Thoughts on a 5-3 Rangers win

Rangers 5, Orioles 3

• The Rangers won again. That is fun to type.
• Another Quality Start for a Ranger starting pitcher. Their #5 starter, Andrew Heaney, had a shutout going into the seventh before allowing an Austin Hays solo shot, the only run Heaney allowed.
• Interestingly, Heaney wasn’t missing bats — he had just three Ks, and just five swings and misses out of 95 pitches. But he walked just one batter and while allowing four hits and hitting a batter. While he normally relies mostly on his fastball and slider, he went change up heavy on Saturday — 30 of his 95 pitches were change ups, with 50 fastballs and just 15 sliders.
• This is only the second time this year Heaney has gone more than six innings, and his seven inning outing is the deepest he has gone into a game this year. That said, the three hardest hit balls of the game for Baltimore all came in the seventh, so may have been running out of gas then.
• Brock Burke pitched the eighth and needed just nine pitches, and I was thinking that with a four run lead he might go back out for the ninth. Instead, Bruce Bochy went with Will Smith to finish things out. That almost turned out very badly.
• The first two batters of the ninth made loud outs — both were 100+ mph EV fly outs with xBAs over .500. Having dodged those two bullets, it appeared that Smith was going to have a 1-2-3 inning when he caught Austin Hays looking at a 3-2 fastball at the bottom of the zone. The umpire called it ball four, though, and Hays went to first.
• The O’s followed it up with back-to-back hard hit doubles, resulting in two runs scoring and the tying run coming to the plate in the form of James McCann. Smith did not seem to have it, the O’s were hitting rockets off of him, and thinks we’re getting sweaty.
• Bruce Bochy responded to the crisis by getting Josh Sborz warming in the bullpen. I’m sure that made everyone feel better.
• Smith, however, got it together and struck out McCann on three pitches. Game over, bootyholes unclench, everyone is happy.
• The Rangers decided that scoring a bunch of runs in one inning was played out and so scattered their five runs over four different innings.
• Jonah Heim got two days off by virtue of Thursday being an off day and Sandy Leon playing Friday. Heim had been slumping but showed signs of life on Saturday with a pair of hits.
• Leody Taveras and Marcus Semien also had two hits apiece.
• Adolis Garcia had a single and a walk, but his most noticeable play was in the bottom of the third. The inning started with an HBP and then a GIDP. James McCann then lofted a high pop fly down the line into deep left. Josh Smith…I’m not sure how to explain what Smith did on the play. It looked like he could have made a play on the ball near the wall, but kind of stopped and looked unsure as to what to do, and the ball hit off the wall and McCann had a double.
• An Adam Frazier single to right should have put runners on the corners with two outs, but for unfathomable reasons, the Orioles third base coach sent McCann home. Sent him home, mind you, despite the fact McCann was still three steps away from third base when Adolis fielded the ball in shallow right field. Adolis looked confused at first that a catcher was trying this shit with him, then threw home. It wasn’t a great throw, but it was there way before McCann. Heim turned and basically tapped his foot waiting for McCann to go ahead and slide towards home so Jonah could tag him out.
• Truly a baffling send.
• Heaney retired 12 of the next 13 after that, the Hays homer being the lone exception.
• So there you go. Run on Adolis and it just makes the pitcher better.
• Andrew Heaney topped out at 95.3 mph. Brock Burke’s fastball hit 97.0 mph. Will Smith reached 94.0 mph with his fastball.
• Corey Seager had exit velocities of 108.5, 106.7, 105.7 and 104.4 mph, and had just one single to show for it. Adolis Garcia had a 111.0 mph single. Leody Taveras had a 108.6 mph single and a 102.3 mph double. Marcus Semien had a 102.4 mph groundout. Josh Jung had a 101.5 mph double. Jonah Heim had a 101.1 mph single. Robbie Grossman had a 101.0 mph lineout.
• Cody Bradford looks to pitch the Rangers to a series sweep on Sunday. Everyone send positive mojo thoughts to Bradford overnight.