The Rangers played good enough to sweep the A’s, who came into this series hot. They did not sweep the A’s. The Rangers pen, which has been great, finally had a misstep today and gave up 3 runs Oakland. Even though losing an afternoon game to the A’s is not the end of the world, there are a few bad things that I take from today’s loss.
1. Mike Napoli and Josh Hamilton, among a few others, are not hitting well. It has gotten to the point that when Napoli comes to the plate I go refill my beverage of choice and come back to see the next batter. Josh is also in a major slump, but you just never know when he is going to jack one out of the park so I like to watch him.
2. We have a problem at first base. The Rangers hope Moreland is the answer, but he has had a up and down season and is not as good defensively as Chris Davis was. His bat is better, but not the kind of better that this organization really needs from the 1st base position. Look for the Rangers to maybe surprise everyone and get a power hitting first baseman at the trade deadline instead of a starting pitcher.
3. Colby Lewis likes to give up the homerun ball. Not literally, of course, but you can count on the fact that Colby is going to give up at least one home run ball per start. Overall he looked pretty good today, but the Rangers need to find ways to score more, and soon.
I still think you are watching the team favored to win the AL for the third straight season. Lets hope I am right and the problems get sorted out very soon so we can go back to watching dominating baseball.
