27-17 - Rangers cruise to 7-2 series-opening win over Colorado

The Texas Rangers scored seven runs while the Colorado Rockies scored two runs.

One way to high leverage bullpen-proof your baseball games is to just score a bunch of runs and have the starter go deep in the game.

That’s what Texas accomplished tonight as they scored five runs in the 4th and two more in the 5th while Martin Perez bounced back from a troublesome pair of outings on the West Coast with seven innings of two-run ball on seven hits with zero walks and seven strikeouts.

For a minute there, it didn’t look like the Rangers were going to score enough to prevent nervous moments in the later frames as, through the first time through the order, debuting Rockies hurler Karl Kauffmann held them in check.

Texas figured out the righty on their second look at him with newly minted AL home run leader Adolis Garcia hitting his third dong in the last three games, a two-run shot, that kicked off the scoring. An inning later, the Rangers batted around to all but put the game to bed.

The win gets Texas even on their homestand and returns them to ten games above .500.

Player of the Game: There was a lot of good stuff tonight in addition to El Bombi and Perez. Corey Seager doubled in a couple of runs, Zeke Duran had three hits, a walk, and a stolen base, and a bullpen tandem of Joe Barlow and Jose Leclerc tossed two scoreless innings from the reviled ‘pen.

Josh Jung going 2-for-3 with two RBI and walk and a run scored should be highlighted, however. After struggling a bit on the road trip, and getting the evening off last Wednesday, it was nice to see Jung bounce back with a productive night in the opener.

Up Next: More Rangers and Rockies with RHP Jon Gray next up for Texas against LHP Kyle Freeland for Colorado.

The Saturday afternoon first pitch from The Shed is scheduled for 3:05 pm CT and can be viewed on BS Southwest.