Rangers Lose In 10

{fshare id=5277}

ANAHEIM, Calif. — Starting pitchers Jered Weaver and Nick Martinez were so good Saturday night, they effectively canceled each other out, leaving the fate of the game between the Los Angeles Angels and Texas Rangers to their respective bullpens.

That matchup went to the Angels, who won the game on second baseman Howie Kendrick’s RBI double, scoring left fielder Josh Hamilton in the bottom of the 10th inning for a 3-2 win at Angel Stadium.

With Hamilton running on the full-count pitch, Kendrick laced a pitch from Rangers right-hander Jason Frasor into the left-center-field gap to score Hamilton easily.

Early in his at-bat, Kendrick got the sign to bunt, but fouled it off. He also fouled off a hit-and-run attempt before working the count full.

“It’s getting more and more fun,” Kendrick said of performing in key situations. “The younger you are, the more pressure you put on yourself. The more experience you get, you just try to have a good at-bat and let it happen.”

The veteran right-hander Weaver seemed to have won the battle against the rookie right-hander Martinez after the Angels took a 2-1 lead into the ninth inning. But right-hander Kevin Jepsen, the Angels’ closer du jour, gave up a game-tying homer on his second pitch to left fielder Shin-Soo Choo.

Ernesto Frieri had been the Angels’ closer most of the season, but he has

struggled lately, including allowing a walk-off grand slam to Cleveland’s Nick Swisher on Thursday. Right-hander Joe Smith had pitched in each of the previous two games and was not available.

Angels right-hander Mike Morin (1-1) pitched a scoreless 10th inning to earn the victory.

Martinez was perfect through five innings and wound up throwing a career-high seven-plus innings. But a home run by designated hitter C.J. Cron leading off the eighth inning snapped a 1-1 tie. And when catcher Hank Conger followed with a single, Martinez was finished for the night.

“I thought he was great,” Rangers manager Ron Washington said of Martinez. “He was moving the ball around. He never gave them too many pitches in the same spot consecutively. He used his changeup well, spotted his curveball, spotted his fastball. He was good.”

Martinez gave up two runs and three hits in his seven innings, striking out three and walking one.

Weaver gave up a first-inning run but nothing more through eight innings. He allowed four hits and struck out five, making an adjustment in the process.

“Something clicked there toward the end of the game,” Weaver said. “I’m not a big video guy, but I just compared myself from my last start to 2011 (when he went 18-8) and made a minor adjustment and everything went good.”

The Angels didn’t have a baserunner until Conger led off the sixth with a double to left. Conger took third on third baseman David Freese’s groundout, then scored on a groundout by first baseman Efren Navarro to tie the game at 1.

Conger admitted he was a “little bit” concerned about being no-hit through five.

“There was about as much offense as the World Cup,” he joked.

The only other Angel to reach base through seven innings was Hamilton, who walked with two out in the seventh. Martinez had made just 86 pitches through seven innings.

But in the eighth, Cron came up with what seemed would be the decisive hit of the night — his fifth homer of the year. It came only hours after the club released veteran Raul Ibanez, a move made so Cron could get more at-bats. Cron had been playing primarily against left-handed pitchers, even though he was hitting better vs. right-handers (.321 to .245).

The Rangers had two players ejected in the game, both for arguing balls and strikes with plate umpire Vic Carapazza. Designated hitter Alex Rios was unhappy with a called strike against him in the fourth inning. He eventually grounded into a double play to end the inning, then was kicked out between innings.

In the 10th, right fielder Michael Choice was called out on strikes, then approached Carapazza, who swiftly threw Choice out.

“He’s got a quick trigger finger, he needs to settle down a little bit,” Washington said of Carapazza. “This is the big leagues, there’s going to be some tension flying around and he has to be able to deal with some of that. People are out there competing.

“He’s got to have some patience, it’s ridiculous. He seemed to think you can’t say anything about the strike zone. I don’t know if that’s written in the umpires’ rules when they teach these guys to be umpires, but he’s taken it to another level.”

Share and Enjoy !

Shares