Martin again.


Marcus Semien hits one of four Rangers homers to back Martin Perez in a 7-0 victory over the Phillies.

It was a dream, right? 

It wasn’t real, right?

Martin Perez’s career had always been punctuated by stretches of brilliance wrapped around far too many longer stretches of frustration.

So, this stretch of brilliance we were seeing from Perez earlier on wasn’t sustainable, right? It was just Martin being Martin before Martin became the real Martin. Right?

Then he had that outing in Chicago where the White Sox scored seven runs of him. He gave us twelve hits. He didn’t have his command. 

And, Rangers fan were waiting for the bubble to burst. Ah, that was it. That game was going to bring Perez back down to Earth.

Nope.

He followed that up with one earned run in seven innings against Detroit. Then, last night, he was even more brilliant. Six shutout innings against a recently ignited Phillies team that had gone 15-3 under new manager Rob Thomson. 

This Phillies team came in hot. They got doused with some ice-cold Martin Perez water. Perez dropped his ERA below 2.00 once again, settling at 1.96 after his six innings of work. 

Philadelphia had its chances. The got at least one runner on in every inning. Two in the first, fifth, and sixth. But Perez kept them from touching home. And he kept his remarkable season alive.

It certainly helped that the Rangers bats came alive, especially with four runs in the eighth, to coast to a 7-0 victory. 

Martin Perez has been unreal.

*****