It’s ironic that the Little League World Series is going on. The Rangers won yesterday only because of a Little League home run.
With two on and a tenuous 1-0 lead in the seventh, Delino DeShields hit a harmless slow ground ball single to Jose Bautista in right that would have loaded the bases. Bobby Wilson had already been stopped at third.
But somehow, the ball got past Bautista and rolled deep into the outfield.
Wilson scored. Hanser Alberto, who had been at first, scored. Even Delino DeShields, who hit the ball, motored all the way around the bases to score.
After pounding Rangers pitching into submission the first two games, Toronto bats were held in check by Yovani Gallardo, who, in his eleventh game in a row without getting past the sixth inning, lowered his ERA to 3.15. Remember all that talk about him having a National League ERA of 3.69 when he came to the Rangers, and how in the American League that would balloon?
In the end, the Rangers salvaged one game of this three-gamer in which they looked very much like the bad Little League team in the previous two, giving up eleven walks in the second game, and throwing away the victory in the first game.
But yesterday, the boys from Team USA beat the boys from Team Canada, 4-1. Their parents took them for ice cream and sodas after the game.