Rangers Beat Indians

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ARLINGTON, Texas — Texas Rangers ace Yu Darvish didn’t have his shut-’em-down best stuff, but for once the Rangers’ bats picked him up.

Texas designated hitter Michael Choice hit the go-ahead solo home run in the bottom of the seventh as the Rangers snapped the Cleveland Indians’ six-game winning streak 6-4 on Friday at Globe Life Park.

Darvish scattered nine Indians hits while striking out eight. He gave up four runs and did not return to the game after getting out of the top of the seventh in a 4-4 tie. But Choice took care of him in the bottom half of that inning.

“I wasn’t really focused on whether or not Yu was going to come back out,” Choice said. “I was just focused on getting a good pitch and being aggressive at the plate. It was a fastball about middle of the way.”

Indians starter Trevor Bauer battled Darvish as both players overcame rough patches to work past the sixth inning. Bauer gave up four runs on five hits and two walks. He left with a no-decision as the

game was tied 4-4 with one out in the bottom of the seventh. Two batters after Bauer left, Cleveland reliever Marc Rzepczynski gave up Choice’s homer.

“You can yell and scream or you can choose to believe in your guys,” Cleveland manager Terry Francona said. “He’ll be fine.”

Texas added a run in the bottom of the eighth when shortstop Elvis Andrus scored on an Adrian Beltre sacrifice fly to center. Indians center fielder Michael Bourn caught Beltre’s fly out in shallow center and made an on-target throw, but Andrus slid around Cleveland catcher Yan Gomes’ tag.

It was the second time in the game that the Rangers narrowly beat a Gomes tag on what proved to be crucial plays at the plate. But Francona was not in the mood to talk about Gomes’ execution after neither play resulted in outs for the Indians.

“They beat ’em,” Francona said. “They were close plays. I don’t know what to tell you.”

Andrus singled with one out in the eighth to extend his hitting streak to all 38 games of his career against Cleveland. The hit came immediately after Andrus made a stellar play in the field in the top of the eighth. He fielded a hard grounder from Indians third baseman Mike Aviles with designated hitter Carlos Santana moving on the pitch. Andrus stepped on second to force out Santana, then stopped his throw, recovered from a collision with Santana and threw to first in time to get Aviles and end the inning.

Center fielder Leonys Martin drove in the first run of the Rangers’ four-run second inning with a sacrifice fly.

Texas catcher Chris Gimenez slid just under the tag of Gomes for the Rangers’ second run of the inning. Gimenez had been on second with a double when Choice singled to left. The throw from left fielder Michael Brantley was on time, but Gomes had to jump to catch it. Gomes still appeared to have time to get the out, but his tag near Gimenez’s knee was too late as Gimenez’s foot crossed the plate.

That would have been the third out of the inning, but the Rangers added two more runs in the frame to grab a 4-0 lead. Second baseman Rougned Odor smacked a two-run home run into the upper deck in right field with Choice on base.

“He’s a strong kid and he hit the ball pretty hard tonight,” Rangers manager Ron Washington said. “He went up there and sat on a first-pitch fastball in and got it.”

Cleveland made up for some of it in the top of the third when first baseman Lonnie Chisenhall blasted a full-count offering from Darvish off the foul-pole in right for a three-run home run, cutting the Texas lead to 4-3.

Then Indians shortstop Asdrubal Cabrera tied it in the fourth with a solo home run to almost the exact same spot as Chisenhall’s homer.

But Darvish kept fighting and seemed to get stronger after throwing his first 85 pitches of the night.

“I tell you what he did do is he kept us in the ball game,” Washington said. “He got through the seventh inning, and if you looked at it earlier you probably wouldn’t think he would get that far.”