The Weekend Buzz while you were donning your fake ears, or whatever it is you do when you see Star Trek. ...
1. Rangers in the night: The only thing more surprising than Angels starter John Lackey being ejected just two pitches into his 2009 debut on Saturday in Arlington was that Texas second baseman Ian Kinsler didn't figure out a way to smash a homer on Lackey's first pitch, which was behind Kinsler.
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| Starter Brandon McCarthy, acquired from the White Sox in '06, owns a 3-1 record this season with the Rangers. (Getty Images) |
"Sweep, sweep, sweep!" roared the crowd of 37,146.
"Just awesome," Washington said when it was finished.
Whereupon looking at Sunday's pitching line and seeing (Feldman) listed after Texas once would have elicited madcap visions of Marty Feldman as Igor in Young Frankenstein, we all know with today's Rangers it means Scott Feldman, the club's 30th-round pick in the 2003 draft, who is 2-0 and lowered his ERA to 4.04 with six shutout innings.
Feldman is part of what has been a sensational rotation, and when did you ever think you would hear that description in Texas? Rangers pitchers getting blown up long has been one of the game's most cherished traditions, like the seventh-inning stretch or hopping over the third-base line for good luck.
No more. Get this: Texas starters have compiled a 3.14 ERA over their past 22 games to climb to fifth in the AL (4.37 heading into Sunday). Texas starters have quality starts (six innings or more, three or fewer runs) in eight of their past nine games and in 10 of their past 12. Kevin Millwood, Vicente Padilla, Feldman, Brandon McCarthy (acquired from the White Sox in December 2006) and Matt Harrison (acquired from Atlanta in the 2007 Mark Teixeira trade) have worked at least five innings in 22 of their past 23 starts -- and in 34 of 37 this season.
Now, we've seen this in stretches before: Between April 25 and Aug. 5 last season, the Rangers went 53-38, the third-best record in the majors during that span. But Texas' overall 5.37 ERA was the majors' worst, and so was the club's .978 fielding percentage (this year, their .986 ranked tied for third in the AL on Sunday). For a decade or more, the Rangers haven't been able to get out of the way of their own inadequate pitching.
President and Hall of Famer Nolan Ryan laid down the gauntlet before spring camp started, demanding that his starters toughen up, be more aggressive and pitch deeper into games. While it's still way too early to credit Ryan and new pitching coach Mike Maddux as miracle workers, the consistency with which the Rangers have been pounding the strike zone (tied for fifth among AL rotations for fewest walks heading into Sunday) and the consistency with which they've been pitching deep into games has been impressive.
Their 3.13 May ERA is best in the majors.
Meantime, in the what's fair is fair department, it should be noted that over in Detroit on Sunday, former Ranger Armando Galarraga did not make it out of the first inning, surrendering four hits and five runs while walking three. Last year, as Galarraga was winning 13 games for the Tigers while Texas' pitching struggled, he was being held up as just one more example of Texas general manager Jon Daniels' failures.
This isn't to say that Galarraga won't come back strong or that the Rangers' current pitching success will continue to this magnitude. Things change in this game, and they've seen plenty of that in Arlington.
But with Texas (23-14) currently owning the AL's second-best record behind Toronto (26-14), and tied for third-best in the majors, its pitching is at least to the point where it has a chance to continue to flourish.
We know Kinsler and Co. will get the job done. The Rangers currently are second in the AL with 206 runs scored, and they led the league with a .496 slugging percentage before Sunday. Even with a pitch here and there being thrown behind them.
2. Rays bat pitcher third, beat Cleveland: Friday night, Tampa Bay rallied from a seven-run deficit, the largest game-winning rally in club history. Then, the Rays thumped the Indians again on Saturday.
So while most figured the Rays simply made a mistake when they turned in a lineup card that listed two third baseman (Ben Zobrist and Evan Longoria) on Sunday and cost them a designated hitter, thus forcing pitcher Andy Sonnanstine to bat third (and Longoria to the bench), maybe it simply was Tampa Bay's way of spotting Cleveland a head start in an effort to level the playing field.
A sporting chance? The Indians' bullpen is a fiasco. As such, they promoted pitchers David Huff and Greg Aquino from Triple-A Columbus on Sunday and demoted Tony Sipp and Masa Kobayashi.
"We've got to pitch," manager Eric Wedge said following Friday's disheartening 8-7 loss. "Hell, it was 9-0 Thursday and we barely won. Tonight we're up 7-0 and lose the ballgame.
"At some point in time, these guys have got to look in the mirror. It's not their stuff. Their stuff is fine. But they've got to concentrate and pitch to spots. You can't miss by a foot-and-a-half when you're trying to throw the baseball. ... It's ridiculous."
3. Dodgers' Clayton Kershaw takes no-hitter into eighth inning: Doorbell rings. Florida Marlins: "Who is it?" Kershaw (mumbling): "Land shark." Marlins: "Sorry, nobody's home." Kershaw: "Um, mailgram." Marlins: "Oh, OK." Door opens. "Aaahhhhhhhhhhh!" Yes, it only took a few days at Land Shark Stadium for the silly Marlins to fall victim to the oldest Saturday Night Live trick in the book.
4. Raul Ibanez: Phillies' new outfielder slams three homers and collects seven RBI in Saturday's doubleheader sweep over the Nationals. He's even catching most balls hit his way. In a related development, old Pat Burrell bobblehead dolls are now worth less than AIG stock.
5. (Slam-)Dancing in the Streets: To kick off a weekend sweep of Oakland, Detroit got two grand slams in a game Friday (Ryan Raburn and Brandon Inge) for the first time since Jim Northrup did it on June 24, 1968. Difference? Northrop's slams helped Denny McLain win his 13th in a 31-win season. Friday starter Edwin Jackson might win 31 games, but we know he's not going to take his organ-playing act to Las Vegas.
6. Phillies feted by President Obama at White House: World champs were honored Friday. It was going so well, too, until someone discovered a memo from Dick Cheney advising waterboarding and forced nudity for the Tampa Bay Rays. Nancy Pelosi says she didn't know anything about it, adding that she has never even heard of the Rays.
7. Commissioner Bud Selig delivers commencement address at University of Wisconsin: But graduates from the science department were not invited, and the word "steroids" was not mentioned.
8. Big Papi sits in Seattle: Boston manager Terry Francona opened the door for all kinds of bad Sleepless in Seattle jokes when he said he knew David Ortiz's horrific start was getting to him Friday because "it looked like he had been fighting with his pillow." Coincidentally, that's sort of what it looked like when Ortiz was going 0-for-7 with three strikeouts Thursday in Anaheim. Now he's up to 157 plate appearances without a homer. When he was at a mere 142 last week, he joked about Alex Rodriguez homering in his first at-bat of the season. "He showed me up," Ortiz said. "OK, so that's how you're going to do it." At this point, that Johan Santana matchup Friday when the Mets come to Fenway Park is looking like a replay of the Impossible Dream.
9. Manny Ramirez apologizes to teammates: He spoke in a private gathering at the Dodgers' team hotel in Miami on Friday. Many players said aw, he really needn't have apologized. The hotel staff would have appreciated it, though, if Manny had picked up the syringes that fell from his pocket on his way out.
10. Beat Generation pioneer Jack Kerouac played early form of Fantasy baseball: According to the new book Kerouac at Bat: Fantasy Baseball and the King of the Beats, he obsessively played a Fantasy baseball game of his own invention. He invented teams (Boston Fords, New York Chevvies) and wrote about them, even covering financial news and contract disputes. What's next? Allen Ginsberg's Howl was based on Don Larson's perfect game in the 1956 World Series?
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