Two words: Ug. Ly. 688 comments


 

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From the time he last started a major league game in July of 2013, Ross Detwiler anxiously waited a season and a half for his next major league start. It came last night in Oakland.

He was pitching on 540 days’ rest.

He could have used a few more.

He started out the first two innings looking like he was the first-round pick he actually was. In the end, though, he ended up confirming why he was the bullpen pitcher he has become.

Two innings was all he could really go.

In the third, fourth innings and fifth innings, thanks to his defense’s inability to make simple plays, and his own inability to keep the ball down in the strike zone, Detwiler allowed eight runs. Five of them earned. All of them count.

And the way Oakland’s Scott Kazmir was pitching, it might was well been a hundred runs he let in, because the Rangers were not coming back in this one.

What they did, though, was come back to Earth after Tuesday’s sharply played game followed Monday’s fiasco. They came back to Earth hard.

No runs scored.

Three hits.

Thirteen batters struck out, including four by Ryan Rua.

Four errors committed, two more by Elvis Andrus, who now has four in three games.

Ten runs allowed.

It was ugly.

In three games so far this season, the Rangers have just twelve hits and six errors. Ten singles and two doubles. Two RBIs and zero home runs. Given up twenty-one runs, scored three.

Ugly all around.

Oakland won 10-0 in game three of the four-game series.

Nick Martinez takes the mound this afternoon at 2:35 against Kendall Graveman, making his first ever major league start. He couldn’t have picked a better opportunity.