Thoughts on a 4-1 Rangers win

Rangers 4, Red Sox 1

• Kyle Gibson continues to baffle and amaze.
• I’m not even sure what to say about Kyle Gibson at this point. I mean, we did the hoo-haws over the fact that he was another non-descript pitcher who got a three year deal from the Rangers, so obviously he would be great. And last year, when Gibson was struggling, I kept pointing out that Lance Lynn and Mike Minor had issues early on — in the case of Minor, to the point people were saying pull the plug on the starting experiment and just stick him in the bullpen a month or two into his stint with the Rangers.
• Gibson wasn’t perfect yesterday — he issued three walks, all in the first two innings, the first time he’s issued that many walks in a game since that bad Opening Day start. But he also allowed just one hit through the first five innings, allowing the Red Sox on the board only in the sixth when Alex Verdugo led off the inning with a double, and then Rafael Devers had a two out double to bring him home. Gibson got the final out and then was done for the day at 98 pitches.
• Final line: 6 IP, 3 hits, 3 walks, 4 Ks, 1 run allowed. Gibson now has a 2.16 ERA on the season, and since that disaster start Opening Day, he has a 0.82 ERA in 33 innings pitched. The expected stats aren’t quite as good, but they are still quite good — his xERA is a 2.96, per Statcast, rather than the actual 2.16, and I think we all would be pleased if Gibson had a 2.96 ERA this year.
• John King continued his curiously strong month of April, with a 1-2-3 7th inning, lowering his ERA to 1.35. Joely Rodriguez and Ian Kennedy had perfect innings as well, nailing down the win for Texas.
• The Rangers got on the board with their first run in the fourth. Joey Gallo doubled the other field, and when the ball was finally tracked down in left, there was no one at third base. Three Red Sox fielders all seemed to realize that at the same time and ran towards third, while Alex Verdugo threw the ball in towards the general direction of third base. It was so far off line towards the infield no one could track the throw down, allowing Gallo to advance to third, putting him in position to score on Adolis Garcia’s sac fly.
• The Rangers got a bit fortunate in the bottom of the sixth to get on the board again. A routine grounder by Adolis to Xander Bogaerts at shortstop was booted by Bogaerts. Martin Perez got Nate Lowe for the second out and was lifted for Hirokazu Sawamura, who Jose Trevino took deep for a two run home run. The final run of the game came on an Isiah Kiner-Falefa home run to straightaway center in the seventh, something I still haven’t stopped finding surprising.
• Kyle Gibson hit 95.0 yesterday, as well as 94.9 a handful of times. Ian Kennedy also touched 94.9 a couple of times and 94.8 a couple of times. Joely Rodriguez maxed out at 94.4 mph, while John King hit 92.6 mph with his sinker.
• Isiah Kiner-Falefa’s home run was 103.0 mph off the bat, while Jose Trevino’s was 101.9 mph. Charlie Culberson had the hardest hit ball of the day for the Rangers, at 105.3 mph, with Adolis Garcia’s sacrifice fly coming in at 104.2 mph. David Dahl had a ground out at 103.2 mph.
• That was a very nice win. I liked that game. Let’s see some more of those.