#5: .970/.766
#6: .703/.560
#7: .700/.650
#8: .675/.519
Yeah! No one on the Astros has a higher OPS than a corresponding lineup spot on the Rangers!
*Keppinger and Pence had the only multi-hit games. Keppinger's .289 batting average is the highest on the team. The Rangers have three hitters with a higher average than Keppinger.
*This is Pence's third multi-hit game in four. Good for him. Let's keep him around.
*Michael Bourn was 0x5 for the second time this season (Apr 28 is the first. With 4Ks). He was 0x5 five times in 2009.
Pitch Count Hero: Pence (2x4) - 23 pitches in four PAs.
Pitch Count Punk: Keppinger (2x4) - 7 pitches in four PAs.
Man of the Match: Gotta go to Pence.
Goat of the Game: Wandy. Get your crap together.
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
