September

I had my pick of four games to attend a few weeks ago. I randomly chose Monday night against the Pirates solely because I wanted to watch Andrew McCutchen play. Three consecutive series losses to the Twins, Athletics and Angels coupled with football starting back up made me actually forget I was going to watch two really good teams battle it out until yesterday.

I was able to successfully distract myself for most of the day with work, but the excitement of seeing Yu Darvish in person for the first time (I seem to always just miss his turn in the rotation) take on Gerrit Cole in a bona fide pitching duel started reaching a boiling point around mid-afternoon.

Add to it that the Rangers sat a game and half behind the idle A’s on Monday with the final Oakland-Texas series of the year looming this weekend in Arlington, and this game was taking on a whole different level of importance.

Oh, and factor in that every time Yu Darvish takes the mound, a no-hitter is a legitimate possibility.

Plus, it was going to be nice to see Marlon Byrd play at the Ballpark again. He was always a fun Ranger to watch in the years before we started playing games in October.

So naturally, given my luck, Darvish gives up a hit to McCutchen before I’m even in my seat. But, he then proceeded to give up one run on three more hits, one walk and six strikeouts over seven very efficient innings.

From 1998 to 2012, the Rangers had lost 1 game by a score of 1-0. They have now lost two such games in 2013. Yu Darvish has started both games.

The narratives by the local beats tomorrow will most likely involve, if not entirely consist of, Darvish needing to and failing to lock it down late in a close game where his team needed him to be great. What they will most likely fail to note is that Darvish WAS great, and he was much, much better than he should have needed to be.

Cole was great tonight, and he deserves credit. He gave up three hits and 2 walks compared to nine strikeouts in the same seven innings.

But when this team gets into a rut, it seems that the entire lineup forgets how to work the count and hit.

And that’s dangerous when that grab bag of clowns in Oakland wins eight out of ten this late in the season. 

I feel bad for Yu as he has to put up with the media absurdity he’s had to put up with this summer. He deserves better. But mostly I feel sad about watching this team unravel in the month of September for the second time in two years.

Beat Bama this weekend, Farmers.