Thursday morning Rangers things

This is the fifth straight postseason series in which the Rangers have lost Game 1.  I don't know what that means, really, other than the Rangers have won three of the previous four series where that happened, and so they certainly can still win this series.*

*  Oh, yeah, they won Game 1 against Detroit.  Nevermind the intro, then.

This was a frustrating game last night.  Texas only had eight baserunners all game.  C.J. Wilson had another middling performance, which resulted in some Rangers fans proclaiming him a choker, a guy who can't perform when the pressure is on, someone they can't wait to see leave the organization, which is ridiculous.  But you aren't going to win many games when you only score 2 runs, regardless of who you have pitching.

The two particularly controversial moments were Esteban German hitting for Alexi Ogando with two on and two out and Adrian Beltre being called out on a foul ball off his foot.  The first of those was a questionable decision by Ron Washington, the second a clearly blown call by the umpires.  My guess on the German pinch hit is that Washington expected LaRussa to go to a righthander, at which point he'd replace German with either Endy Chavez or Mitch Moreland, and he didn't want to waste Torrealba on a sequence that would result in him not hitting.  Or else he just preferred German in that situation than Torrealba.  

Either way, if Torrealba hits instead of German, he's not much more likely, if any more likely, to get on base.  And if the Beltre call is made correctly, Beltre is still more likely than not to get on base, as well.  So those moves probably didn't matter.

But they might have.

And as a separate matter, there are a few people who have complained about Craig Gentry hitting for David Murphy in the seventh.  David Murphy can't hit lefties.  There's no reason to let him hit against a lefthander in that situation, period.

Jeff Wilson's game story talks about the bats falling short.

T.R. Sullivan's game story touches on the Rangers' struggling with runners in scoring position, going 0 for 5 in those situations.

Richard Durrett has his reactions to last night's game.

Anthony Andro writes that Ron Washington's moves last night backfired.

Jeff Caplan writes that C.J. didn't get the win last night, didn't pitch particularly well, and didn't get much support from the offense.

Joey Matches offers his thoughts on last night's 3-2 loss.

Jeff Sullivan has some thoughts on Game 1 -- and in particular, on C.J. Wilson and the Adrian Beltre 9th inning thing -- that are worth checking out.

Andro offers five thoughts on last night's game.

Durrett talks about the decision to have Esteban German hit for Alexi Ogando instead of Yorvit Torrealba.  He points out that Torrealba is hitless against lefties in the postseason and hasn't hit well with runners in scoring position, although I don't think either fact is particularly meaningful in this situation.

Gil Lebreton says last night looked a lot like the 2010 World Series.

Randy Galloway writes that the Cardinal bullpen outperformed the Ranger bullpen.

Evan Grant writes that C.J. Wilson's post-season struggles may make the Rangers think twice about re-signing him.

The S-T's notes talk about Dirk Nowitzki throwing out the first pitch for Game 3, Cruz moving up in the lineup, and the Rangers' roster moves for the World Series.