A lonestar in california

Well, the bad news is, they did again: the Rangers could not break out the brooms against the Houston Astros. That’s the bad news. The good news is, that doesn’t affect the fact that the Rangers have still won 7 straight series, and are still hovering around .500, at 22-23. IT wasn’t exactly a shameful loss either, as the Rangers did their best to try and pull off a late-inning miracle, and went from being shut out on 2 hits through the first 6 innings to making the Astros sweat out a 5-4 ballgame.

Simply put, Houston starter Brandon Backe was dominant through the first 6 innings, allowing just two hits in the 4th inning, while walking nobody and striking out 5. Meanwhile, the Astro offense gave him some support in the 4th and 5th innings, tagging Kason Gabbard for a total of 5 runs.

The Rangers did have a rally against Backe with those 2 hits in the fourth, after back-to-back singles by Ian Kinsler and Frank Catalanottoput runners on the corners with nobody out. But Kinsler ran the Rangers out of the inning when he decided to try and tag an score on Michael Youngs popup to Kaz Matsui in shallow RF. Kinsler was out by a mile at the plate, and the rally was killed, as Milton Bradley struck out to end the inning. That gaffe may have cost the Rangers the game, as they would rally in the 7th inning, and came within a run of tying the game.

The Rangers have not been shut out yet this season, and for all Backe’s brilliance through the first 6 frames, he would not be the first opposing pitcher to accomplish that feat. After a one-out single by Michael Young, Milton Bradley and David Murphy teed off back-to-back homers to cut the lead to 5-3. Doug Brocail had to come on and bail Backe out of the inning, and the Rangers would tack on another run off him (and Houston closer Jose Valverde) in the 8th to make it 5-4.

But the Rangers couldn’t get it done in the 9th. Although they got the tying run to the plate after Gerald Laird singled with 2 out, Valverde struck out the side, getting Brandon Boggs swinging to end the game.

Overall though, despite the fact that Kason Gabbard had probably his worst outing of the season, the Rangers can still chalk up this as a productive game, and head into this upcoming 10 game road trip with their heads held high. As Ron Washington put it:

 ”We played the hottest team in baseball and took the first two, and they had to fight for the third,” Washington said. “We played good baseball.”

Now for the big news of the day: Hank Blalock is going to convert from third to first base. Apparently, this is something Hank himself has volunteered to do, as the Rangers are apparently not happy with the Frank Catalanotto/Chris Shelton platoon the currently are going with. This is going to be a permanent thing according to Hank, although Ron Washington has left the possibility of using Hank at third in a pinch open.

“I’m not doing anything to benefit myself here,” Blalock said. “It’s a new position for me, so I’m not sure how I’ll do over there. Just watching the guys and how well we were playing, it crossed my mind.”

This move will take affect immediately once Blalock comes off the DL (which could be later this week against Cleveland), after he has spent some time working out at first base out in extended spring training in Arizona. For the immediate short term, it will leave Ramon Vazquez and German Duran platooning as the regular third basemen (as they are currently doing right now) but one would expect that sooner or later, Travis Metcalf will take over the inteirm at third once the Rangers think he has seen enough time in AAA after returning from surgery to repair a torn hamstring muscle.

Long term, this suggests many ramifacations: for one thing, it opens up third base for Michael Young, whose move from shortstop is inevitable – I can see Young moving to third as soon as later this year, if the Rangers can find somebody (such as Joaquin Arias) to plug the SS hole until Elvis Andrus arrives. For another, it also makes one think that Blalock may be on his way out the door - power prospect Chris Davis should take over the first base position by next year, and Hank is only under contract through 2009 (the ‘09 year is actually a team option) which means that sooner or later, Hank will wind up trade fodder or at DH. In the meanwhile, all Hank will do is play stopgap at a position that the Rangers have only gotten a 618 OPS out of in 2008.

Personally, I gotta say this move surprised the hell out of me, and I think it may be a little rash – for example, it throws a huge wrench into the bench situation – it means either Frank Catalanotto or Chris Shelton has to go now. Catalanotto is a left-handed bat, which the Rangers don’t need another of on the bench, but his contract makes it hard to just release him. Shelton would be the better fit from the standpoint that he’s right-handed, and is a better defender at first base that Cat, but he’s the expendable contract - that’s a tough situation for the Rangers right there, unless they have a trade lined up for Catalanotto. It also pretty much seals Hanks fate as trade bait (I doubt the Rangers are going to resign him just to DH), but more importantly opens up somewhat of a vacuum for quality options at third base. The Rangers are now dependent on either a trio of sub-par replacement-level players, or a guy who has never played 3rd before in his career at third (Vazquez, Duran, Metcalf, or Young). Meanwhile, the only real quality third base prospect in the Rangers system in currently Johnny Whittleman, and he’s still in high-A, a couple years yet away from the majors.

If it where me, I probably would have just stuck it out with Cat and Shelton platooning at first. I don’t really see the immediate need to start generating uber-offense again from first base. Granted, first base is the worst position on the team production-wise, but since we’re just waiting on Chris Davis… who cares? Perhaps that’s the thing that really scares me about this – it seems like the kind of move a contending team would make. Granted we’re on quite a tear lately, but that’s no reason to deviate from the plan, and block any prospects (like Davis). I just hope the Rangers aren’t beginning to fool themselves about contending too soon again.

Other news: Matt Harrison, the third wheel prospect from the Mark Teixeira trade, threw a 7-inning no-hitter yesterday for the Frisco Roughriders. Good, right? Well, sort of – the only problem was, in those 7 innings, he walked 6 and threw 120 pitches, which seems a little excessive to me, especially considering Harrison just came off the disabled list a short time ago from a sore shoulder. This is AA here, not the Majors - irregardless of whatever morale boost this may give Harrison, I think it would be better not to run one of your elite prospects ragged, and save the no-hitters for when he reaches the majors.

This appears to perhaps be the latest product of Nolan Ryan’s statements this year regarding pitch counts. He wants pitchers to go deeper into games, and judging by this recent quote from Kasey Kiker (who pitches for the Rangers high-A Bakersfield Blaze), it applies to the prospects in the minors as well as the Rangers Major League pitchers. And that worries me. Developing pitchers can be a delicate thing – you can’t afford to chance blowing out their arms just because you and Bert Blyleven threw 120 pitches every time out way back in 1989. I respect Nolan, but this is one aspect of player development that he needs to either keep his nose out of, or get with the times – it’s flat-out not good for elite prospects to be throwing 120 pitches, I don’t care if they are pitching no-hitters.

Hopefully this outing by Harrison will be an isolated incident, and I’m just overreacting here, but the evidence I’m seeing right now regarding the workloads Nolan Ryan seemingly wants to put our minor league pitchers on concerns me greatly.

As mentioned above, the Rangers now hit the road for a long 10 game road trip. Two of the three upcoming series will even be played on the artificial turf in the domes of Minnesota and Tampa Bay, making it all the more grueling on the players. First the Rangers will play a four-game set with the Twins – that kicks off today, with Scott Feldman squaring off against Boof Bonser.

And finally, something slightly (okay, waaay) OT: I’d like to send a congrats out to my favorite music artist (and admitted crush) Miranda Lambert, who won the Country Album of the Year award at the ACM’s yesterday. Congrats, Ran – it’s about damn time they finally gave you a big award like that.